The move reflects growing demand in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) for advanced fleet, fuel, and retail payment technologies, with the region’s unique market conditions proving a natural fit for Payment24’s flexible platform.

The company’s Middle East journey began with a major contract win from one of the region’s largest oil companies, which selected Payment24 to deliver a comprehensive fleet and payment solution.

Building on this momentum, the company has since opened a dedicated office in Dubai, with plans underway to expand its physical presence in Abu Dhabi.

With boots on the ground, Payment24 is now supporting a growing portfolio of customers across the UAE and Saudi Arabia, with projects spanning payment automation, loyalty, mobile payments, and advanced retail capabilities.

“The Middle East is an exciting market that presents a rare blend of digital ambition, regulatory momentum, and appetite for innovation,” said Shadab Rahil, CEO at Payment24. “We’re seeing a region-wide shift towards modernisation, and that creates a significant opening for platforms like ours that are flexible, scalable, and deeply rooted in real-world operational experience.

“For example, Saudi Arabia is an exceptionally competitive market, but it’s also highly fragmented, with no single fuel brand owning more than 5–6% of the market. But that’s exactly where the opportunity lies. The government is pushing for consolidation and digital transformation, and our platform allows new and existing players to leapfrog stages of evolution—moving straight to cloud-based, mobile-first infrastructure that’s already proven in Africa and other developing markets.”

In contrast, the UAE represents one of the most advanced retail fuel markets in the world. Payment24’s engagements there go beyond providing a payments platform; they include integration with facial and licence plate recognition systems, as well as the enablement of EV, CNG, and even hydrogen refuelling solutions.

Looking ahead, there is also a focus on integrating robotic refuelling arms. “UAE operators prioritise convenience above all else. The tech sophistication is unmatched, and our solutions fit perfectly into this environment,” Rahil noted.

As part of its long-term strategy, Payment24 recently repackaged its extensive platform into four solution verticals: Fleet Solutions, Payment Processing, Loyalty & Rewards, and Retail Automation.

This modular approach has enabled the company to support oil and gas customers in designing a full digital roadmap tailored to each market’s maturity. From basic fleet cards and windshield tags to fully automated, open-loop mobile payment ecosystems, the platform acts like an “operating system” for the downstream oil and gas sector.

Payment24’s growth in the GCC is testament not only to its product flexibility but to its hands-on approach.

The company has steered clear of reseller models, opting instead for direct presence and local engagement.

“Understanding local behaviour, culture, and regulation is essential when servicing customers in any region, but especially in the Middle East. There’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all approach in this business,” said Nolan Daniel, CEO at Payment24.

“Every market and city comes with its own set of customer expectations, regulatory frameworks, and operational realities. What works in one region can completely miss the mark in another. That’s why we don’t just deploy a product, we embed ourselves in the local environment, invest in people on the ground, and take the time to localise both our platform and our service model.”

Looking ahead, Payment24 is actively pursuing opportunities across the wider GCC, including markets such as Oman, Bahrain and Qatar, where similar dynamics are opening up room for rapid digital acceleration.

The company’s global footprint also extends to Africa and Latin America, with the Asia Pacific region set to follow.

“Our success in the Middle East proves that with the right product architecture and regional commitment, you can deliver world-class technology that truly meets the needs of local operators, no matter how complex or fragmented the market may be,” concluded Rahil.

The EMV standard, now being implemented in over 80 markets, has dramatically reduced the incidence of counterfeit card fraud associated with magnetic strip cards, saving hundreds of millions in potential losses.

This partnership not only drives innovation in the fleet and fuel payments sector, but also aims to speed up the transition to the secure EMV standard and help fleet operators reduce the risk of fraud associated with magnetic strip fleet cards.

This expanded collaboration extends the geographical reach of a proven solution and delivers modern fleet and fuel payment solutions to banks and fleet card issuers throughout the region. While drivers benefit from a quick, secure, and seamless way to make payments, fleet operators can now monitor driver spending in real-time, set expense limits, and minimize the need for cash.

“By combining Mastercard’s leading payment technology with Payment24’s innovative and proven fuel payments platform, we deliver a solution for the region that enhances security and adds significant value and convenience for customers,” said Clyde Rosanowski, senior vice president of Commercial Solutions, EEMEA at Mastercard.

Through the partnership, customers will be able to take advantage of an end-to-end Fleet Management solution to help them rapidly deploy and scale their own secure fleet and fuel payment offerings. The offering is designed to deliver a suite of EMV-based payment products and extends to a host of modern payment mechanisms, including tokenized tags, e-wallets and vouchers that are all native to the Payment24 platform.

“We are exceptionally proud of how our partnership with Mastercard has developed. The expansion of this alliance to EEMEA highlights the urgent need to get ahead of fraud in the fleet and fuel payments industry. We believe that our combined offering will help customers in the banking industry to better mitigate risks associated with legacy technologies while enhancing transparency and flexibility,” says Shadab Rahil, Joint CEO of Payment24.

“Our deep understanding and tailor-made fuel and fleet technologies go beyond providing secure EMV cards. We deliver mobile payments, windshield tags for identification, and real-time tracking of vehicles and fuel via telematics, all integrated within a dedicated vehicle and fleet management platform. This allows customers to monitor fuel expenses and consumption and actively detect and prevent potential fraud,” adds Nolan Daniel, Joint CEO at Payment24.

Customers across the region can now be rest assured that each transaction is protected by Mastercard’s multiple security layers, fraud prevention technologies, dispute processes and underpinned by Payment24’s technical knowledge and in-depth understanding of fuel payment technologies.

The businesses will collectively provide customers throughout Europe access to the Payment24 platform, including payment, fleet management, mobile and retail, loyalty, electric vehicle (EV), and Cloud Switch solutions.

Payment24 is an emerging leader in digital platform development with a presence in five continents and 18 countries. With the growing demand for its white-label and infrastructure-agnostic solutions in Europe, its investment in Inergy 24 provides the company with a further launchpad into the continent and the scalability needed to provide its multi-national clients with the expertise and reach required to support the global rollout of the Payment24 platform.

“As a fairly new player in the European digital and fuel payments ecosystem, our platform provides customers bound to unwieldy legacy payment solutions with an entirely reimagined digital solution that is quick and easy to deploy. This is extremely exciting time to enter the European market, and we are experiencing enormous interest in the platform and its additional retail and banking capabilities,” says Shadab Rahil, Joint CEO at Payment24. “Our investment in Inergy 24 allows us to better serve and deliver solutions to clients across Europe.”

As part of the agreement, the Payment24 team has appointed industry expert Alan McGown as the CEO of the Inergy 24 and joint Payment24 CEOs Shadab Rahil and Nolan Daniel will serve on the company’s board. Alongside ongoing investment and access to its platform, Payment24 will provide Inergy 24 with access to its development, support, sales, and marketing teams.

Payment24 has significantly advanced in the payment and loyalty sector, particularly in the fuel industry. It operates one of Africa’s largest private label refuelling networks, handling transactions for a significant portion of the region’s fuel stations and facilitating cross-border refuelling.

Payment24 also operates in multiple countries in the Americas and is experiencing tremendous growth in the region.

This is supported by its growth in fuel loyalty programmes, processing billions of litres of fuel annually, and its expansion into retail loyalty, enhanced by click-and-collect and mobile payment features.

Its services include advanced payment channels like windshield fuel tags, Fastlane, mobile payments and vouchering, and customer engagement methods like WhatsApp and USSD, and it offers solutions for car rental business and banking, supported by its recent launch of Cloud Switch, a cloud-based payments and transacting solution.

In recognition of the shift towards alternative energy, the company also offers an electric vehicle (EV) solution, enabling transactions for EV and traditional fossil fuels that meet European and EU standards.

Beyond its expertise in closed-loop payments, Payment24 now supports open-loop EMV payments, combining the security of its traditional system with open-loop requirements.

“The investment from Payment24 comes at a time when European businesses are hungry for a change from outdated, inflexible payment solutions,” says Alan McGown, CEO at Inergy 24. “The modularity and expandability of the Payment24 platform allows our customers to think beyond payments and add elements such as loyalty, telematics, mobile payments, and even vouchers to their offerings. Its EV payment is also exceptionally relevant for the growing ESG requirements in Europe.”

“Over the last three years, the Payment24 platform has grown from a fleet management and petroleum payments solution to an all-encompassing payments and transacting solution,” says Nolan Daniel, joint CEO at Payment24. “We are constantly developing the platform, and today we are delivering solutions to customers in the banking, oil, retail, convenience, transport, and logistics markets. In addition, our ongoing development and the inclusion of technologies such as AI to the platform ensure that our clients benefit from constant modernisation and can adapt their offerings at the speed of business.”

At its core, Payment24 remains committed to an open, highly integrative platform compatible with various third-party technologies and hardware, ensuring real-time service delivery.

This approach allows the platform to work seamlessly with partners and competitors, highlighting its versatility and adaptability in the evolving digital payment landscape.

This revolutionary cloud-based payment solution expertly serves the unique needs of acquiring banks, fuel retailers, merchants, and retailers, and dramatically decreases the time to market for businesses wanting to upgrade their transaction switching systems.

Cloud Switch is a fully integrated, versatile, hardware-less payment switch that supports a myriad of payment methods.

The product combines cloud technology, various payment methods, robust POS compatibility, and a suite of value-added services to deliver an all-inclusive transaction environment.

For companies looking for a one-stop-shop solution, Payment24 is also offering customers the option to purchase the Cloud Switch transaction switching platform, POS Terminals, TMS and Field Service Support components directly from them.

“Cloud Switch embodies our dedication to transforming the payment ecosystem. This solution empowers acquiring banks and fuel retailers to easily manage complex payments, harnessing the cloud’s power for unmatched scalability and reliability,” says Shadab Rahil, Joint CEO at Payment24. “Ultimately Cloud Switch was developed to cater to a global market but developed with the localisation capabilities required to adapt it to every region it is deployed in. We believe it marks a significant stride in financial technology, bringing versatile payment methods, seamless transaction flows, and vital real-time monitoring capabilities into our clients’ hands. Our goal is to simplify, streamline, and secure the payment processes, and Cloud Switch is a testament to that mission.”

According to Payment24, the time to market to change a transaction switching platform is usually an arduous and painful exercise for retailers and banks. With Cloud Switch’s unique architecture and multitude of existing integrations, the time required to migrate can be decreased significantly.

Key features of the new solution include cloud-based infrastructure hosted on Microsoft Azure, no need for additional hardware, support for multi-faceted payment methods, and an inclusive merchant portal for comprehensive transaction monitoring.

For acquiring banks, Cloud Switch enhances traditional standalone POS machines allowing banks to expand offerings to modern digital payment services, offers a comprehensive application engine, and supports a wide variety of payment methods.

The transaction switching platform also provides fully integrated payment processing with various industry leading POS and forecourt systems, something not seen before in the existing payment market.

Fuel retailers can expect a multitude of benefits such as multi-bank acquiring, compatibility with popular forecourt controllers and POS terminals, and value-added services like support for their Loyalty and Rewards, Click n Collect, Vouchering, and Coupons offerings. Additionally, Payment24 Cloud Switch also enables the acceptance of Mobile Money a growing need in emerging markets globally.

A unique optional feature of Cloud Switch is real-time TMS monitoring, providing businesses with comprehensive insights into their transactions and aiding in data-driven decision-making.

The product also offers tailored application flows for standalone and integrated merchants, ensuring a seamless transaction process.

“With an established history of industry-leading innovation, Payment24 continues to redefine payment solutions. Cloud Switch embodies this ethos of transformation and progress,” Nolan Daniel, Joint CEO at Payment 24. “We understand the intricacies of the payment landscape and strive to make it more efficient, seamless, and user-friendly for businesses. Our comprehensive Cloud Switch solution goes beyond merely processing payments; it’s a powerful tool that empowers businesses to stay ahead of the curve, increase profitability, and deliver an unmatched customer experience. As we move into the future, we believe we are setting new standards in the payment industry with the launch of Cloud Switch.”

Payment24, the global platform provider specialising in payment and loyalty solutions, announced that the organisation is enjoying continued growth, has significantly expanded operations and acquired several new logo clients as it diversifies its business beyond a provider of solutions for the fuel industry and banks only.

In support, the company has also announced the significant global expansion of its operations into North America and Europe and ongoing product innovation with the launch of Cloud Switch, the expansion of its loyalty platform, the inclusion of artificial intelligence (AI) across its products, and a bold move into the electric vehicles (EV) space.

The organisation’s geographical reach has expanded considerably, and Payment24 has a deployment presence in five continents in close to 17 countries.

According to its executive team, following on its success in Africa and Latin America region, its sights are set on Europe and North America, and in 2022 the company opened its doors in Boston.

Based on the growing interest and demand for its solutions, a platform specifically tailored to the North American market will be released in the next six months.

Further, it has extended its reach in Europe with the investment in a business based in Geneva, Switzerland, from which it will serve the needs of the European market.

Since its launch, Payment24 has one of the largest private label refuelling networks in South Africa and neighbouring countries and is on target to facilitate the payments of more than half of the fuel stations in the country.

This is alongside an extensive network supporting cross-border refuelling in hundreds of locations across over ten African countries. Based on its expansive and growing loyalty footprint, which sees billions of litres of fuel transacted through the Payment24 platform annually, it is now also one of the largest fuel loyalty providers in the country.

This follows a growing retail loyalty footprint, which with the recent inclusion of click-and-collect and mobile payment modules to its platform, is experiencing exceptional growth across a diverse retail market.

Due to the diversity of the company’s platform and its evolution from being a dominant player in only the oil space to its expansion into other industries, Payment24 has announced that it has streamlined its offerings into industry-specific solutions catering to six core industries, including banking, oil, retail, convenience, transport, and logistics.

According to Shadab Rahil, CEO of Payment24, the company’s renewed focus and categorisation of its offerings provides a clear direction of where it can assist customers while helping them better understand how the platform supports their business.

We have experienced exceptional growth over the past three years and continue to enjoy significant success in the banking and oil industries,” says Rahil. “Since the expansion of our platform and the modules we provide, we have made notable inroads into the retail, payments acquiring, and fleet management space, having secured several new customers in these sectors over the last two years. To support this growth, we have more than doubled our headcount in the last two years, and because more than 50% of our business comes from outside the South African borders, 33% of our team is now based outside of the country.

“As an R&D company, Payment24 invests heavily in our development teams, which is quickly being matched by a growing support team, especially in Central America, as demand mounts for localised support in each country we operate,” adds Rahil.

Technical and Product Evolution

In the last three years, the company has matured the core competencies of its fleet and fuel payment and loyalty offerings by introducing additional payment channels and customer engagement methods such as WhatsApp and USSD, as well as the overall enhancement of its loyalty platform.

Its focus has also been extended to provide service offerings to the car rental and the banking industry, underpinned by its launch of Cloud Switch.

This cloud-based acquiring solution is a fully integrated standalone offering that is today being used by several banks across the continent as their primary payment acquiring tool.

According to Payment24, its loyalty offering is receiving incredible interest. Based on the complex nature of loyalty transactions, the company has expanded its platform to include multiple loyalty options for its customers depending on the nature of the industry and the transaction itself.

This is clearly defined in the product roadmap it delivers to customers who can invest in a finance, fleet, or retail solution today and then add a loyalty component as their needs evolve.

To support the growing global demand for alternative fuel and energy sources, the company has recently developed and enabled modules and support for electric vehicles (EV) on its platform, providing oil companies with an effective means to transact across both EV and fossil fuel transactions. This includes developing a tailored system to support European and EU requirements.

 “It’s important to meet your customers where they are and simultaneously offer them a roadmap for the future of their business while melding this with future technologies. This approach provides stickiness between you and your customers while ensuring you can walk a longer road with them,” says Nolan Daniel, CEO at Payment24. “Another key evolutionary step for us is identifying the effective and ethical use of artificial intelligence (AI) across our entire platform. We are already looking at improving automation and elevating the customer experience using AI and believe this will become an essential part of the future of Payment24.”

While traditionally leaders and experts in the closed-loop payment space, the company has also expanded its offering to support open-loop EMV (MasterCard and Visa) payments by adding its own issuing and acquiring open-loop EMV platform to its platform. This solution melds the security features inherent in its traditional closed-loop solution with the newly mandated open-loop requirements, providing transactional customers with an extra layer of security.

The core features of the Payment24 solution promise continue to be underpinned by an open platform that supports high integration with third-party technology and software providers. It is also 100% hardware agnostic, works with partners and competitors when required, and delivers all its services in real time. 

“Looking ahead, 2023 will be a watershed year for Payment24, where we will be announcing our expansion into new geographies supported by the announcement of several new key technologies and several significant new customers. Our reach and influence is one of our greatest success stories and we are looking forward to helping our customers globally transform their business and improve their customer experience through the application of our technologies,” ends Rahil.