Business View Caribbean | April 2021

103 BUSINESS VIEW CARIBBEAN APRIL 2021 Wi Pay WiPay also processes government payments in Trinidad, in Guyana for the country’s civil aviation agency, besides additional government contracts in Grenada. Away from the public sector, it provides online payment solutions for the private sector, including fertility clinics in Grenada and the insurance company Sagicor that has operations across the Caribbean. While Wayne is proud to list all the company’s major customers, he is also quick to reiterate their commitment to serve the whole market. “We serve everyone,” he says, “from mega- corporations and government agencies down to individuals like high school kids building mobile apps.” Speaking on the broader payments industry, Wayne sees WiPay moving towards digital cash, a trend he sees playing out across the region and indeed the world. “Right now, WiPay is focused on fiat payments, but soon, I see us making a strong push towards digital currencies like Bitcoin or some variation of it,” he avers. He supports his rationale by referencing a recent announcement by Visa and MasterCard to include cryptocurrencies in their payment network. As the de facto online payment network in the Caribbean, WiPay expects to follow suit within the near future and include cryptocurrencies within its network. However, instead of just allowing third-party digital currencies, it is taking a more ambitious stance and looking to develop and deploy its own digital currency. Wayne acknowledges, “We recently signed an agreement with the company that developed for the Government of Bahamas the world’s first Central Bank-backed digital currency, the Sand Dollar. Our agreement sets the stage for the development of WiPay’s cryptocurrency digital currency that will work within our payments ecosystem across the Caribbean and potentially gain acceptance from each of the central banks in the region.” On WiPay’s growth trajectory, Wayne expects the company to expand to the non-English- speaking Caribbean, including Haiti and the Dominican Republic, in the next two years. However, the area he sees the most potential in is creating a unified payments system for the entire Caribbean. “The Caribbean is disjointed as a region,” he says, “with different central banks and monetary policies covering a relatively small geographical area, which makes it difficult to do business seamlessly across the region. Our ultimate goal is to bridge the gap between all Caribbean islands using a unified settlement network built on top of a regional payments ecosystem that uses a regulated currency or a central bank-backed digital currency.” To achieve this, WiPay is forging valuable partnerships with local banks and multinational companies like MasterCard, Ria, and Western Union. According to Wayne, “With these