Grameen Telecom concern launches gpay

Samadhan Services Ltd, a concern of Grameen Telecom Trust, today launched its digital financial services platform gpay, about a year after receiving a licence from Bangladesh Bank to operate as a payment service provider (PSP).

The platform will offer merchant payments, remittance transfers and other financial transactions, with the company initially targeting online merchants and about 900,000 retail touchpoints.

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Speaking at the launch ceremony at Pan Pacific Sonargaon Dhaka, Prof Muhammad Yunus, said it was another step in using technology to reduce people's reliance on cash.

Technology can help bring financial services to people at the bottom of society, said the founder of Grameen Bank and Grameen Telecom.

Recalling Grameen Bank’s early days, he said the bank embraced technology even when rural Bangladesh had little electricity or connectivity.

He also said Grameenphone, which was created as a joint venture between Grameen Telecom and Norway's Telenor, was designed to take telecommunications to poor people, particularly rural women.

“Our vision was that Grameenphone would be the telephone of poor people,” added Yunus, who won the Nobel Peace prize in 2006 for founding the Grameen Bank and pioneering the concepts of microcredit and microfinance.

He said the decision to give phones to poor rural women was initially mocked, with people questioning whom they would call and whether they could operate the devices.

However, the women eventually used the phones to provide communication services in their communities and earn money, he added.

According to Yunus, the experience demonstrated how technology could transform the lives of people at the bottom of society.

He said gpay represents another step in that journey by helping people move away from carrying cash. “I don’t have to carry money. Whatever money I need, I can get it, but I don’t have to carry it.”

Yunus said this freedom was particularly important for low-income people, for whom even a small amount of cash could be highly valuable.

He also described gpay as a “social business”, saying its purpose was to solve problems rather than generate personal wealth for its owners. “If people’s welfare improves and their problems are solved through this, which is why it is being done.”

Presenting  gpay’s key features and services, the platform’s CEO Ahmed Armaan Siddiqui, said, “Our goal is to reduce the complexities of financial transactions and make them simple and understandable for everyone. Our core commitment is to bring a solution to every financial challenge through ‘gpay, the Solution’.”

He said gpay would leverage Bangla QR to create an inclusive payment ecosystem and provide users with greater freedom to move money through National Payment Switch Bangladesh (NPSB) and cards.

“gpay will be nationwide,” he said, adding that it would start with huge numbers of key online merchants and 900,000 retail touchpoints.

He said gpay aims to reach 10 million users in 2026, with 90 percent targeted from the “bottom of the pyramid”.