Ivorypay Becomes the First Company in Africa to Launch X402 Payments, Enabling Machine-to-Machine Stablecoin Transactions Across all Major Blockchains

0 2 minutes read

Ivorypay, a stablecoin payment infrastructure company operating across 17 African countries, has launched support for the X402 payment protocol, making it the first company on the continent to do so. The integration allows software applications and AI agents to make and receive stablecoin payments natively over HTTP, using the standard 402 Payment Required status code.

X402 is an open protocol that enables machine-to-machine payments without human intervention. When a client application requests a paid resource from a server, the server responds with an HTTP 402 status code and a payment request. The client settles the payment in stablecoins on-chain, and access is granted automatically. The entire transaction completes in seconds.

Ivorypay’s implementation supports all five blockchains currently specified by the X402 standard: Base, Ethereum, Polygon, Arbitrum, and Solana. This full-chain coverage means developers building on any of these networks can integrate Ivorypay as their X402 facilitator without switching infrastructure.

“Cross-border payments in Africa have always been a human-to-human problem. X402 extends that to machines. As AI agents begin to transact on behalf of businesses, they need payment rails that settle instantly, cost almost nothing, and work across borders. That is exactly what our infrastructure was built for. We are not waiting for the future of programmable commerce to arrive in Africa. We are building it now.”– Oluwatobi Ajayi, CEO and Co-founder, Ivorypay

Why It Matters

The X402 protocol was developed as an open standard to bring native payments to the web. Until now, adoption has been concentrated in North America and Europe. Ivorypay’s launch extends the protocol’s reach into Africa’s fastest-growing digital economies.

Sub-Saharan Africa received over $205 billion in cryptocurrency value between 2024 and 2025, with stablecoins accounting for 43% of all transactions. Nigeria alone recorded $92.1 billion in crypto activity, ranking second globally. With 22 million crypto holders in Nigeria and growing adoption across East and Southern Africa, the infrastructure demand for programmable, low-cost payment rails is accelerating.

Use Cases

X402 payments unlock a range of applications that were previously impractical with traditional payment infrastructure. These include AI agents purchasing API access, data feeds, and compute resources autonomously; content platforms monetising individual articles, images, or data queries without subscription walls; developer tools offering metered, per-request billing settled in real time; and cross-border B2B micro-transactions that would be cost-prohibitive through conventional banking rails.

About Ivorypay

Ivorypay is stablecoin payment infrastructure purpose-built for Africa. The company provides a payment gateway, on/off ramps, and treasury APIs that enable businesses to accept and settle payments in stablecoins, local fiat currencies (across 12+ African currencies and USD, EUR, GBP), and via mobile money networks including M-Pesa, MTN MoMo, and Airtel Money.

To date, Ivorypay has processed over $500 million in total payment volume across 17 African countries, serving more than 16,000 merchants. Ivorypay is backed by Hedera, Starkware, Blockchain Founders Fund, CV VC, and other institutional investors.