Kenya’s WapiPay is expanding its network into the Caribbean through a partnership with Jamaica’s JN Money Services, opening a new payment corridor linking Jamaica with markets in Africa and Asia, months after it announced entry into the market.
The agreement, announced after WapiPay received regulatory approval from the Bank of Jamaica, will allow customers using WapiPay to send money to Jamaica for cash collection at JN Money locations or direct deposits into local bank accounts.
The move gives WapiPay access to JN Money’s established payout infrastructure while extending the Kenyan fintech’s reach beyond its core Africa-Asia business. JN Money operates an international remittance network spanning 18 countries, according to its parent company, Jamaica National Group.
For WapiPay, Jamaica represents an entry point into the Caribbean and another step in its effort to build payment infrastructure across emerging markets rather than operate individual remittance corridors in isolation.
WapiPay was founded in 2019 by brothers Edward and Paul Ndichu and initially focused on payments between Africa and Asia, particularly transactions involving African businesses paying suppliers in Asia. The company has since expanded its network across Africa, Asia, the UK, the US and the Caribbean.
The Jamaica partnership also broadens the potential use of the platform beyond consumer remittances. The companies said the arrangement will support both person-to-person transfers and business-to-business payments, including trade-related transactions.
That distinction is important for fintechs competing in the increasingly crowded cross-border payments market. Remittances provide a large and recurring transaction base, while business payments can generate larger transaction values and create deeper relationships with merchants and companies.
Under the arrangement, WapiPay customers will be able to send funds to Jamaica for cash pickup through JN Money or have money deposited into recipients’ local bank accounts. WapiPay said it is targeting completion of transfers in less than 30 seconds on supported transactions and will not charge a fee on its side for the service.
The partnership comes as remittance companies compete on speed, foreign-exchange transparency and distribution rather than simply the ability to move money between countries.
JN Money said the partnership will also expand the international corridors available to Jamaicans, particularly as digital-first providers seek to connect Caribbean consumers with newer sources of migration, trade and financial flows.
For WapiPay, the move fits into a broader expansion strategy. The company has recently added regulated markets and services to its network, including a Canadian Money Services Business license that allows it to provide foreign-exchange, money-transfer and payment services in Canada. The license also covers virtual-currency and digital-asset transactions.
The company has also been building products around remittance data. Earlier this year, it introduced a remittance-based credit-scoring tool designed to help financial institutions assess borrowers using patterns in their international money transfers.
Jamaica’s importance to the strategy comes from the scale of its remittance economy. The country is one of the Caribbean’s major recipients of money sent home by citizens living overseas, making access to reliable international payout infrastructure commercially significant for payment providers.
JN Money will serve as the local payout conduit under the new arrangement, allowing WapiPay to use an existing network rather than build a physical cash-distribution infrastructure in Jamaica from scratch.
The partnership effectively creates a three-region payment link: WapiPay brings its network across Africa and Asia, while JN Money provides the local Jamaican infrastructure. The companies say the arrangement could eventually connect Jamaican customers more efficiently with Africa, Asia, North America and Europe.
For African fintechs, such corridors are becoming increasingly important as companies look beyond domestic mobile-money markets and compete to capture a larger share of international payments.
WapiPay’s Jamaica expansion is therefore less about adding another destination to a remittance app than about building a broader network through which money can move between emerging-market economies with fewer intermediaries.
The company is positioning the network around consumer remittances, trade payments and business disbursements, giving it multiple potential sources of transaction volume as it expands into new regulated markets.
With Jamaica now added to its international footprint, WapiPay is betting that the next stage of African fintech growth will involve connecting the continent not only to traditional financial centers, but also directly to other high-volume emerging markets.