Every year, payments company Mastercard facilitates an initiative aimed at supporting innovative start-ups in the commerce solutions industry. Applications are open, to start-ups globally, for this year's course and will close on 11 October.
The Start Path Global programme offers small businesses the opportunity to work with mentors from MasterCard, and possibly collaborate with the firm.
The company says it is specifically launching a call for applications in South Africa.
"Start Path will be intensifying its search in South Africa because of the vibrant start-up community," the company said in a statement.
"The objective of the programme is to stay close to innovations that are coming out of South Africa and to drive success for the early-stage companies that are working on next-generation commerce technologies."
The course runs over six months.
Start Path was established in 2014 as a way for Mastercard to work directly with global start-ups building all manner of solutions, including blockchain, artificial intelligence and chatbots.
Since inception, 90 companies across 24 countries have gone through the programme. MasterCard is currently running active pilots with, or has directly invested in, nearly 20% of the companies.
There are three start-ups from Africa currently working with Mastercard: Saida, NFrnds and Dopay.
Saida is a start-up from Kenya that developed an app that uses the data on customers' smartphones to underwrite loans to them in minutes.
NFrnds connects five billion feature phone users, who don't have data plans, to information, communication and mobile payments.
Dopay is designed to be the 'day-to-day' bank in markets with largely unbanked populations. It provides a cloud-based payroll service that allows employers to calculate salaries and pay all employees electronically.
Applications for Start Path can be submitted here.
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