Your customers, your float, your licence
Kobri is not seeking approval of its own. We are looking for a licensed institution to operate under, and we bring the product, the technology and the fieldwork. Here is exactly what that means.
What the regulation actually says
Regulation No. 04/18/CEMAC/UMAC/COBAC reserves payment services to approved institutions — which includes you. COBAC Regulation R-2019/01 provides that distributors and sub-distributors operating under the cover of an approved provider do not require approval of their own.
You are the provider
You hold the licence, you hold the funds in your segregated account, you remain responsible for the activity. Nothing changes in your regulatory position.
Kobri is your distributor
We operate in your name and on your behalf. We never have access to the funds. The distribution agreement sets out precisely what is entrusted to us.
Merchants are sub-distributors
They operate under your licence. Each engagement triggers your duty to notify COBAC within one month.
Customers, float, and reach
- Every Kobri user becomes your customer, with a KYC file already assembled
- The float sits in your segregated account — interest-bearing, and shielded from creditors under the 2026 reform
- Every equipped shop is a point of presence that costs you no branch
- A young, urban customer base that traditional channels struggle to reach
- Your COBAC notification duties industrialised, rather than endured
What we are asked in the room
- Do our technical teams have to build an interface?
No. The default connector requires no interface from you: the Kobri ledger is authoritative, and real movements are reconciled against your statement by an administrator. Of the 385 licensed microfinance institutions in Cameroon, the vast majority expose no technical interface at all. We designed the service around that fact, rather than hoping otherwise.
- Who carries the risk if a merchant commits fraud?
The merchant funds their account in advance. They cannot give back more change than they have deposited. This limit is not an application rule that a defect could bypass: it is a database engine constraint that refuses a negative balance.
- How do you know your accounts are correct?
The ledger is kept in double entry: every movement produces two balancing entries, and the sum of all balances is exactly zero. An automated check runs continuously and can be queried on demand. The sensitive-action log is hash-chained: any retroactive change breaks the chain and becomes detectable, including changes made directly in the database.
- And the COBAC notification duty?
It falls to you: Article 6(2) of R-2019/01, one month from the engagement of each sub-distributor. Kobri assembles the file automatically on activation, counts down the deadline, and alerts you before it expires. An incomplete file stays pending with a list of what is missing: we do not send the regulator an incomplete file.
- What happens if Kobri disappears?
The funds are with you, not with us: their fate does not depend on our survival. The ledger sits in a standard PostgreSQL database and is fully exportable. No proprietary technology holds your data hostage.
- What about the data protection law?
Law No. 2024/017 of 23 December 2024 applies, its compliance deadline having expired on 23 June 2026. It concerns both of us. We built the product with those obligations in mind: ID documents encrypted at rest, explicit retention periods, data subject rights handled. The processing register and the APDP filing remain to be established jointly.
How we move forward together
A first conversation
One hour. We present the structure, you tell us what blocks it on your side. No commitment.
Compliance review
Your compliance team reviews the distribution structure, the content of the notification file, and the handling of personal data.
Distribution agreement
It sets out what is entrusted, the responsibilities, the limits, and the reconciliation arrangements.
A bounded pilot
One neighbourhood, a handful of shops, low ceilings. We measure, we correct, and then we decide together whether to widen.
Book a meeting
Pick a day and a time: we confirm the meeting within one working day, with a demonstration of your future space.
Let’s meet
We are looking for a first partner institution. If the structure makes sense to you, an hour is enough to find out whether this can work.