e-finance, Egypt’s national developer of digital payment infrastructures, announced a partnership with IBM to expand its digital payment services and enable clients to securely make payments across hybrid cloud environments.

One of the critical challenges of doing business in Africa is the lack of a reliable and efficient payment gateway infrastructure. This often leads to companies relying on cash-based transactions, which can be expensive and risky.

Ziina, a Dubai-based, YC-backed fintech start-up on a mission to bring money online for Middle Eastern consumers, continues to innovate in the payments space. Its most recent innovation is a payments keyboard, the first of its kind in the digital wallets space, for which Ziina has filed a patent.

Tabby, the payments and shopping app for the Middle East and North Africa, has secured $150 million in debt financing from Atalaya Capital Management and existing investor Partners for Growth (PFG).

New research from payment solutions provider Checkout.com has revealed that half of UAE residents are using digital wallets for the first time.According to the survey, security is still the most important factor for UAE residents when shopping online, with nearly 40% of respondents trusting digital wallets as much as banks. Indeed, the future looks bright for digital wallets, with 48% of respondents.