Welcome to this week’s weekly news roundup, where we bring you a quick overview of the latest developments in finance, payments, retail, e-commerce and more across the Middle East and Europe regions.
In the Middle East…
- Among this week’s notable launches, the Ministry of Hajj and Umrah – وزارة الحج والعمرة (MoHU) has partnered with the The Saudi National Bank – SNB to launch the Nusuk Wallet, the first international digital wallet globally to serve Umrah and Hajj pilgrims. The first-of-its-kind digital wallet is supported by banking infrastructure from the SNB AlAhli through its brand NEO and has been specially designed to allow pilgrims to manage money and expenses,
- Banque Misr and EFG Hermes ONE have teamed up with PayTabs Global (Egypt) to launch an Egypt’s first debit card top-up feature on the EFG Hermes ONE online trading platform. The partnership has already received the approval of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) for debit card acceptance in the realm of stock trading. The feature’s integration means that customers can use their debit cards for fluid securities trading, improving accessibility and efficiency in the region.
- As the Saudi Arabia undergoes a significant digital transformation and diversifies its economy, data centres have emerged as one of the key drivers of this technological evolution. This was further evident, this week, when Infobip , a global cloud communications platform, announced operational launch in the country. This includes its first data centre in KSA, which will host and process data within the country as well as streamline business processes
- The UAE’s reputation as a global hub for talent continues to flourish and now RemotePass , an HR and fintech platform, has launched a new tool that enables UAE companies to onboard, manage, and pay their local and global employees through a single platform. The Direct Employee feature will allow companies to create compliant employment contracts, track expenses and time off, generate essential HR documents, and gain crucial insights through analytics and reports. All through one platform.
- Speaking of talent, unsurprisingly remote work and freelancing remains popular in the region. This week, Dubai-based fintech start-up Elevate secured $5 million in new funding to scale its operations and capitalise on the growing trend. The company bases it business model on facilitating international payments for freelancers and remote workers at reduced fees and plans to use the funds to expand in the Middle East and Africa
In Europe…
- Starting with the retail segment, this week, a Carrefour outlet in Belgium is testing a new system designed to help visually impaired customers shop more independently. The first-of-its-kind solution combines two technologies. Virtuoz, a tactile sound map placed at the entrance to the store, allows visually impaired customers to easily discover the layout of the store. while NaviLens uses intelligent QR codes detectable up to 20 metres away and in less than 3 milliseconds through a dedicated application. The technology can guide the blind and visually impaired safely through the store to the products of their choice, but also towards aisles, checkouts and other services.
- We also learned this week that ZARA HOME is planning to take its live shopping shows to the UK, Europe and the US this year, on the back of growing popularity in China, where the format was launched last November. It comes as the fast-fashion brand invests in new ways to engage shoppers. The shopping broadcasts, which can last for up to five hours, are broadcast weekly on Douyin, TikTok’s Chinese sister site. They have been reportedly been instrumental in improving sales in the region so it will be interesting to see if Europe’s follows this trend.
- Elsewhere, in the e-commerce market, TikTok is taking a more cautious approach and has paused plans to expand its rapidly-growing e-commerce business across major European markets. Instead, the company is reportedly making growth in the US a priority for the short term where it is fighting a divest-or-ban-law. The rollout of the social media firm’s shopping plaform had been due to take place, this July, across Spain, Germany, Italy, France and Ireland.
- The European Banking Authority (EBA) (EBA) has published three regulatory products on governance, conflicts of interest, and remuneration under MiCAR and as part of plans to improve the regulatory landscape for crypto assets The products are part of ongoing efforts to create a transparent, secure, and well-regulated crypto-assets market.
- Among new and notable partnerships, fintech unicorn Bitpanda has expanded its ties with Deutsche Bank to launch real-time payments for users of its digital asset platform in Germany. The deal enables Bitpanda to provide local IBANs for users in Germany, streamlining incoming and outgoing transactions in the field of virtual asset investing.
- bunq , the second largest neobank in Europe, has partnered with Mastercard to offer its users across Europe a complete overview of their finances. To do this, it will leverage Mastercard’s Open Banking platform, which allows users to add accounts from any bank to their bunq app. It means bunq users can now get spending insights from all their bank accounts directly within the bunq app, enabling them to budget more effectively and plan ahead. As well as this, bunq’s AI money assistant, Finn, will be able to offer insights using transaction data from multiple banks.
There you have it! It’s been another eventful seven days of new launches, partnerships and innovations in the world of Seamless Xtra
Till next week!
