Kora Takes Flight: New IATA Partnership Revolutionizes African Airline Settlements

Kora, a leading payment infrastructure platform, has announced its integration with the International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) IATA Financial Gateway (IFG). This strategic partnership aims to connect global airlines to Africa’s diverse payment ecosystem through a unified and reliable infrastructure layer.

The IATA Financial Gateway is specifically designed as the airline industry’s dedicated platform for payment orchestration and management. It unifies global, regional, and local payment partners to offer airlines a comprehensive mix of payment options, thereby maximizing acceptance, reducing operational costs, and enhancing customer service across various markets.

Through this significant integration, airlines and travel agencies leveraging IFG will now have the capability to accept a wide range of payment methods across the African continent via Kora. These methods include cards, bank transfers, mobile money, and other local alternative payment solutions. This eliminates the need for individual airlines to build or manage multiple complex integrations independently, streamlining their operations in the region.

Africa is recognized as one of the world's fastest-growing aviation markets, with projections indicating an addition of over 300 million new passengers by 2050. However, global airlines have historically encountered substantial operational hurdles when expanding into African markets. These challenges include fragmented local payment rails, complex foreign exchange regulations, disconnected settlement systems, and the arduous task of managing numerous payment service provider relationships across key countries such as Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, Egypt, and South Africa.

The partnership between Kora and IATA directly addresses and aims to remove these frictions. A single connection through IFG now grants airlines access to Kora’s extensive African payment infrastructure, ensuring robust settlement reliability and adherence to local compliance standards, which are crucial for enterprise-level operations.

Dickson Nsofor, CEO of Kora, underscored the importance of this collaboration, stating, “Africa is not a market to figure out later. It is a growth opportunity that demands serious infrastructure today. Our partnership with IATA signals that the rails are ready. Global airlines no longer have to choose between expanding into Africa and managing payment complexity. With Kora inside IFG, they get both.”

IATA currently represents over 370 international airlines worldwide. With Kora’s inclusion in IFG, these airlines gain direct access to Africa’s comprehensive payment stack across every market where Kora operates. Kamil Al-Awadhi, Regional Vice President, Africa and Middle East at IATA, further emphasized the benefits, remarking, “IATA Financial Gateway (IFG) enables increased travel payment processing flexibility for the world’s airlines and travel suppliers to build a cost-effective travel payment strategy. Kora’s participation strengthens our ability to serve airlines operating in or expanding across African markets.”