We engage Zapper CEO Brett White on the state of small business in South Africa one year into the pandemic. We also discuss innovation, fintechs vs banks, and the technologies that will drive the payments space in the years to come.
Here are some excerpts from the episode.
On banks v fintechs
“There are regulations and there are limitation in terms of what the systems allow for. And the fintechs are always going to push those limits to do exactly those things that are limited…And the reality is a lot of the bigger entities move slower. So they're going to struggle in that space.”
“And I think that they will be a lot of opportunity for fintechs to supplement and work with those bigger entities to provide the capability that they so desire. So I think there will always be a symbiotic sort of relationship there.”
On emerging technologies
“I think long term biometric technologies are going to take over in terms of how people transact and purchase things. In the interim, however, I mean for the next five years, we're in a space where mobile payments are predominant. There's gonna be a lot of innovation around payments instruments themselves in terms of the rails over which people make payments. Things like blockchain, open banking, instant EFT, all those types of solutions are being introduced.”
On cryptocurrency
“What we've seen over the last few months are some schemes starting to produce the ability to at least flirt with the idea of supporting crypto. And some of the banks are talking about it as well. And I think a couple of months ago, that would have been very frowned upon. I don't think that would have been well supported. I think what Elon Musk has done recently with buying a lot of Bitcoin has certainly lit a fire under that.”
Episode 14: Brett White, Zapper