DIGICEL says its plan to deepen it penetration in the mobile money market in Jamaica is in high gear with expectations to launch a new service “in the coming months” that will also target the remittance market.

Oliver Coughlan, chief executive officer of the Digicel Group, told the Jamaica Observer that the process is advanced with the person selected to head the division expected in Jamaica shortly.

“We have recently engaged and employ as head of financial services a world-leading industry expert, and she is top class. She’s worked in Eastern Europe, she’s worked in Pakistan…,” Coughlan said, indicating that the person selected is a woman. While her name was not revealed, the CEO said she has been working with the company for the last six months.

Digicel currently offers mobile money services in eight markets – Haiti, Jamaica and its six south Pacific markets which are now in the process of divestment to Australia-based telcoms Telstra.

The service in Jamaica includes a mobile app which was launched in partnership with Sagicor and Mastercard in 2018.

However, the company is now planning a mobile wallet.

“It’s providing a wallet, it’s letting people do remittance – we have a very strong diaspora across the globe in the south Pacific and across the Americas – allowing people to pay bills and it is allowing people to transfer money around the country,” Coughlan said without giving more details about the plans. He, however, in that answer indicated that Digicel will be going after the competitive remittance market which is dominated by Western Union.

“We’ve had it in Haiti for 10 years, we relaunched it in 2017, it’s a business that is growing phenomenally, it is growing well in Papua New Guinea. It will be a much better and a great business in Jamaica and then we will expand into other markets.”

“We’re going through the licensing [process] with the Bank of Jamaica. We are making good progress there. Our plan is to roll it out in the coming months in Jamaica,” said Coughlan about the issue.

“We will engage with Paymaster, which is one of our subsidiaries and bring those people into the fold and set up this mobile financial services business that can be, if needs be, a separate entity, but very much part of the Digicel family and it very much sort of supports and serves the customer base in our markets. So we have absolute plan to expand that beyond Jamaica, beyond Haiti in the coming months and those plans are well underway,” he reiterated.

Mobile money services in Jamaica has been expanding especially since the onset of the novel coronavirus pandemic. Just last week the central bank revealed it digital currency will be called Jam-Dex. Other entities such as NCB through its Lynk app and Wipay offer various types of mobile money services.

“I guess what helps us is that we have a very, very strong customer base who we talk to on a regular basis,” Coughlan replied when asked how the company plans to navigate what is increasingly becoming a competitive market.

Mobile money aside, Digicel is facing more competition in the mobile market with the recent announcement of Rock Mobile, headed by former ScotiaGroup CEO Bruce Bowen.

“We’ve had a very mobile savvy competitor come into this market recently, Claro, and I think they are still running. This is fundamentally a mature market,” Coughlan said in reference to the entry of the new telcoms operator.

“I’ve read the article on that competitor. They are talking about small numbers of investments to date and I just hope their investors have deep pockets and aren’t looking for a dividend anytime soon. We’ve invested US$1 billion, we are investing another US$200 million that was announced last year,” he continued.

Rock Mobile has been reported to plan US$90 million in investments over the next few years with its focus mainly on the broadband market.

According to records from Jamaica’s Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR), Rock Mobile has held ISP, Carrier, International Service Provider and Domestic Voice Service Provider licences since June 2020. The firm first expressed an interest in obtaining Jamaica’s third telecoms licence in January last year. It’s entry follows the exit of Caricel. The company is required to be “fully operational” within two years, with coverage reaching 95 per cent of the population. Rock Mobile executive chairman has ,however, indicated that he is facing setting up issues.

Coughlan, however, outlined that the new player won’t have it easygoing. “We will never take any competitor for granted, that’s not our nature.”

“We are not going to stand still and let anybody come in a do what we’ve did for 20 years. Digicel was founded in Jamaica, we built mobile in Jamaica as our base to go across the world…and we are not going to standstill and let anybody come in and [take away our share].