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Saudi Arabia’s PayTabs has agreed to acquire Amazon Payment Services’ operations across the Middle East and North Africa in a deal valued at more than $100 million, in a transaction that will significantly increase the payments company’s regional scale.
PayTabs to acquire Amazon Payment Services
The acquisition, which has been approved by both companies, will combine Amazon Payment Services’ MENA operations with PayTabs’ existing payment infrastructure, creating a business expected to process more than SAR150 billion ($40 billion) annually.
Amazon Payment Services operates across nine markets in the region and provides online payment processing to more than 3,500 businesses. Its services include card processing, fraud management and alternative payment methods, with support for global networks including Visa and Mastercard alongside domestic schemes such as mada in Saudi Arabia, KNET in Kuwait and Meeza in Egypt.
For PayTabs, the deal represents a substantial expansion of a business that has increasingly repositioned itself from a payment gateway towards a broader payments infrastructure provider serving banks, fintechs, enterprises and government organisations.
The Riyadh-headquartered group said continuity for existing Amazon Payment Services customers would be a priority during the integration, with the combined operation expected to offer faster merchant onboarding and greater localisation around regulatory and compliance requirements.
The transaction also brings together two businesses whose histories in regional e-commerce stretch back more than a decade.
Amazon Payment Services
Amazon Payment Services was originally launched as PayFort in Dubai in 2013. The business subsequently became part of Souq.com, which Amazon acquired in 2017 for about $580 million, before PayFort was rebranded as Amazon Payment Services in 2020.
The acquisition continues a period of consolidation for PayTabs. Earlier this year it bought UAE-based contactless payments provider TAPn’GO, adding tap-to-phone and hospitality payment capabilities to its portfolio. Previous deals have included Saudi point-of-sale provider Digital Pay, Turkish social-commerce platform Paymes and the acquisition of full control of PayTabs Egypt.
The Amazon deal is considerably larger, however, and reflects intensifying competition for scale in a MENA payments market that remains fragmented by local regulation, domestic payment methods and national acquiring structures.
For PayTabs, absorbing an established regional rival gives it greater transaction volume, merchant reach and local connectivity. For Amazon, the sale unwinds part of the payments infrastructure it inherited through its acquisition of Souq almost a decade ago.
The result is another step towards consolidation in a regional payments market where local scale is becoming increasingly important.
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