Mission Mobile has secured up to R500 million ($30.8 million) from South African investment group DN Invest (DNI) to expand its smartphone financing business, The Condia reported.
How it works
Mission Mobile sells through mobile network operators’ shops. Customers pay for a smartphone over time and get cheaper data as part of the package. Its DataBack Device product is aimed at prepaid customers, while a postpaid option targets people who would normally be rejected for a contract.
More than 80% of South Africa’s roughly 108 million mobile connections are prepaid, so most people are outside the contracts that usually come with phone financing.
Scoring customers differently
The company’s underwriting platform, Beam, assesses customers using income and spending data, not only credit bureau checks. Mission Mobile says more than 40% of applicants fail standard credit checks even though they can repay.
About the funding
The money comes from DNI’s own capital and ring-fenced debt facilities, much of it secured against the phones being financed and the repayments they generate. That makes it closer to asset financing than a typical venture round. DNI works with all four major South African networks and handles more than four million handsets a year, giving Mission Mobile ready-made distribution.
Why it matters for Nigeria
Smartphone financing is growing in Nigeria too, through companies such as Easybuy and CDcare, and through partnerships with operators. As AI-driven demand for memory chips pushes phone prices up, pay-over-time plans are becoming one of the main ways Africans get online. The key risk, as in South Africa, is whether lenders can judge who will repay without traditional credit records.
Source: The Condia.
