Bruno Mettling, Orange's President and CEO for Middle East and Africa, has confirmed the company will launch its AI-enabled mobile bank offering, Orange Bank, in Madagascar and Mali in the first half of 2018, followed by Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal in the second half of the year.

There are plans to launch in Niger and Guinea in 2019.

In 2016, Orange acquired a majority stake in Groupama Banque which became Orange Bank in 2017. Orange Bank officially went live last November when it became available in mainland France. The mobile-based service provides real-time balances, mobile payment and IBM Watson-enabled virtual advisor called Djingo. In March 2018, Orange Bank announced the service had 100,000 customers.

Countries selected for launch are members of the West African Economic and Monetary Union which share a common central bank and are using the CFA currency. Orange has already applied to the union for a license with which it would be able to launch the service.

Mettling said Orange Bank would be operated in the selected countries with a yet unnamed partner and would build on the offerings of Orange Mobile Money which has been available in Africa since 2008 and has over 12 million active users in 18 countries.

The online bank would offer users in Africa services including simple saving products, access to credit services and insurance.

"Orange Bank is a normal evolution that actually implies, from the legal point of view, that we have banking licenses. We examine the conditions under which we can, depending on the country, have a banking partner and be a distributor of its products, or, be a direct partner of a bank," said Mettling.

The Orange Group described the launch of the Orange Bank as an illustration of its ambition to diversify its services, particularly in mobile financial services, which it said offer significant growth prospects. The Group aims to reach 400 million euros in revenues in 2018 in the mobile financial services sector, across all of its markets.

Stéphane Richard, the Chairman and CEO of Orange said: "With Orange Bank, this is an important new chapter in our history: Orange is now also a bank. A 100% mobile-based bank that is dedicated to providing an incomparable user experience. A bank that combines the best innovations available on the market today into a single offer. A bank that will listen to its customers and constantly enrich its offer and its features to meet their expectations. In short, a bank with the customer at its heart."