Hannes van Rensburg CEO of Fundamo

It also announced on Thursday a new, long-term commercial agreement with Monitise, a leading provider of mobile money solutions for financial institutions in more developed geographies.

The combination of acquiring Fundamo and expanding the relationship with Monitise is expected to enable the company to deliver mobile financial services and payments capabilities to consumers across the full spectrum of uses, geographies and mobile environments from basic services on simple handsets to more advanced services for smart-phone owners.

"Mobile network operators and financial institutions will now be able to take advantage of Fundamo's trusted mobile financial services platform backed by Visa's high standards for security, reliability and scale," said Hannes van Rensburg, CEO of Fundamo.

Van Rensburg and the Fundamo management team will continue to manage current and future Fundamo implementations as valuable members of Visa's mobile product organisation.

Privately held, Cape Town-based Fundamo has more than 50 active mobile financial services deployments across more than 40 countries, including 27 countries in Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

Fundamo's deployments currently have a base of more than five million registered subscribers and the potential to reach more than 180 million consumers with mobile financial services.

Mobile prepaid payments are increasingly providing affordable, convenient and secure transaction capabilities that are transformational to the lives of merchants and consumers in those regions.

The acquisition is expected to close today, and is slightly dilutive to Visa's earnings per share in its fiscal year 2011 ending September 30.