• Saudi Arabia-based fintech PayTabs, will fully acquire compatriot point of sale (POS) provider Digital Pay, for an unknown amount.
• Under the acquisition, Digital Pay will serve as PayTabs’ flagship POS terminal product for e-commerce and physical stores, which allows PayTabs to complete its foray into both online and offline payment capabilities.
• Founded in 2014 by Abdulaziz Al Jouf, PayTabs is a payments solutions provider that offers a payment gateway for online stores, meanwhile, Digital Pay, founded in 2018, offers POS terminals and soft POS for physical stores.

Press release:

PayTabs — Middle East, Africa, and South Asia’s (MEASA’s) award-winning payments powerhouse — in a historic move announced that it plans to acquire a 100% stake in Digital Pay, Saudi Arabia. 

Under the terms of the acquisition, Digital Pay will serve as PayTabs’ flagship point of sale (POS) terminal product, enabling and augmenting millions of e-commerce and retail businesses as well as physical stores, hypermarkets, and departmental stores to benefit. 

The merger allows PayTabs to complete its foray into both online and offline payment capabilities and elevate its market presence and commitment to the Kingdom’s Vision 2030. The aim is to grow the bottom line, revenue, transaction volumes, ticket sizes and the number of transactions for both firms.

The MoU, which aims to boost synergised super payments, comes just as digital disruption has hit a peak in the kingdom with Saudi Payments being both the foundation and driving force. On a mission to enable the payments ecosystem through secure, reliable, interoperable, and accessible solutions, Saudi Payments has long accelerated growth in the Kingdom via its’ flagship payment infrastructure brands SADAD, Sarie, Esal and mada.

Tamim Alqusair, senior vice president, business in Saudi Payments, said: “Saudi Payments aims to enable entities operating in the fintech space once players pass all needed testing and certification requirements successfully. Our objective in doing so is to maintain competitiveness between payments players through all different domains of e-invoicing, and e-commerce, point of sales and others. The past short period witnessed the successful enrollment of more than 30 players in the domains of e-commerce and POS to provide the needed support for these pivotal sectors to help them grow, and foster the Kingdom’s leading position as a payment hub for the region.”

Having conquered the Mena payment space with an online payment gateway acceptance, and expanded its portfolio to include soft-POS tap-to-pay solutions and more recently full-stack payment orchestration and social commerce, PayTabs will now cater to more retailers and traditional businesses that wish to offer payment acceptance via POS terminals. 

By providing merchants with more methods to accept payments, both firms are empowering merchants with digital payment methods, which powers and pushes forward the aim of the Saudi Vision 2030

This move will solidify PayTabs’ mission to provide a holistic best-in-class payments ecosystem platform for the region. This includes supercharged, seamless payment experiences for businesses in all key segments in the region from travel and trade to hospitality and healthcare. 

Digital Pay, which pioneered the POS business in an efficient and speedy way in the Saudi market, will continue to expand its footprint by offering POS to online merchants as well in multiple PayTabs markets. Any business will now be able to benefit from either digital payment acceptance solutions in the online space or the brick-and-mortar offline payments space.

Abdulwahab F. Alahmari, Chairman of Digital Pay, said: “As an innovative Fintech company driving digital payments in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the proposed merger with PayTabs will enable us to expand our customer and merchant reach across the region. We see limitless opportunity, growth, and potential in this upcoming alliance.”

Commenting on the MoU, Abdulaziz Al Jouf, PayTabs founder and CEO, said: “Our aim is to be the foremost infinite payment platform equation that accelerates the Kingdom’s economy towards Vision 2030. Every merchant wants you to solve his problem – and every payment solution, PayTabs orchestrates, is essentially born out of a problem in the market. We’re offering merchants of all sizes and scale a single platform and dashboard for all their next-generation payment processing requirements – be it virtual, physical, or digital. Online and in-person retailers, subscription businesses, software platforms and marketplaces, and everything in between will emerge winners from this powerful dynamic.” The greater impact of the deal is that omnichannel payments will now be a reality. 

The proposed consolidation with Digital Pay is another key milestone in PayTabs' efforts to offer e-commerce merchants and businesses an unparalleled best-in-class payments super platform, regionwide. The valuation of the merger deal remains undisclosed.

According to Statistica, the total transaction value in the Digital Payments segment is projected to reach $42.25 billion in 2022. The total transaction value is expected to show an annual growth rate of 13.16 per cent or a projected total amount of $78.40 billion by 2027.