Mastercard and Moovn Technologies have signed a five-year agreement to expand digital payments across East Africa through Moovn’s transport, delivery and online shopping services. Announced in Nairobi on 19th October 2026, the deal includes expansion in Kenya and Tanzania, with other African markets also in the companies’ plans.
Moovn wants riders, drivers and businesses to use its MoovnPay wallet for more of their everyday payments. The agreement covers virtual and physical prepaid Mastercard cards, payments between users, online and in-app checkout, and eligible international money transfers.
Some of that work is already under way. The companies say Moovn has launched Mastercard Payment Gateway Services in Kenya. The next phase includes launching Shooga prepaid Mastercard cards and expanding Pay Local, a service for paying participating merchants through a local wallet, in Kenya and Tanzania.
How the wallet, cards and merchant payments fit together
Moovn’s services extend beyond booking a ride. RUSH handles package deliveries, and Noobea is a marketplace for buying and selling online. MoovnPay handles payments across those services. Shooga, its fundraising and donations product, will join MoovnPay in giving users access to the planned prepaid cards within a single digital wallet.
With a prepaid card, you spend money that has been loaded in advance. Moovn plans both a virtual card, with details supplied digitally, and a physical card you can carry. Connecting those cards to MoovnPay would give customers more ways to spend through its payment services.
Businesses need a way to accept those payments too. Mastercard Payment Gateway Services, or MPGS, lets them take payments on a website or inside an app. The agreement includes MPGS through Mastercard Merchant Cloud, Mastercard’s platform for merchant payment services. Expanding the gateway across Moovn’s platforms would allow digital payment for more of the purchases and bookings made there.
The partners also plan to expand tokenisation, which replaces a card number with a digital substitute during supported payments. So when a customer pays online or through a wallet, their underlying card details are less exposed.
Pay Local would extend payments to participating merchants in Kenya and Tanzania. In Mastercard’s general explanation of the service, a customer links a Mastercard to a local wallet, then scans a merchant’s existing QR code to pay. The companies say their expansion will let participating merchants accept payments directly from MoovnPay users.
For international transfers, the partners plan to use Mastercard Move, Mastercard’s money movement services. Access is limited to eligible users and transfers, and will depend on which services are introduced in each market.
What the five-year agreement adds
MoovnPay was one of 11 companies selected for Mastercard’s Start Path Emerging Fintech programme in September 2025. Start Path helps startups develop and expand their businesses. Following the Kenya gateway launch, the agreement sets out more of the payment services the companies intend to introduce together.
Mastercard has pursued prepaid card partnerships elsewhere in Kenya too. In August, we covered the Carrefour, KCB and Mastercard grocery card. The Moovn agreement gives Mastercard a route to payments made through transport and commerce services, while Moovn gets more ways for its customers to pay and move money.
The companies have not disclosed the deal’s financial value. Their announcement gives no country-by-country launch dates for the planned services, card charges or transfer fees. It also leaves out supported international routes, transaction limits, how the cards will be funded, where their use may be restricted and which institution will issue them. The regulatory arrangements for each planned service are not explained either.
Those details will determine how useful the services are to a driver or merchant. Someone receiving money through Moovn needs to know where they can spend or transfer it, and what that will cost. Once fees and launch terms are published, users will be able to compare MoovnPay with the payment accounts they already use.
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