Remita Intends To Expand to other African Nations

SystemSpecs’ Nigeria payment technology platform, Remita, is getting ready to enter markets throughout Africa, according to Mr. Deremi Atanda, the company’s managing director and CEO.

The CEO disclosed that what began as a payroll function within an HR application has developed into a strong ecosystem that currently handles over N60 trillion yearly, characterizing it as a “ecosystem of rails, products, and services” that is set to experience substantial expansion outside of Nigeria.

Atanda said in a statement on Wednesday that “we’ve evolved into an ecosystem of rails, products, and services.” Combining all of that with the wide range of clients we’ve served, we usually handle more than N60 trillion in naira transactions annually. 

And this will only increase, particularly as we start to envision a dynamic Pan-African growth. We are on the periphery of it.

Remita’s early days were described by Atanda, who said that the platform started out as a function for wage payments.

“What many now know as Remita actually began as a feature within our HR/payroll application,” he stated. Simply remit salaries since you process them and wish to pay. By the way, remittance is the origin of the name “Remita.” We just left it at “A” and removed one “T.”

Additionally, he explained the meaning behind the company’s emblem, which consists of three dots arranged in increasing order. “That logo tells a lot of stories. We introduced it as a product after it began as a feature, Atanda said.

SystemSpecs changed course to concentrate on creating Remita as a stand-alone solution in spite of early failures, such as losing a bid for the National Pension Commission contract in 2004. 

We originally introduced it as a product when we submitted a bid for the National Pension Commission. The PenCom Act was passed in 2004. In less than two weeks, we turned this into a product that will handle end-to-end pensions as intended. I assure you, that vision remains relevant today. We lost that bid, though,” he remarked.

“We went back and said, ‘What do we do with this asset?'” Atanda added, unfazed. Let it become a product if it won’t work for pensions. As a result, we changed the name of pensions.com.ng to Remita and turned it into a product.

Since then, Remita has expanded beyond payroll processing to become a comprehensive payment platform with a range of services.

Give them a website to visit if they choose to handle their own payroll and simply make payments. It later expanded beyond payroll payments. Other forms of payment were desired. “You go to Remita if you want to make non-salary payments,” Atanda stated.

He clarified that the platform has developed into a stand-alone business offering a variety of services, such as terminals, super agency, switching, and payment service provider.

We provide payment services, switches, super agency, terminals, and anything else you may imagine. “Payment service advisory is one of the fundamental services we offer in the payment space,” he stated.

Atanda also emphasized how Remita was instrumental in the development of Nigeria’s first account-to-account changeover, which took place prior to the introduction of the Treasury Single Account.

“We built a rail, Nigeria’s first account-to-account switch, which worked with all the banks before TSA,” he explained. Few people are familiar with that tale. from one account to another. Its rail, front, and application are the first of their sort.

“The government was looking to solve a problem, and we were looking to get regulated,” Atanda said of the TSA’s agreement with the federal government, calling it “a happenstance.” When individuals use the word “luck,” they are merely referring to a meeting opportunity for preparedness. 

Upon contemplating Remita’s path, he remarked, “These have been some of those moments where you feel validated, where the visionary leadership that set the business up feels the vision is being realized.”

With more than 300 Nigerians working for it now, Remita is setting itself up for rapid expansion throughout Africa. “We’re dedicated to achieving the ambitious goal. We’re setting ourselves up for exponential growth,” Atanda stated.

“Remita’s success is an inspiring example of local innovation with global relevance,” said Shina Badaru, Chairman of Digital Transformation Media Limited, the parent company of eGovernance Nigeria Magazine.

“The success of Remita underscores the pivotal role that indigenous technology solutions play in redefining Africa’s digital economy,” he said.

In addition to addressing issues locally, we hope to highlight how indigenous innovation is positioned to revolutionize markets throughout the African continent as the cover story of the upcoming issue of eGovernance Nigeria Magazine.

There are also unconfirmed reports that Remita could very well indeed suffer a replacement or competition soon as the Tinubu administration continues its government digitisation process . It only makes that Remita looks outward to other nations building on its success in Africa’s biggest economy.