
Pan-African integrated payment processing and transaction switching company, Interswitch Transnational Holdings, has spun-off two of its core divisions into separate businesses.
According to an Interswitch statement, the two units that have been spun-off are Verve International (“Verve”) and Switching and Processing.
Verve is a payment card solutions business while Interswitch Switching and Processing is a transaction switching business.
Verve offers issuers, cardholders and organisations with payment card products and solutions in Nigeria. The unit’s pan-African chip-and-pin payment card, is the first chip card accepted across all payment channels in Nigeria, says Interswitch.
Verve is also said to “over 20 million cards in circulation and access to over 119,631 points of sale (“POS”), 11,287 ATMs and over 1,000 online merchants.”
Meanwhile, the switching and processing business is connected to all 20 banks in Nigeria, including seven microfinance institutions and 16 mobile money operators, says Interswitch. In addition, the switch processes local and international transactions originating from payment cards such as UnionPay of China, MasterCard, VISA and Discover Financial Services (Discover and Diners Club).
Interswitch says the rationale for the separation -- which has become official as of 1 April this year -- is driven by its strategy to “orchestrate the next stage of sustainable growth through empowering the various line businesses to broaden and deepen their solution and service offerings to better serve their customers across Africa.”
Interswitch adds that the separation could further enable Verve to leverage its strategic alliance with the ‘Discover’ network, in a bid to provide “new business opportunities in over 185 countries around the world.”
The separation could also enable Interswitch Switching and Processing to take its ‘card-agnostic pureplay switching services’ and ‘third party transaction processing’ (Mastercard, Visa, Union Pay, Verve) capabilities across the region, says Interswitch.
“It has always been our desire to evolve into an integrated payments holding business where the various parts of the business are driven to deepen and broaden their relationships with their various customers by creating innovative products and services of real value,” said Mitchell Elegbe, group managing director and chief executive officer of Interswitch Transnational Holdings commented.
“Creating the right governance structure to herald this new phase of sustainable growth has been the focus of the board and management in the last few months. I am elated that we have successfully completed this separation, which took effect from April 1st 2013,” said Elegbe.
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