Why Fintech in Ethiopia Has Failed to Unify Payment Systems — And Why That’s Finally Changing

Dr. Jibril Mohamed Ahmed, Founder of Flamingo

For a country with a fast-growing digital economy and a rising generation of tech-savvy users, Ethiopia still faces one major fintech challenge: payment fragmentation. Despite the explosion of wallets, apps, and digital banking services, there’s no truly unified payment experience — one app, one flow, one place to manage all your money.

So why hasn’t fintech in Ethiopia cracked this yet?

The answer isn’t simple. It’s historical, structural, and sometimes philosophical. But change is coming — and it's being led by a new wave of solutions that put users first and collaboration at the center.

From mobile wallets to digital banks, fintech in Ethiopia has grown in silos. Each player builds its own app, creates its own ecosystem, and tries to lock users in. This worked in the early phase of growth. But now, it’s become a burden. Users are tired of juggling multiple apps to check balances, send money, or make payments. They want simplicity — not fragmentation. Yet many fintechs have fallen into the trap of viewing interoperability as a threat instead of an opportunity. Unification doesn’t mean giving up ownership. It means giving users the freedom to move.

A lot of digital finance in Ethiopia has been technology-centered rather than human-centered. In other words: "What can we build?" has too often replaced "What do users need?" But the average user doesn’t care about your backend architecture or custom protocol. They care that their money is accessible, manageable, and secure — in one place. This is where fintech needs to grow: from product-focused to experience-focused. The future belongs to apps that listen to users, not just engineers.

Ethiopia is building the backbone: EthSwitch, the national payment switch, is a powerful piece of the puzzle — designed to facilitate interoperability between banks, wallets, and PSPs. But making that infrastructure work smoothly requires full integration from all players, updated regulatory frameworks, and aligned technical standards. Progress is happening. But it’s slower than what users are asking for.

There’s a widespread belief that to lead in fintech, you have to control the backend — the transactions, the rails, the funds. But that mindset is outdated. Look at India’s UPI: it revolutionized payments not because one company owned everything, but because everyone connected to the same rails. Apps like PhonePe, Google Pay, and Paytm built amazing user experiences on top of a shared infrastructure. That’s what unification really means — not monopoly, but mutual alignment.

Interoperability requires more than tech — it needs cooperation. Banks, startups, regulators, and developers need to share APIs, collaborate on pilots, and agree on common rules. Until now, that level of trust and coordination has been rare. But the culture is shifting. We’re seeing more openness, more dialogue, and more players willing to build together.

It starts with flipping the script. Instead of building more isolated platforms, we need to build bridges. Instead of asking, “How do we own the transaction?” we must ask, “How do we help the user succeed?”

That’s where Flamingo comes in — not as a wallet, not as a Payment system operator/Gateway, but as a user-first interface. One app that connects to all banks and wallets. One space where users can see and manage their money. One flow that simplifies payments, powered by licensed partners and national infrastructure.

We don’t own the backend. We connect the ecosystem. And in that lies the true promise of fintech — not building alone, but building together.

Ethiopia doesn’t lack fintech talent. It lacks fintech unity. Let’s change that. Let’s build bridges — for the user, for the country, and for a future where payments just work.