Refreshing

Africa's biggest mobile operator by subscribers said on Monday it signed a $9.7 million deal with Fundamo, a South Africa-based mobile banking and payment solutions group, to provide mobile banking facilities. You can read all the hype about the race to provide mobile banking services in Africa here, here and here.

This development finds itself on IP Finance because it is refreshing - refreshing amidst all the news about liquidations and recession, and refreshing because it largely involves African IP development and investment by Africans within Africa.

As one posting describes: "Africa leading the world in mobile banking", and another:

"The telcos in Nigeria are taking the battle to the next frontier in coming months: Mobile Money. Not to be left out of this race are Banks and Independent providers which had seen the clearly untapped potentials in an economy of only 20 million Bank accounts and 60 million mobile subscribers under an addressable market of 140 million people. No one wants to be left behind in the evolving ecosystems."

....and Standard Bank, Africa's largest bank, just purchased a 33% stake in Russia's investment bank Troika Dialog (CNN Money).