On April 19, tech and finance leaders, policy makers, innovators, and investors from across Africa and the US will gather at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., to discuss the future of financial technology.
Occurring in line with the spring meeting of the World Bank Group and IMF in Washington, the Africa Fintech Summit (AFTS) will include keynote addresses from the Central Banks of both Nigeria and Kenya. It will also feature some of the continent’s principal tech entrepreneurs—such as Tayo Oviosu, Founder & CEO of Paga, Iyinoluwa “E”Aboyeji, Founder & CEO of Flutterwave, and Lorien Gamaroff, CEO of Bakymoon—as well as leading venture capital investors from across Africa and the US.
Focus areas include financial inclusion, new technologies in payments and remittances, Africa-specific blockchain use cases, cryptocurrencies on the continent, startup ecosystems, and venture capital funds designed for African.
The AFTS will also include the launch of the Atlantic Council’s Disruptive Tech in Africa series of publications as well as a drinks and awards ceremony recognizing excellence and innovation in African fintech. The US Nigeria Council’s biannual reception and dinner will follow the AFTS.
As a region, Africa has the largest unbanked population in the world, a fact that has hamstrung the continent’s economic dynamism of the last decade. The rapid adoption of new financial technologies is helping to dramatically change that picture. In Kenya, for example, 50% of GDP moves through M-Pesa, a mobile phone-based money transfer, financing, and microfinance service that came to market in 2007. Today, Africa has the highest number of mobile wallets per capita of any region in the world. This environment is creating a flurry of innovation on the continent, along with unprecedented opportunities for investment in scalable technologies.
“It’s an inflection point,” says Leland Rice, chair of the AFTS organizing committee. “The potential for fintech to change lives and economies in Africa is real, but there needs to be coordination between countries, deployment of smart capital, and communication across the ecosystem, from bankers to tech entrepreneurs to policy makers. And this is the motivation behind the AFTS—to foster that coordination, facilitate investment flows between the U.S. and Africa, and raise global awareness for the people and technologies driving these opportunities.”
