Kabir Ruhee
CEO of Rogers Capital
Finance / Mauritius
“Digital wallets will become the new payment battleground”
A leading Mauritian provider of fiduciary, technology and financial services, Rogers Capital is the fintech arm of the Rogers Group, charged with developing emerging technology. Kabir Ruhee, CEO of Rogers Capital, tells us more about how financial innovation is set to impact Africa.
What are the most disruptive examples of fintech emerging in Africa today?
The affordability of low-cost cloud platforms, the strong penetration of high performance mobile solutions and devices, and the maturing of payment technologies, such as digital wallets and tokenization, are creating a universe where physical cards are and will be increasingly irrelevant. Digital wallets will become the new payment battleground as banks and fintech companies battle to own customers’ habits and affinities. Customer experience is proving to be the name of the game. Rogers Capital intends to become a major player in this space.
What African markets does Rogers Capital consider ripe for financial innovation?
We consider South Africa, Rwanda, Ghana and Ivory Coast as markets that are ripe for financial innovation. South Africa is probably in a different league compared to the other countries, but Rwanda, Ivory Coast and Ghana have reached a level of development and governance that make them interesting markets for us. Our strategy will include partnering with key local players to ensure complementarity. Other than these countries, we plan not to neglect other African countries as we are aware how technological innovation can leapfrog the development status of a country and allow opportunities to quickly unfold.
How is your partnership with Blockcerts, signed on May 16, going to shape how you can offer emerging blockchain solutions?
The BlockCerts blockchain platform is a business process platform that includes the most important business functions. These can be easily customized to customers’ requirements. Once fintech regulations are finalised, a live node of the BlockCerts blockchain will be set up in Mauritius. In the meantime, BlockCerts and Rogers Capital will be working on a number of projects in the banking and healthcare sectors.
How is Mauritius nurturing know-how in its financial eco-system?
Not a week goes by in Mauritius without some training or conference being held specifically geared towards up-skilling professionals in the financial services sector. This demonstrates the level of consciousness that the sector has reached in recognising that training and continuous learning is key to maintaining our competitiveness and relevance in an ever-evolving sector. At Rogers Capital, we are setting up a Training Academy that will coordinate the significant budget that is already allocated to training and development and ensure that each dollar spent on this vital ingredient of our offering goes even further.
