As Africa’s digital economy expands, homegrown innovators are building tools to solve long-standing gaps in essential services. One of them is QuePay, a Kenyan fintech and IoT startup selected for the latest Spark Accelerator, a venture-building programme by Safaricom, M-PESA Africa and Sumitomo Corporation.
Spark Accelerator gives early-stage companies access to M-PESA APIs, cloud services, engineering support and hands-on mentorship. The goal is simple: help refine products, test them with real customers and prepare startups for commercial scale.
QuePay stands out in this cohort for its approach to digitising automated community services. Its locally engineered IoT devices connect water ATMs, milk dispensers, oil vending kiosks and other machines to the cloud, enabling cashless payments and real-time data visibility. The result is more transparency for operators, cooperatives and counties and easier access to essential goods for thousands of users.
We sat down with Victor Boit, Founder of QuePay, to understand how the company is tackling accountability challenges, improving service delivery and leveraging Spark Accelerator support to scale across Africa.
How is QuePay addressing the transparency gap in automated community services?
For years, water points and milk ATMs have run with very little visibility. Counties and cooperatives often relied on manual reconciliation, which left room for leakages and doubt. QuePay connects every machine to the cloud in real time. Each sale is captured instantly, giving stakeholders clear data on revenue, machine uptime and usage patterns. This transparency restores trust and turns these kiosks into accountable, well-managed micro-enterprises.
What advantages come from engineering your IoT hardware locally?
Imported devices are expensive and rarely built for African conditions. Designing and fabricating our hardware in Kenya lets us lower costs and tailor performance to local realities from unstable power to dusty environments. We can also customise fast, support users quickly and adapt to new sectors without waiting for overseas shipments. That agility has been key to our growth.
Which Spark Accelerator integrations have made the biggest impact?
The deeper M-PESA API integration has improved the speed and reliability of payments on our devices. Working directly with Safaricom engineers has strengthened our platform’s stability and security. Cloud credits eased one of our biggest cost pressures. And access to EADAK, Safaricom’s device assembly facility, gives us a path to mass production locally.
How is QuePay supporting youth and women running automated kiosks?
QuePay gives them real-time sales visibility, reduced cash risk and data to guide decisions. Many are seeing business intelligence for the first time which improves profitability and builds trust with suppliers and funders.
Which African markets show the strongest demand, and what barriers remain?
We see strong traction in water, dairy, oil vending, laundromats, transport and recreation. To scale, we must address fragmented payment systems, regulatory differences and manufacturing capacity. By integrating multiple PSPs and building local partnerships, we’re preparing for continent-wide deployment.”
