Meghan McCormick, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of software company, OZÉ, has highlighted some opportunities that exist in the financial technology (fintech) business field.
Interviewed on the Springboard Hangout Show by host, Comfort Ocran on eTV Ghana, she first noted that there are two broad categories of opportunities in the fintech space and there is a lot of work to do on both ends. She named these opportunities as the ‘enablers’, which is basically the infrastructure that powers fintech, and the consumer facing or customer facing application that sits on top of the enablers and meets a need.
“If I put it in the context of my own company, OZÉ is one of the second level players and we sit on top of that infrastructure so that small business owners can keep digital records, they can turn that data into information, they can accept payment from their customers, they can apply for a loan and have it credited directly into their bank account “, she said.
She noted however, that OZÉ relies on many different infrastructural players to make their job possible and some of these are technology companies that allow them automatic SMS sending to customers, so that they can have a secure OZÉ account. This process, she said, is what is known as ‘two-factor authentication’.
“The opportunity here in Ghana is that that is still so much to do on both ends. We’ve also built some of this infrastructure because without building that infrastructure, there’s no way that our large banking partners to digitally lend to our small business customers. So I think if you’re an entrepreneur looking to get into fintech, go talk to the big fintech players whether there are infrastructures and ask them why they’re building this or what they hope to enable, and build something that can sit on top of that”, she advised.
In addition, she hinted that, “You can also go to the interface players and ask them what their biggest headache is, or what they are building that they wish they could buy, and go build the pipe underneath it. I think those are the two main entry points into the fintech industry”.
By: Maureen Dedei Quaye