Team Ownapay SA emerged victorious from a global field of competitors at the 2025 G20 TechSprint on Tuesday 11 November.
According to a press release from the South African Reserve Bank (SARB), in collaboration with the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the organisations announced the winners of the 2025 G20 TechSprint challenge on trust and integrity in scalable and open finance. Hosted under South Africa’s G20 Presidency, the competition marked the first time the global innovation initiative has taken place on African soil.
Launched in May this year, the TechSprint invited innovators, entrepreneurs, developers, data scientists and financial sector experts from around the world to respond to three problem statements. The competition sought to identify practical, technology-driven solutions to enhance trust, integrity and inclusion in the global financial system.
An independent panel of experts assessed more than 165 entries submitted by participants from over 30 countries during an in-person judging session held in Pretoria. The three problem statements focused on digital identity solutions to establish trust among financial institutions, credit data portability to improve small and medium-sized enterprises’ access to finance, and fraud and cyber-risk mitigation in fast payment systems.
Team Ownapay SA (Proprietary) Limited won the digital identity solutions challenge by addressing what they call the “African merchants’ paradox”.
In a video uploaded to SARB’s Facebook page, Papi Chabalala of Team Ownapay SA explained that Know Your Customer verification requirements create significant barriers for merchants trying to adopt digital payments. While these processes are designed to prevent fraud and money laundering, they often block legitimate businesses from accessing payment services.
“This creates the type of friction that undermines the transition into digital payments,” said Chabalala.
Ownapay’s winning solution tackles this problem using cutting-edge technologies including Zero-Knowledge Proofs and Decentralised Identifiers. Their system establishes trust among financial institutions through innovative, verifiable and privacy-preserving digital identity technologies.
The breakthrough allows merchants to verify their identity once, then reuse their digital credentials across multiple payment providers. This eliminates the need for repeatedly completing lengthy verification processes for each new service.
At its core, the system creates secure, tamper-evident digital versions of identity documents that can be instantly verified online. Merchants maintain complete control over their personal data while proving necessary attributes without revealing unnecessary information.
When every African can prove who they are without revealing any sensitive data, that’s when financial inclusion happens.
The other winners were Team Silence Laboratories Pty Ltd from Singapore for credit data portability – improving access to finance for small and medium-sized enterprises through secure, consumer-consented data exchange mechanisms that enable seamless cross-border sharing of credit information.
Team FNA and Proto from the United Kingdom won for fraud and cyber-risk mitigation for fast payments – promoting wider adoption of fast payment systems globally while enhancing fraud prevention and cyber resilience to advance financial inclusion.
According to the press release, the TechSprint exemplifies the power of global collaboration in advancing innovation that strengthens trust, resilience and financial integrity. Under South Africa’s G20 Presidency, the initiative reflects SARB’s commitment to inclusive innovation, cross-border cooperation and the responsible use of technology to address emerging challenges in the financial sector.
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