Bangladesh is taking a decisive step toward financial modernization by building the nation’s new inclusive instant payment system (IIPS) on the Mojaloop platform.
On September 15, 2025, Bangladesh Bank announced the release of the system, confirming that the platform will connect banks, mobile wallets, and accounts with smaller institutions like microfinance providers into a single, seamless system. Governor Dr. Ahsan Mansur outlined a clear and coherent vision for the country, reducing the cost of cash for both the government and the nation’s most vulnerable.
Solving for Financial Inclusion
Modern microfinance and microcredit was born in Bangladesh, thanks to the pioneering work of Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus. This underscores the importance of Bangladesh’s new IIPS. But today, payments in Bangladesh remain fragmented. Popular services like bKash and Nagad operate in silos, meaning funds can only move within their own networks. These services also largely focus on agents as cash out agents. With the Mojaloop-based IPS, individuals and institutions will be able to transfer money instantly across accounts of all types — bank accounts, non-bank financial accounts, or even institutional accounts. For the first time, true account-to-account interoperability will be possible, enabling new use cases such as:
- Streamlined merchant payments, creating new opportunities for digital commerce and reducing the costly burden of withdrawing funds to make a payment.
- Businesses sending and receiving payments instantly across different financial providers.
- Government-to-person (G2P) transfers without being tied to a single platform.
“Bangladesh has long been a global leader in innovations for financial inclusion, with some of the most successful mobile money and microfinance industries globally. The vision of this project from Bangladesh Bank has already demonstrated their IIPS project will continue that leadership role with the Mojaloop Community,” said Steve Haley, Director of Market Developments and Partnerships, Mojaloop Foundation.
Maintaining Digital Sovereignty
This shift is more than a technical upgrade — it represents digital sovereignty for Bangladesh. Unlike proprietary systems, Mojaloop is open source, which means Bangladesh Bank will own, deploy, maintain, and upgrade the system on its own terms. That independence ensures the nation’s financial infrastructure can evolve to meet local needs while reducing reliance on external vendors.
Relying on a single foreign vendor can be vastly more expensive and can leave nations vulnerable to externally determined privacy rules and geopolitical risks. Foreign vendors can also have difficulty understanding the nuances of local use cases and last mile customer behavior.
Upskilling Local Providers to Promote Digital Sovereignty
The Mojaloop Foundation offers the Accelerator Program to empower local systems integrators to build national IIPSs with help from providers who are already experienced with the platform. Knowledge transfer should happen before and during an implementation, not after it.
In Bangladesh, the Accelerator Program has already demonstrated the strength of local innovation at the Interoperable Payments Bangladesh event, held from September 15 – 19, 2025.
After just six weeks of work, two participating companies, Spectrum Software & Consulting (Pvt.) Ltd. and IT Consultants PLC, showcased working implementations of Mojaloop to Bangladesh Bank and members of the wider financial ecosystem at the event. Their contributions highlight how domestic expertise will be central to building and sustaining the IIPS.
Mojaloop’s Technical Solutions Lead Julie Guetta, Engineering Director James Bush, and Director of Market Development Steve Haley spent the week at the event.
“It was incredible to witness the progress of the Mojaloop Foundation Accelerator Programme participants in just six weeks,” said Guetta. “The in-person training sessions were equally energizing, seeing such strong engagement from both Accelerator Programme participants and representatives of Bangladesh Bank truly highlighted the shared commitment to building inclusive payment systems.”
Empowering the Transition to a Digital Economy
By reducing the country’s dependence on cash — which currently costs about $170 million USD to manage every year — the new system is expected to save resources, expand financial inclusion, and open the door to a more transparent, efficient, and cashless economy.
Bangladesh’s decision to build its IIPS on Mojaloop positions it at the forefront of digital payments innovation, aligning national priorities with a globally proven, community-driven technology.
