Mpesa reaches 50 million active users in Africa

Mobile money service provider Mpesa has reported reaching 50 million active users in Africa. The platform, owned by Kenya’s Safaricom and Vodafone South Africa, operates in Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique, Lesotho, Ghana and Egypt through its subsidiaries. In April 2020, Safaricom and Vodacom acquired the M-Pesa brand and platform from their UK parent firm Vodafone Plc to form the joint venture, M-Pesa Africa. The uptake of mobile money services was catalysed by social-distancing measures applied during the COVID-19 pandemic.