Dual-listed Net1 UEPS Technologies has received a new order for 1.1 million smart cards and 2 500 EFT point-of-sale devices from banks in Uzbekistan.
The company, which is listed on the JSE and Nasdaq, will deliver the cards and terminals during the course of next year.
Net1 provides a universal electronic payment system, or UEPS, as an alternative payment system for about four billion unbanked and under-banked people in developing economies.
The deal to provide the cards and devices was awarded to its majority-owned subsidiary, Net1 Universal Technologies (Net1 UTA), in Austria.
Net1 explains the National Bank of Uzbekistan started a small pilot project in 1995 with 5 000 smart cards. The project has since evolved into a fully-fledged National Interbank Payment System under the brand name UZKART, and has expanded to 6.6 million UEPS smart cards and 45 000 point-of-sale terminals.
The National Interbank Payment System operates on Net1's FTS/UEPS technology platform and is supported and jointly managed by the 25 largest banks of Uzbekistan.
Net1 UTA MD Leonid Delberg explains the UEPS smart card technology was developed to substitute cash in the domestic mass markets. “After 15 successful years, transaction volumes and numbers are consistently increasing, establishing UZKART as the preferred day-to-day means of payment in Uzbekistan,” he adds.
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