Interswitch, the first Nigerian fintech unicorn, announced on Thursday, August 11, at its Code Call Africa event in Zone Tech Park, Lagos, Nigeria, that it has now aggregated all of its API products in one platform. With this development, customers can access the company’s products with little or no customer support.
The company stated that it wants to assist developers and businesses in maximizing the array of benefits that its various API products have to offer without causing friction.
At the event, Abdul-Hafiz Ibrahim, the company’s head of engineering for payment services, said that previously, developers had to contact Interswitch whenever they needed to integrate without an API. But now, they can go on the platform and call whatever API they need without calling Interswitch for help.
Interswitch, one of Nigeria’s first financial technology companies to handle remittances, focused on laying the groundwork for other fintech companies to use over time. According to Muyiwa Asagba, divisional CEO of Interswitch’s Paymate, who spoke to TechCabal at the event, the company has over 20 APIs with millions of calls across these APIs.
Four of the 20 APIs are at the forefront of Africa’s financial revolution, particularly in Nigeria. The Paycode API, which powers cardless transactions, is changing how individuals and businesses interact with remittances. Customers who do not have a card or a cheque can withdraw cash by entering a 10-14-digit code into their bank’s mobile app. They can then use the digits to perform a cardless transaction at an ATM. According to Ibrahim, this addresses the lack of ATM cards and is helpful in emergencies where a person’s card has been misplaced or is unavailable.
A value-added services API also allows businesses to automate bill payment and airtime recharge for their customers. Lenders can use the lending services API to automate their credit scoring system, disburse and collect loans more easily, and access customer transaction history. Because of the company’s long history in the market, it already has a large data bank on consumers’ spending habits, which is necessary for developing an efficient API supporting the lending space.
Finally, the “accept payment” API enables businesses to accept payments online, in-app, or in person through its POS SDK or by creating their own payment experiences through its various APIs.
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