HyperPay gets regulator’s approval to boost e-commerce in Saudi Arabia
Local payment gateway HyperPay has obtained a permit from Saudi Payments to activate new “mada” services for its merchants in Saudi Arabia.
The move will address the growing needs of local e-commerce merchants in the Kingdom, the company said in a statement.
“The Saudi market is witnessing a significant growth in e-commerce, as the value of e-commerce sales via ‘mada’ cards in the Saudi market jumped during the third quarter of this year by 89 percent on an annual basis,” Muhannad Ebwini, chief executive officer at HyperPay, said.
HyperPay claims it will make payments easier and more secure and offers pre-saving customer card details, and other billing services.
The payment gateway currently has over 2,000 Saudi merchants on board its platform, and it aims to expand across the Kingdom.
The value of point-of-sale transactions in Saudi Arabia reached SR40.5 billion ($10.8 billion) in October, up by 1.2 percent compared to the previous month, the Saudi Central Bank reported.
Some of the sectors that helped drive the increase were restaurants and cafes, hotels, food and beverages, clothing and footwear.
For example, sales in restaurants and cafes reached their highest level since at least January 2016.
The number of transactions rose markedly to over 495 million in October from the previous month’s 469 million transactions.
Some of the point-of-sale transactions could be conducted using mobile phones and cards, otherwise referred to as near-field communication technology.
The number of mobile phone transactions continued its expansionary trend, recording a monthly increase of 1.9 percent to hit 179 million transactions in October. Meanwhile, the number of transactions using cards was up by 8 percent to stand at 293 million.