Samsung Pay Comes to Africa, Launching In South Africa

Samsung Pay, the mobile payment from the world’s largest smartphone maker, has launched in South Africa.

Calling it the first such service in Africa, Samsung has partnered with two of South Africa’s big banks, Absa and Standard Bank through MasterCard and Visa cards.

The system took three years to set up, says Sung Yoon, president and CEO of Samsung Electronics Africa, working with the banks and the regulatory body, the Payments Association of South Africa (Pasa).

Because of the country’s mobile-first nature, he says “acceptance of Samsung Pay at launch in South Africa is much better than 2015 in the US when it launched. People in South Africa understand the technology better today, too, than users in the US did three years ago.”

Samsung Pay uses Galaxy handsets from the world’s largest smartphone maker to make payments using both MST and NFC technology – or tapping your phone on a point-of-sale terminal.

Once the app has been installed and credit cards have been added, people can make a payment just by authenticating themselves in the app – using a Pin code, fingerprint or iris scan.

The security is built on its “defence-grade Samsung Knox security platform and biometric authentication” which it installs on its smartphones.

Shapshak is editor-in-chief and publisher of Stuff magazine. Based in Johannesburg, his TED talk on innovation in Africa has had more than 1.4m views.