Opera to join Emerging Payments Association EU as founding member

By Megha Bhattacharya

Opera recently announced that it is joining the Emerging Payments Association EU, a membership association of companies working in the payments industry, in a bid to help it grow its operations within the European FinTech space. The association helps deliver projects for connecting the European payment ecosystem as well as encourage sustainable business growth.

“We have some real competitive advantages with 50+ million users in Europe. This gives us a huge potential to kick-start innovative financial services. We have started testing our digital wallet in our first EU markets,” said Opera’s Co-CEO Song Lin.

“The EPA-EU is incredibly pleased to welcome Opera, a player that has repeatedly proven its capacity for innovation. This membership proves an interest in joining a European network whose philosophy is ‘collaborate to innovate.’ This demonstrates that the payment industry of tomorrow will be built by technology companies that arise from different backgrounds,” said Thibault de Barsy, Vice-Chairman and General Manager at the Emerging Payments Association EU.

The company recently announced its acquisition of the Estonian banking-as-a-service startup Pocosys. It also announced an investment as well as an agreement to acquire Fjord Bank.

Opera is a global internet brand with a growing base of over 360 million monthly active users out of whom more than 50 million live in Europe. With more than 20 years of innovation in the browser space, the company announced in January 2020 its plans to launch new solutions that reimagine the way people use financial services in their everyday lives.

“Opera is a company deeply rooted in Europe. With the added strength of our Pocosys acquisition and the recent Fjord Bank announcement, we are very excited about the potential and opportunity that we see in Europe. European fintech will be one of the main areas of focus for our team. We really look forward to scaling this new business,” added Krystian Kolondra, EVP Browsers & EEA FinTech.