Follow CGSP on Social Media

Listen to the CGSP Podcast

OPay and PalmPay: Two Chinese-Backed Investments Battle it Out in Africa’s Rapidly Growing Mobile Payment Market

by Eric Olander
Nairobi-based Malawian tech entrepreneur Wiza Jalakasi offers his take on the Opay vs. PalPay duel that is emerging. Follow Wiza on Twitter at @wizaj and find out more about his portfolio on his personal website at wiza.jalaka.si.

For those of you old enough to remember the early days of the Internet, you may also recall using a Norwegian web browser called Opera. Unable to compete against Google, Firefox and Microsoft, Opera fell on hard times and sold most of its assets to a Chinese-led consortium for $600 million.

Now, five years later, Opera is back, but you probably wouldn’t know it if you don’t live in Africa where the company enjoys a thriving search and browser business that’s now second only to Google.

Lead the Conversation on China

Subscribe Today to Get Full Access to The China-Global South Project

Check Out Everything You'll Get With Your Subscription

The China-Global South Daily Brief delivered to your inbox at 6AM Washington time

Full access to exclusive news and analysis from editors based in the Global South

Transcripts of CGSP’s twice-weekly podcasts

Students and teachers with a valid .edu email address are eligible for a 50% discount off monthly or yearly subscriptions. Email us to receive a discount code.

You Might Like

“We’ve Been Waiting for China to Go All-in in African Digital in Full.”

The Bloomberg BusinessWeek Podcast featured an interview in their weekly show with TechCrunch journalist Jake Bright who’s broken of the deal news around the recent spate of Chinese venture capital investments in African ...

Transsion’s VC Fund Makes First Investment in an African Fintech Start-Up; the Chinese-owned Opera Mobile Browser Well Positioned to Capitalize on Financial Services

Lead the Conversation on China Subscribe Today to Get Full Access to The China-Global South Project ...

Now That Chinese-Owned OPay Has Become Africa’s Third Tech Unicorn, the Magnitude of What Happened Last Week is Starting to Settle In

When the Chinese-owned African mobile money app OPay wrapped up a massive $400 million investment round led by Japan’s Softbank and a who’s who of Chinese venture capital firms, the magnitude of what ...

What is The China-Global South Project?

Independent

The China-Global South Project is passionately independent, non-partisan and does not advocate for any country, company or culture.

News

A carefully curated selection of the day’s most important China-Global South stories. Updated 24 hours a day by human editors. No bots, no algorithms.

Analysis

Diverse, often unconventional insights from scholars, analysts, journalists and a variety of stakeholders in the China-Global South discourse.

Networking

A unique professional network of China-Africa scholars, analysts, journalists and other practioners from around the world.

Subscribe