Nigeria-based payments infrastructure Kora has announced the launch of USD card-acquiring in Africa, looking to enable merchants on its platform to accept payments in USD. As per the information detailed in the press release, Kora’s Payin service gives merchants the option to receive customer payments leveraging various popular payment methods, including mobile money, bank transfers, and cards.

The launch of USD card-acquiring marks the most recent addition to the company’s suite of currencies which includes NGN bank account issuing, payins, payouts, and cross-border settlement across a multitude of countries. USD-card acquiring and what it means for Kora’s merchants When commenting on the launch of the product, the Head of Product at Kora, Sandra Israel-Ovirih advised that the company has had the incorporation of USD card payments as a priority for a while, as it has an understanding of the fact that a multitude of businesses operate in a global marketplace and have a need for a seamless payment system to handle cross-border transactions. As per the spokesperson’s statement, the launch of the product is believed to become a ‘game changer’ for African businesses that are selling to a global market.

Following the introduction of USD card-acquiring, Kora is looking to enable its merchants to create truly global businesses and to contribute towards the acceleration of Africa’s participation in global trade. Adding on this, Dickson Nsofor, Kora CEO advised that the company wants to assist the merchants it serves in scaling globally and providing them with the option to accept USD marks an ‘important milestone’ in this effort. As the focus is on Africa, the official stated that despite an increase in Africa’s participation in global trade, the contribution still sits around only 3%, and offering African businesses the ability to accept global payments is thought to help accelerate the continent’s contribution to global trade.

What is more, company representatives confirmed that the company’s next step is launching a multicurrency bank account product that is set to allow its merchant clients to access banking solutions currencies of the likes of EUR, GBP, and USD through the Kora platform. Kora offering and strategy Based on the information detailed in the press release, the USD card-acquiring product is the latest in a series of merchant-facing initiatives that the company launched in 2023. Being a pan-African payment infrastructure, Kora offers a robust payment API for payment collections (payins), disbursements (payouts), and cross-border settlements, having offices in Nigeria, Canada, and the UK.

The company’s services aim to enable companies to scale across Africa in an expedited manner and, with a single integration, Kora enables businesses to accept payments, make payouts to customers, and settlements across a multitude of payment channels. .