Telcoin in bed with Vodacom?!!!
written by H|D
This article will point out why we are very bullish on Vodacom Group being Telcoin’s African partner.
The importance of the GSMA Mobile Money Certification
The GSMA Mobile Money Certification is about enhancing trust and empowering consumers to make more informed choices about their financial services. This encourages mobile money adoption and advances financial inclusion. It gives assurances to potential financial partners that robust controls are in place, facilitating interoperability and encouraging integration into the financial ecosystem. Certification is open to all providers of mobile money services, whether they are a mobile network operator, a bank or an over-the-top provider. The Certification is available to mobile money services operating within a variety of business models and regulatory environments across the world.
Which Mobile Money Provider is certified?
There are currently 6 providers with this certification: Safaricom Kenya, Orange Money Côte d’Ivoire, Tigo Pesa Tanzania, Vodacom mPesa Tanzania, Telenor Microfinance Bank (Easypaisa), and MTN MFS Côte d’Ivoire.
GSMA Membership
Telcoin states the following in the whitepaper page 21: “… only GSMA full member operators will be eligible for Telcoin issuance”. This is very important because it emphasizes that GSMA is the foundation of their business model, hence why it was so important for them to become a GSMA member.
Let’s not forget that back in May 2018, Telcoin sponsored the GSMA Fraud & Security Group (FASG #11) in Tokyo. Coincidence much? Not at all. There are almost 300 criteria to become a certified mobile money provider, and most of them focus on security:
- Safeguard customer funds against risk of loss
- Combat money laundering, terrorist financing and fraud
- Manage staff, agents, and third parties correctly
- Operate the service well and reliably
- Ensure the security of the systems supporting the service
- Communicate fees, T&Cs and information transparently to customers
- Effectively address customer service requests and complaints
- Protect customers’ personal data
Telcoin, in essence, has to partner with an operator that holds the GSMA mobile money certification.
Who is the African Partner?
As you all know, Telcoin recently announced a partnership with a major African operator. The partnership will allow said partner to start testing Telcoin’s blockchain solution; the focus will be on Africa.
We know that the partner must be a GSMA Full Member, and we “now” believe that they must also be GSMA Mobile Money certified. That conclusion led us to the 6 operators mentioned earlier: Safaricom Kenya, Orange Money Côte d’Ivoire, Tigo Pesa Tanzania, Vodacom mPesa Tanzania, Telenor Microfinance Bank (Easypaisa), and MTN MFS Côte d’Ivoire.
Looking at the most recent roadmap, Telcoin focuses on the following African countries: Tunisia, Algeria, Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania.
We used the process of elimination to determine our final candidate. We first eliminated Microfinance Bank (Easypaisa), which is a subsidiary of Telenor Pakistan, because it operates out of Pakistan. We eliminated Orange Money Côte d’Ivoire and MTN MFS Côte d’Ivoire because Côte d’Ivoire is not one of the African countries that Telcoin is currently focusing on. We eliminated Tigo Pesa Tanzania, which is a brand of Tigo Tanzania — subsidiary of Millicom International, because the latter has no affiliation with Telcoin. The process of elimination left us with Safaricom Kenya and Vodacom mPesa Tanzania.
Note that both operators are owned by Vodacom. And if you remember, Claude has been on record, in his interview with Ian Balina, stating: “… so when you talk to the group, you actually have access to the network underneath”, meaning all the brands, subsidiaries, locations, etc.
Vodacom provides services to over 55 million customers, and generates revenue north of $5 billion annually. Whoa! If Telcoin is indeed in bed with this big fish, that would be a major accomplishment.
The Vodacom Group makes a lot of sense for a lot of reasons, which we’ve established throughout this article. We hope to continue finding more concrete evidence until Telcoin makes an official announcement.
As always #telfam, connect the dots…
H|D
Disclaimer: The information and discussion above is absolutely speculative, and is not confirmed until we receive an official statement from Telcoin. Please do not use this as financial advice. Do Your Own Research!
