M-PESA Ethiopia adds AI to its wallet

28 February 2026

On today's Techpoint Digest, we discuss M-PESA Ethiopia adding AI to its wallet, when a job offer becomes a war zone, and SIU exposing R181M Home Affairs fraud.

Bonjour,

Victoria from Techpoint here,

Here’s what I’ve got for you today:

M-PESA Ethiopia adds AI to its wallet

When a job offer becomes a war zone

SIU exposes R181M Home Affairs fraud

M-PESA Ethiopia adds AI to its wallet

M-PESA

Ethiopia’s mobile money app is getting an AI upgrade. M-PESA Ethiopia has teamed up with Gebeya Inc., an AI-powered creator platform, to roll out the Dala AI Bundle, a subscription product that gives users access to AI creation tools directly through their mobile money accounts. In simple terms, the same app people use to send money can now help them build apps, design games, generate comics, and create content in local languages.

The companies say this is the first time an African mobile money operator has bundled AI-powered creative tools as a mainstream consumer product. The bundle integrates Gebeya’s Dala Studio tools into the M-PESA ecosystem, allowing Ethiopians to subscribe and pay seamlessly within the app. The tools support app development, AI agent creation, game building, and AI-generated content in Amharic, Oromo, and other local languages, a notable move in a market where most AI tools default to English.

What this means is that AI access in Ethiopia may no longer be limited to developers with foreign cards or access to global platforms. By embedding AI tools inside a widely used payments app, the barrier to entry drops significantly. A student in Addis Ababa, a small business owner in Bahir Dar, or a creative in Hawassa can experiment with building digital products without navigating complicated payment systems.

The launch also builds on Gebeya’s earlier footprint in the country through the Safaricom Talent Cloud, which has trained thousands of Ethiopian developers. Now, instead of focusing only on upskilling, the model extends into tooling — giving creators infrastructure, not just training.

MTN in talks to acquire remaining 75% of IHS

Zooming out, the move signals something bigger: M-PESA’s evolution from a payments...