US Fintech company QPS Global will be expanding its operations in the Middle East, the company has announced. To this end, the company will be making an investment of US$10 million in the region over the next 6-12 months.

The B2B card issuance and processing platform aims to grow its presence in key Middle East markets by March next year. These include the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman and Kuwait.

“After expanding our reach in the European markets, we are now entering the Middle East by purely focusing on our technological disruption. In fact, we have already secured a deal of issuing 2.3 million prepaid cards across the Middle East market.

 

Going forward, we are also looking at clocking up revenues to the tune of US$100 million in the next two-three years across India, UAE and UK,”

Vinay Kalantri, CEO and Founder, QPS Global said.

Kalantri added that QPS Global aims to secure at least 20% of the card issuance market. The company is looking to acquire B2B customers across the banking and financial, fintech, travel, D2C, and ecommerce sectors.

The 2019-founded company recently announced expansion plans for Europe, with an investment of US$13.96 million. It will also be hiring over 300 employees across India, Europe and the Middle East, the company said.

Cashless economy in the Middle East

The Middle East is increasingly moving away from cash as a mode of payment. In the MEA region, card payments are the most popular payment method, accounting for 44% of the payments market.

The UAE (39%) and Saudi Arabia (35%) fall slightly below this average, whereas Turkey far surpasses it, with card payments responsible for 71% of payment methods.

Moreover, according to the Fintech News Middle East: UAE Fintech Report 2021 there are over 10 million debit and 8 million credit cards in circulation in the UAE. Elsewhere, the Bahraini government is pushing to go completely cashless in the next decade.

This growth is further buoyed by local and international payment fintechs such as NymCard and Pyypl, and approaches in the banking and financial sector towards cashless payments, such as ones by Saudi Arabia’s mada and the UAE’s First Abu Dhabi Bank. Governments are also transitioning away from cash, through initiatives such as the Gulf Cooperation Council’s (GCC) first digital nol card.

Featured image credit: Edited from  Pexels, Photo by Denys Gromov