A few weeks ago the BNA assigned to Payment Service Provider license to Unitel, one of the important steps to advance the implementation of mobile payment services.
But, for the full functioning of the Mobile and Instant Transfer System (STMI), some pieces of the puzzle were missing… Now, the official announcement of the BNA appears, realizing that another key point of the process has also been completed: the choice of the “Integrating Entity” for the processing of mobile payments, since the BNA assumes that several operators will be willing to implement Mobile Money ... Unitel is just one of them.
The integrating entity chosen was EMIS (Interbank Services Company), after a public tender initiated in April 2020.
The BNA provided more details in the official communication, which you can readtegra below:
One of the main objectives of the National Plan for Financial Inclusion is to increase access by the non-bank population to financial services, that is, financial inclusion. One of the ways to increase financial inclusion is through the implementation of a Mobile and Instant Transfer System (STMI), commonly known as mobile payments or mobile money. It is an ecosystem where, in addition to the regulator (Banco Nacional de Angola), payment service providers and clearinghouse operators will also be part. On 20 October this year, the National Bank of Angola (BNA) authorized the subsidiary of a telecommunications company to provide payment services. In addition to this, currently, we have in our possession and under analysis several processes for requesting payment service provider licenses, from start-ups. All of these entities, once licensed, will integrate the ecosystem of mobile and instant transfers.
The successful implementation of the STMI ecosystem presupposes not only the existence of several companies that complement each other in offering financial solutions, but also two fundamental instruments: an interoperability platform and a clearinghouse. These will allow all members of the STMI to not only communicate with each other but also carry out financial transactions, similar to what exists today with the Multicaixa subsystem.
The existence of a new payment infrastructure - STMI - requires an operator. In order to identify an operator for the interoperability platform and the clearinghouse, Banco Nacional de Angola started a consultation with the local and international market, on April 24, 2020.
After receiving 53 (fifty-three) responses from entities that wished to operate the interoperability platform and the clearinghouse, the BNA analyzed them, having concluded this process on 21 October this year. On the same day, the BNA Board of Directors decided that, given its technical capacity, experience and knowledge of the local market, the Empresa Interbancária de Serviços (EMIS) is the one with the best conditions to operate the interoperability platform and the compensation.
Banco Nacional de Angola, Empresa Interbancária de Serviços and the other stakeholders of the Angolan payment system will work together so that, during the year of 2021, the STMI infrastructure is completed allowing full interoperability between payment service providers mobile and snapshots.
In fact what many of the Angolans are expecting from this EMIS is that she does something that allows us to shop on foreign websites, for me and I believe that for many Angolans this will also be the biggest technological invention of the moment in Angola.