- Company Profile and Recent Developments: Adumo was acquired by Lesaka Technologies in 2024 for about $96.2 million, becoming a core merchant and payments-business in a larger fintech platform.
- Industry Trends, Challenges & Innovations: The payments sector in Southern Africa grapples with regulation, security, connectivity, and adoption; innovations such as buy-now-pay-later (BNPL), QR payments, digital wallets, embedded payments are growing fast. Adumo is leveraging many of these in its product lineup.
Adumo Technologies’ evolution and role in Lesaka
Adumo Technologies (Pty) Ltd is a fintech company based in Cape Town, South Africa. It provides payment-processing platforms, POS hardware and software, reconciliation services, merchant-lending, customer engagement tools and data analytics.
In October 2024, Lesaka Technologies completed its acquisition of Adumo. The deal included shares and cash, amounting to about US$96.2 million. The acquisition aimed to broaden Lesaka’s capabilities in merchant services, consumer offerings and regional reach in Southern Africa.
Adumo serves around 23,000 merchants. It operates across South Africa, Namibia, Botswana and Kenya. Its offerings are divided into three main business lines: Adumo Payments (payment processing, integrated payments, reconciliation etc.), Adumo ISV (Independent Software Vendor business, POS hardware/software for hospitality etc.), and Adumo Ventures (online commerce, multi-channel POS, aggregated payment and credit platform).
Also Read: Oracle to invest $3B in cloud and AI in Germany and Netherlands
Also Read: Oracle launches AI agent studio
Payments industry in Southern Africa: Key issues
The payments industry across Southern Africa faces many challenges. Regulation is complex. Compliance to financial intelligence, data protection, and anti-fraud laws is essential. Connectivity and reliable internet infrastructure vary; in remote or semi-rural areas power outages, network instability hamper digital payments. Trust among merchants and customers in digital payments is not uniform. Cost of hardware and transaction fees can be barriers especially for small and micro businesses. Also, competition is strong—from global players, local fintechs, mobile money etc.
Innovations and Adumo’s responses
Adumo is active in several innovative areas. It supports the Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) and QR-based payments to give the flexibility to consumers and merchants. It is moving towards to more omnichannel approaches: combining in-store POS, online payments, payment links, integrated POS software and reconciliation tools so merchants can manage different payment types in a unified way.
Security and compliance are priorities. Adumo is a registered Third Party Payment Provider (TPPP), Systems Operator, ISO and Aggregator. It adheres to PCI standards, EMVQR codes for QR payments, strong authentication methods like multi-factor authentication.
Also, it has programmes for indirect partners to reduce payment complexity, simplify integration with many POS systems, lighten regulatory burden for merchants, and provide better tools for reconciliation and financial visibility.
