(Image: Facebook)
At its Yoko Next 2026 event in Johannesburg this month, the South African payments company unveiled more than 20 new products and features designed to take it far beyond card machines.
Founded in 2015, the Cape Town startup now serves 200,000 merchants nationwide and processes 30 million card taps every year. Until recently, its offering was simple: take a card payment, get paid, and spend an awkward minute praying that the card machine caught a signal.
“Yoko started by giving independent businesses access to payments,” said founder Carl Wazen. “Today, we're giving them the tools that used to be only for larger businesses, at a set price for small businesses.”
The centerpiece is Yoko AI, an artificial-intelligence assistant that was created after the company acquired Dyner.ai in May. It learns each merchant's sales patterns, flags anomalies, and can take actions like adding products to the catalog by voice command.
Yoko Loyalty, a card-linked rewards program, lets independent merchants retain repeat customers without the usual app-download friction. The new industry-specific point-of-sale modes cover restaurants, retailers, salons and wellness studios. An integration hub called Yoko Connect already connects 500 merchants with Xero alone, which has 13 partnerships.
The company also opened up its Developer Hub with MCP Server, which lets traders connect cloud and AI tools like ChatGPT directly to their accounts.
The company has also cut transaction rates by up to 40%, a move that will see more than R250 million returned to merchant accounts each year. Yoko Savings, a feature that quietly set aside R3.4 million in over 4,000 merchant accounts in its first 21 days, allows business owners to ring-fence a percentage of daily earnings for VAT or seasonal reserves.
New Chief Executive Carsten Holtkemeyer, who took over on June 1 after a global search, said the change reflects a strategic bet on giving smaller traders the analytics and automation that larger corporations have long enjoyed.
“We are no longer just a payments company,” he said. techcable. “We are a company that helps business owners reduce administrative burdens and simplify everyday tasks through modern technology and innovation.”
Kelly Gibbard, founder of Cape Town fashion retailer Me&B, said there is a desperate need for tools that simplify inventory and cash flow. His business employs 55 people, supports 10 local factories, and competes with global fast-fashion giants like Shein and Teemu.
Yoko is building the operating system that small businesses in South Africa were never able to afford. For a company that started by distributing card readers in 2015, it's a hell of a graduation.
(Source: daily whimsical)