Case study ✦ Bank of West Africa
Digital banking that spans West Africa and its diaspora.
Bank of West Africa is a mobile-first banking platform: accounts with direct-deposit details, transfers by QR, phone number, or link, cross-border remittance with mobile-money payouts, virtual cards, and everyday services, across 12+ countries and 30+ currencies. AppDevs engineered the platform.
Customer
Bank of West Africa
Region
West Africa + North America corridor
Coverage
12+ countries, 30+ currencies
Platform type
Mobile-first digital banking
User roles
Consumers, merchants, and agents
Applications
Web, iOS, and Android
The context
A diaspora corridor needs banking on both ends.
Money in the West Africa–North America corridor lives in two systems at once: direct deposits and card checkouts on one side, mobile-money wallets and community agents on the other. Serving both usually means two products: a neobank for the diaspora and a wallet back home.
Bank of West Africa runs it as one platform: the same account holds a balance, receives a salary, sends money home to mobile money, and spends on a virtual card, with identity verification routed to the right provider for each region.
What was built
Banking, remittance, and cards on one account model.
01
Accounts with direct-deposit details
User accounts carrying routing and account numbers, so salaries and payouts can be deposited directly. That is banking behaviour, not just wallet behaviour.
02
Transfers three ways
Money moves by QR scan, by phone number, or by shareable payment link, whichever the sender and recipient have in hand.
03
Cross-border remittance with mobile-money payout
Sending across the West Africa to North America corridor with payout into mobile-money wallets, the collection method that actually reaches recipients across 12+ countries and 30+ currencies.
04
Virtual debit cards
Virtual cards issued on verification, extending account balances to online card-accepting checkouts.
05
Everyday services
Airtime top-ups, bill payments, gift cards, and small loans built into the same account. These are the recurring reasons to open the app.
06
Merchant acceptance and agent network
QR acceptance and gateway integration for merchants, plus agents facilitating transactions in their communities. Three roles on one account model.
07
Region-aware KYC orchestration
Identity verification routed by region: Smile ID for West African users, Persona for North America. One onboarding flow over two providers, because no single KYC vendor covers both markets well.
AppDevs engineered the technology platform, including the KYC-provider orchestration. Regulatory obligations, licences, card programmes, and banking or payout relationships are held and operated by Bank of West Africa as the operating business.
Outcomes
Measured results, published once verified.
From engagement to production
Confirmed with the customer before publishing
Processed across the corridor
[CUSTOMER QUOTE]
[NAME], [ROLE], Bank of West Africa
[Written quote from Bank of West Africa pending]