MOBILE MONEY PLATFORM
Vodafone: call to split M-Pesa is ridiculous
Safaricom will have to reconsider future investment in Kenya if proposals to break up the company are implemented, says Vodafone’s head of mobile money
Nairobi — Safaricom, East Africa’s biggest cellphone company, would have to reconsider future investment in Kenya if proposals to break up the company are implemented, the head of mobile money at parent Vodafone said. The company, 40%-owned by Newbury, England-based Vodafone, was found to be Kenya’s dominant carrier in a draft report by UK-based advisory group Analysys Mason. The study was commissioned by the Communications Authority of Kenya to check whether the market leader had abused its position. The report recommends Safaricom opens up its mobile-money platform known as M-Pesa to transfers from competitors’ services at prices determined by the regulator. Separately, Kenyan opposition MP Jakoyo Midiwo is also proposing a law to force a Safaricom split, a plan that CEO Bob Collymore has called "plain stupid". The proposal was "inconceivable thinking", said Michael Joseph, Vodafone’s director of mobile money, who founded the decade-old service when he was Safaricom’s CEO. "If you...
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