Digital payments company Efficacy has been acquired by the Stitch Group, enabling it to become one of the first fintechs to offer direct card clearing services in the market.

South Africa-based payments infrastructure company Stitch Group has announced acquisition of Efficacy Payments, its second major strategic acquisition, enabling the firm to offer card acquiring services directly to merchants as a Designated Clearing System Participant (DCSP), and provide more seamless and cost-effective transactions.

By bringing Efficacy within the Stitch Group, Stitch Group has become one of the first fintechs in South Africa to offer direct card clearing both online and in-person, underscoring its commitment to serving clients across more of their payments needs.

As a designated clearing system participant, Stitch can offer a comprehensive, end-to-end card product with full control over the whole product lifecycle.

• Stitch is the gateway, switch and the acquirer: Merchants can work with one provider that can perform the end to end acquiring service across technical, compliance, financial and operational requirements
• Stitch Group is directly connected to Visa and Mastercard: There is no dependency on an intermediary acquiring bank or switch, removing potential failure points from the transactions

For enterprise merchants, this results in:

Better conversion: due...