South African mobile operator MTN has partnered Vivo Energy, the company that distributes Shell products, to expand services to their customer bases.
MTN has over 207 million subscribers in 22 countries across Africa and the Middle East while Vivo operates 1,430 Shell branded service stations across Africa.
“Through this alliance both companies aim to provide MTN and Shell customers more points of service across Vivo Energy’s network of Shell service stations,” Vivo said in a statement.
The agreement will make Shell service stations Cash In-Cash Out points for MTN’s mobile money platform, service stations will provide float to MTN’s mobile money agents, MTN Mobile Money will be accepted as a method of payment at Shell service stations and Shell will sell stock and MTN airtime through MTN Mobile Money.
The partnership will initially be rolled out in five markets where Vivo and MTN overlay – Botswana, Ivory Coast, Guinea Conakry, Ghana and Uganda.
“Partnerships like the one we have established with Vivo Energy present an opportunity for MTN to make the lives of millions of MTN Mobile Money customers a whole lot brighter, by adding more convenient, easily accessible mobile money merchants to our already extensive footprint,” said Pieter Verkade, MTN Group chief commercial officer (CCO).
“African markets have been driving the growth of mobile money over the past few years and with the increasing use of mobile technology in the continent, it will be touching even more Africans in the near future. We are confident that, together with MTN, we shall remain at the forefront and offer our customers the opportunity to use a modem money transfer and payment tool on our service stations,” said David Mureithi, executive vice president of Supply & Marketing at Vivo Energy.
