Ten million Orange Money customers in 13 countries

Orange Group has announced the milestone of ten million customers of its Africa-Middle East mobile money service ‘Orange Money’, which is now available in 13 countries: Botswana, Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Egypt (under the name Mobicash), Guinea, Jordan, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritius, Niger, Senegal and Uganda. In 2013, Orange says more than EUR2.2 billion (USD3.04 billion) in transactions were conducted through Orange Money. The French group added that in some countries, such as Cote d’Ivoire, more than 40% of all Orange mobile customers have an Orange Money account. Orange executive Stephane Richard called it ‘proof that we made the right choice when we decided to offer mobile payment services in 2008,’ and added: ‘While making a strong contribution to economic and social development, mobile financial services also represent a major growth engine in Africa and the Middle East as well as in Europe for Orange.’ TeleGeography notes that Orange is just one amongst the multinational mobile groups who are all expanding their mobile banking/payment/money transfer services to meet demand; regional rival group MTN reported this week that its Mobile Money service reached a total of 16.6 million registered users across Africa and the Middle East at the end of March 2014.