Wegagen Bank Drops HelloCash in Favor of E-Birr

Wegagen Bank has partnered with E-Birr to launch a new mobile money service, replacing its previous collaboration with BelCash.

The service, unveiled on Tuesday, allows users to open wallet accounts, transfer funds, and make payments via a mobile app or by dialing the USSD code *602#. Yehwalashet Zewdu, Deputy CEO of Enterprise Services at Wegagen Bank, highlighted the potential of this service during the official launch event held in Shire, Tigray Regional State.

E-Birr Mobile Financial Services is a telecom value-added and mobile financial services provider established in 2016. The firm partners with financial institutions to offer its mobile money platform, E-birr. Collaborators include the Cooperative Bank of Oromia and Kaffi Microfinance Institution. E-Birr has facilitated transactions exceeding 2 trillion birr and had 18.2 million users as of June 2024. 

​Belcash Technology Solutions, a tech company in the same field, had been the technology partner of Wegagen's mobile money platform since 2018. Under the HelloCash brand, the two provided the platform, similar to Belcah's collaborations with other institutions like Lion Bank.

However, according to Fisseha Wube, Senior Marketing & Communications Officer at Wegagen Bank, the partnership with E-Birr replaces the HelloCash platform.

“Wegagen HelloCash has ceased operations as of November 4, 2024,” Fisseha stated, adding that the decision to dissolve the partnership stemmed from a lack of financial viability.

“The bank is working on migrating users and their data to the new platform,” he told Shega.

Wegagen had 2.7 million mobile banking users and 287K debit card holders as of June 2024.

Despite prevailing macroeconomic instability, Wegagen, with assets exceeding 74.6 billion birr, managed to increase its total income by 40% over the 2023/24 financial year, reaching 9.8 billion birr.

The bank's gross profits also surged to a historic high of 2.2 billion birr, reflecting an 86% year-on-year increase. The bank boasts 2.7 million mobile banking users and nearly 17,000 internet banking customers.

Last week, the bank became the first bank in Ethiopia to be listed on the newly launched Ethiopia Securities Exchange (ESX).