Leading electronic bill presentment and payment (EBPP), Fawry, is set to launch a new payment service for pre-paid smart electricity metres in Egypt. Ashraf Sabry, CEO and co-founder of Fawry, announced that the new service will allow citizens to pay electricity bills at the nearest Fawry outlet. Customers then won't need to visit electricity companies to provide them with credit cards services for smart electricity metres, he added. Speaking to Amwal Al Ghad, Sabry added that this is one of many services Fawry provides in cooperation with the Ministry of Electricity. Fawry provides payment solutions for the three mobile operators- Vodafone, Mobinil, and Etisalat, in addition to the electricity companies in Egypt. The company also provides payment solutions to nine companies in the water and sewage sector, in addition to the traffic department through allowing the payment of fines online, as well as the renewal of licences. Moreover, the company cooperates with the majority of the private and public banks operating in the Egyptian market. Among the most prominent services provided by the application are cars licence services, paying electricity and water bills, as well as paying Internet and land-line bills. Moreover, Fawry is looking forward to add more services that will make life easier for its clients. A year earlier, a consortium of three international financial investors acquired 85 percentof Fawry. The acquisition amounted to $100 million. Approximately 20 percent of the shares were acquired by the Egyptian American Enterprise Fund, 40 percent by Helios International Partners (on behalf of the funds it consults for), and 25 percent of the share was acquired by the MENA Long Term Value Fund. The remaining shares in Fawry were distributed, with 5 percent for the International Finance Corporation (IFC), while 10 percent represents the management's share.
