Visa Everywhere Initiative is looking for Fintech startups to showcase their products and solutions on a global scale

The Visa Everywhere Initiative (VEI), a global open innovation program, is inviting fintech and payment startups to showcase their innovative products and solutions.

Finalists will gain firsthand exposure to key fintech stakeholders from the banking, merchant, venture capital, and government sectors. The competition’s winners will get monetary rewards as well as the opportunity to work with a globally recognized brand like Visa.

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This year’s program features entrepreneurs that are innovating with bitcoin and Visa Direct, a payment service that may allow businesses to send money to billions of endpoints throughout the world via card and account rails. The VEI finals will bring together finalists from around the world who are driving economic growth in November in Qatar.

“Fintechs and other payments innovators are transforming the way consumers and businesses make payments, making it easier for more people to access the money they need when they need it – and the pandemic has seen this become more critical than ever,” Corine Mbiaketcha, Vice President and Regional Manager, East Africa.

Mookh Africa, a Kenyan software firm, is a previous benefactor of VEI

Previous versions of VEI have given some of the most promising payment innovators a chance to accelerate their growth. Mookh Africa, a Kenyan software firm, received both the top prize and the Social Business Payment Challenge at the 2018 edition of the Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) Visa Everywhere Initiative. Arifpay, a universal mobile Point of Sale (mPOS) platform designed for use by Ethiopian businesses, banks, and consumers, won the Ethiopian round of the competition in 2021 and was a finalist in the CEMEA edition.

VEI Network of over 8,500 startups

There are 8,500 startups in the VEI network from all over the world, and the number is growing every year. Since its inception in 2015, the program has assisted firms from over 100 countries in raising more than $2.5 billion in investment, tackling one of the most significant problems that early-stage entrepreneurs face.

This year, the program will place a strong emphasis on CEMEA, a region where fintech companies are generating innovative products and solutions to help the community. Two additional editions of the VEI will be held in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, as well as a worldwide finale in Qatar in November 2022.

VEI is looking for forward-thinking entrepreneurs who are improving communities by addressing payment and commerce issues that businesses of all sizes and sectors experience.