Visa and Santimpay to Roll Out 20,000 PoS Machines Across Ethiopia

Santimpay Financial Solutions, a rising fintech player in Ethiopia, has teamed up with Visa to deploy as many as 20,000 point-of-sale machines in the next year, a major expansion aimed at drawing small and mid-sized businesses into the country’s digital payment ecosystem.

Under the deal, Visa will cover the upfront cost of the machines averaging around $100 a piece, while Santimpay takes charge of distribution, merchant recruitment, and onboarding. The devices will be provided free of charge to shopkeepers and businesses across Ethiopia, a country of more than 120 million people where card usage is still largely limited to cash withdrawals at ATMs.

Tinsae Desalegn, Santimpay’s chief executive, said high costs have long kept point-of-sale (PoS) machines out of reach for smaller businesses. Banks have typically deployed them only at large merchants with high transaction volumes.

“We hope to bring smaller businesses into the card payment ecosystem,”. Tinsae told Shega.

Ethiopia currently has just over 7,500 active PoS machines. The partnership, which could run for up to five years, aims to lift that figure to 100,000. Santimpay has already begun assembling its own devices locally, starting in July, and says its machines have processed more than 3 million birr in daily transactions over the past two months. The company received its license from the National Bank of Ethiopia in 2022.

For Visa, the initiative fits into a broader strategy to accelerate digital finance in Ethiopia. “Digital transaction growth needs to be complemented by a rise in payment technologies,” said Yared Endale, Visa’s country manager for Ethiopia and head of Eastern Africa. He noted that although more than 40 million cards are in circulation, most are used almost exclusively for cash withdrawals.

Yared also said that past PoS deployment strategies by banks have focused heavily on foreign-currency-earning businesses. Visa, he added, is now in discussions with other partners like Arifpay to roll out thousands more machines, expanding payment access points beyond the capital and into rural communities.

“The maturity of Ethiopia’s payment ecosystem depends on the active participation of all financial stakeholders and regulators,” Yared said, arguing that digital payments could ease life for millions of farmers still reliant on cash.

The partnership was unveiled Tuesday at the Visa Connect Summit at the Sheraton Addis, where speakers included Myriam Seid, an adviser to the prime minister. She linked the effort to the government’s “Digital Ethiopia 2030” strategy, which aims to expand financial access well beyond urban centers.

“We hope digital financial services become commonplace in Ethiopia’s rural areas,” Myriam said.