Number of regulatory sandbox licenses granted by Mauritius body to fintechs grows to nine

The number of startups and companies that have been granted regulatory sandbox licenses by Mauritius’s Economic Development Board (EDB) has grown to nine.

This, after the EDB announced in a statement in January that it had granted five sandbox regulatory licensees.

The EDB’s National Regulatory Sandbox License committee is chaired by Lord Meghnad Desai (pictured above), which oversees approving the granting of sandbox licenses.

This week the EDB’s manager of financial services Jaya Doomun-Dookun confirmed that the number of such licensees stood at nine, since the EDB was formed out of a merger in January last year of the Board of Investment, Enterprise Mauritius and the Financial Services Promotion Agency.

Mauritius’s EDB has granted nine regulatory sandbox licenses so far, up from five in January

Doomun-Dookun confirmed that online peer-to-peer lending platform Fundkiss was the first such company to be granted a regulatory sandbox license, in 2017 — at a time when the licenses fell under one of the three now defunct organisations.

The regulatory sandbox licenses are provided until such a time as regulations are drafted to oversee any such financial activity that the licensee is granted for.

Doomun-Dookun said Mauritius’s Financial Service Commission (FSC) is currently in the process of drafting regulations to oversee peer-to-peer crowdfunding platforms (see this story). This would legalise crowdfunding, which Fundkiss is permitted to carry out under other existing financial regulations.

Those firms that are granted a regulatory sandbox license, she said, need to comply with the guidelines set by the EDB, which include monitoring and completion of the necessary paperwork.

Last week Fundkiss founder Paul Perrier told Ventureburn that Fundkiss’s regulatory sandbox license was renewed in November last year and that currently the company is in the process of renewing it again.

The nine licensees are:

Fundkiss: An online peer-to-peer lending platform allowing individuals and corporates to lend directly to small businesses in Mauritius.

Self-Key: The purpose of Self- Key Foundation is to allow individuals and companies to truly own, control and manage their digital identity, securely manage their cryptocurrency portfolio and instantly on board onto financial, immigration and cryptocurrency services.

Salt: Salt provides a platform through which holders of digital assets can obtain cash loans using their assets as collateral

Xentechnologies: Xentechnologies proposes a next-generation wealth management platform, which combines robo-advisory fund management, blockchain-backed custodian and conventional funds.

FusionX: The company is developing a crypto-asset exchange.

Be Mobile: This digital wallet, or bank-in-a-box technology allowing individuals to deposit cash, top up with existing bank account, remit cash overseas, send exchange crypto. A set of services available to individuals in an innovative manner.

PIRL: This blockchain project aims to improve the accessibility of cryptocurrency and related technologies.
Blockchain technology company whose business activity will be research and development of viable products for day to day use with the benefit of blockchain technology.

CrowdInvest: The financial technology company aims to serve as an online equity crowdfunding platform for entrepreneurs looking to raise equity finance for new startups and growth companies.

FinClub: FinClub P2P platform wants to provide an alternative mode of borrowing funds for the borrowers at
competitive and affordable rates, agreed after a matching process between investors.

Read more: Unclear when Mauritius will introduce planned crowdfunding regulations [Updated]

Featured image: Lord Meghnad Desai chair of the Economic Development Board’s National Regulatory Sandbox License committee (Facebook)