Uchi Uchibeke for Chimoney

Posted on Jan 19

Integrate Interledger to Chimoney — ILF Grant Final Report

#finalreports #grantreports #community #ilfgrantee

Brief Project Description

Chimoney enables efficient cross-border payments, payouts, and disbursements for emerging platforms, financial institutions, and creator communities through our APIs and web Platforms.

Our Integrate Interledger to Chimoney Wallet project integrates Rafiki with Chimoney's Wallet by harnessing the potential of the Interledger Protocol (ILP) and paving the way for enhanced financial interoperability and accessibility on a global scale, enabling funds received into an Interledger-enabled Chimoney Wallet to be effortlessly cashed out to local payment options including Bank accounts across 130+ countries, Mobile Money services like MPESA, 3,000+ global gift cards, Airtime and so much more.

Project Update

Highlights and wins

~200 Chimoney Interledger Payment Pointers have been created by Chimoney users
Transactions of real money between Interledger Payment Pointers were completed successfully in production (beta)
Mass Payout of real money to Chimoney Interledger Payment Pointers completed successfully
Linking an Interledger Wallet Address to an NFC Card and a Chimoney Public Profile hosted at profile.chimoney.io completed successfully.

Project Impact & Target Audience(s)

The Chimoney Project enables users across different demographics to pay and get paid using the payment method they already use and love. Some Areas where Chimoney's project is having an impact include:

1) Users in Emerging Markets: A substantial portion of individuals in emerging markets remains financially underserved. The global freelance economy is growing, yet many freelancers, especially from countries like Nigeria, Gabon, and other African nations, face significant barriers when trying to access their earnings. Traditional payment systems are not only inefficient but also exorbitantly expensive for these users. It's not uncommon for individuals to lose up to 30% of their hard-earned income to a combination of bank fees, unfavorable foreign exchange rates, and other transaction-related charges. Beyond freelancers, beneficiaries of grants and remote workers also face these challenges. Chimoney's solution targets this massive pain point by facilitating seamless, cost-effective global payouts to even those without traditional banking access. With this grant, we worked on issuing Payment Pointers to all Chimoney users.

2) Fintech Startups: The fintech landscape is booming, yet for many startups, the initial journey is fraught with challenges. Deciding on the right API, understanding and complying with multifaceted regulations, and setting up efficient payment systems can be daunting and time-consuming. Chimoney's 'Wallet as a Service' product caters specifically to these startups, offering a streamlined solution that not only simplifies the setup process but will also incorporate an Interledger Payment pointer, further expanding the utility and reach of these startups.

Progress on Objectives, Activities and Key results

The Goals and Objectives of our Integrate Interledger to Chimoney Wallet project include:

The project has the following goals and key objectives:

1. Goal: Research the potential impact of Interledger to enhance Financial Inclusion for the underserved.
Objective 1: Conduct User interviews and surveys to understand the need for ILP.
Objective 2: Do a deep into Rafiki and how it solves the user problems from objective 1.

2. Goal: Prepare and share research findings with partners and prepare to integrate Rafiki into Chimoney Wallets.
Objective 1: Finalize Technical design for Integrating ILP into Chimoney Wallet
Objective 2: Present the design to the Tech team and Interledger Community leaders to get feedback before implementing the integration.

Integrate Interledger to Chimoney Wallets - Google Docs

docs.google.com

3) Goal: Go Live and issue Production Payment Pointers.
Objective 1: Deploy Rafiki and required dependencies within Chimoney.
Objective 2: Connect Chimoney Wallet Creation to Payment Pointer issuance.

Project Key Results

1) Cashout Interledger Payments to local currencies, wallets, and assets: Beneficiaries of ILP Payments often struggle to access these funds in local banks and wallets. This gap widens in regions like Africa, where a significant portion of the population relies on methods like Mobile Money, airtime, or even unconventional digital touchpoints like phone numbers, email, and Twitter. Our integration with ILP acts as a bridge, allowing funds transferred via ILP to be immediately accessible to beneficiaries in their preferred methods, be it bank transfers, gift cards, crypto, mobile money, airtime, and more.

2) Send mass payment to multiple Interledger Payment Pointers: Our integration supports sending bulk transfers to multiple payment pointers with a single click. Organizations can instantly send Payments like Grants, remittances, Contractor, and Creator rewards and Payments to one or thousands of people in any country.

Communications and Marketing

For Communications and Marketing, we leveraged a multi-channel approach which included:

Press Releases
Events and Conferences
Hackathon Sponsorships
Social Media and
Email Marketing

Some highlights of our Communications and Marketing efforts include:

National and International Media Coverage

Our Press release garnered the attention of reputable press and media across Africa, North America, and beyond with a reach of 3.8 billion.

Chimoney Interledger Press Release Impact — Chimoney Interledger Integration PR and Media Analytics

Events and Speaking

We presented our integration at:

1) ILP Summit


Summit Showcase	Chimoney Demo at ILP Summit

2) Interledger Community Call

3) Africa Events: As part of a tour to present Chimoney to the broader ecosystem in Africa, we presented demoed linking Interledger-enabled Chimoney Wallets to NFC cards at AfriHacks 2023 and the Digital Asset Show (DAG) hosted on DSTV which is broadcast LIVE to 10 million viewers across 17 West African countries.


AfriHacks 2023	Digital Assets Show

What’s Next?

The future of Chimoney within the Interledger ecosystem is exciting. As a multi-jurisdiction licensed entity, we are excited to collaborate with the community to achieve the following Milestones:

Move Chimoney Payment Pointer from beta to General Availability (GA)

To go from beta to GA, the next steps are to:
1) Onboard and collaborate with Security partners to complete a Security Audit of our Rafiki integration

2) Complete additional Scalability test

3) Onboard and collaborate with a Compliance firm to complete a regulatory audit to reconfirm compliance

Pair with Interledger-enabled License Financial Service Provider

Transactions between Interledger Payment Pointers within the Chimoney ecosystem is the start of an era to enable cross-border and multi-party money movement powered by Interledger. This era makes sending payments as easy as sending an email.

However, to accomplish this mission, more ILP-enabled partners need to pair and support payment pointers of each other. This is the next step in Chimoney's Integration with Chimoney. Pending Compliance reviews between Chimoney and potential pairs, we are excited to unveil a truly global way to move money as easily as sending an email.

Community Support

Community is everything and Chimoney would not be where we are today without the support and backing of the Interledger community. Thus, we are looking forward to deeper partnership, collaboration, and research with community members and entities.

Asks

Get a Chimoney Payment Pointer: Try out our Interledger Integration and give us feedback in 3 simple steps:
- Get a Production (beta) Payment Pointer: dash.chimoney.io/identity/profile.
- Complete KYC, and log back in at dash.chimoney.io you get the Approval email. Then, fund your account and try sending a Payment to another community member's Payment pointer
- Post feedback as a comment in this Grant Report or DM me directly on Slack.
Recommend potential partners we can pair with and do a 1:1 intro
Build with Chimoney's API which enables*:
- Payouts to Bank Accounts, Mobile Money, Gift Card and Airtime
- Multi-currency wallets with KYC and transfer built-in
- Currency Conversion and Exchange Rates