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Apaya and NymCard Partner to Bring Open Finance–Powered Real-Time Payments to UAE Merchants

  • Writer: Sally Hanekom
    Sally Hanekom
  • 9 hours ago
  • 2 min read
Apaya x Nymcard Partnership For Open Finance


Dubai, UAE – Feb. 16, 2026 – Apaya, the leading payment orchestration platform for the Middle East and Africa, and NymCard, CEMEA’s leading payments infrastructure provider, today announced a strategic partnership to enable Open Finance–powered, real-time account-to-account (A2A) payments for merchants across the UAE via Al Tareq.


Through this partnership, Apaya enables merchant adoption through its no-code orchestration platform, while NymCard provides the licensed Open Finance payment infrastructure required to support secure, consent-driven A2A transactions in real-time.


"For Open Finance to succeed, merchants need more than just access to new payment rails -they need the tools to deploy them quickly alongside the providers they already work with," said Michael Tomlins, Co-Founder and CEO of Apaya.
"Our partnership with NymCard removes the technical complexity that has historically slowed adoption of innovative payment solutions. Merchants can now add Al Tareq to their checkout in minutes, not months, without writing a single line of code and without disrupting their existing payment stack."

Through Apaya's platform, merchants can incorporate NymCard's solution into a unified checkout experience that works seamlessly with their existing payment service providers, whether for card payments, buy-now-pay-later, mobile wallets, or other local payment methods. Apaya's intelligent routing technology enables merchants to orchestrate transactions across all connected providers, optimising for payment success rates and cost efficiency.


“Al Tareq extends NymCard’s payments infrastructure into Open Finance, enabling regulated, real-time account-to-account payments that move funds directly from consumers to merchants,” said Shiraz Ali, Chief Business Officer at NymCard.
“Partnering with Apaya allows these capabilities to be delivered through a merchant-ready orchestration layer, making Open Finance payments practical and deployable at scale.”

Key Benefits for Merchants


UAE Merchants using the Apaya-enabled NymCard implementation of Al Tareq benefit from:


  • Instant Settlement – Funds transferred directly to merchant accounts in real time through secure A2A flows

  • Reduced Costs – Lower transaction fees compared to traditional card payments

  • Simple Onboarding – No-code integration through Apaya's merchant dashboard

  • Unified Checkout – Al Tareq presented alongside existing payment providers in a single experience in line with customisable business rules

  • Intelligent Orchestration – Smart routing to maximise transaction success across all providers

  • No Disruption – Works with merchants' current PSPs for cards, BNPL, wallets, and more


About Apaya

Apaya is a payment orchestration platform for the Middle East and Africa that enables merchants to connect and manage multiple payment providers through a single, no-code integration. The platform optimises payment performance with intelligent routing, unified reconciliation, and flexible checkout experiences, allowing businesses to adopt new payment methods quickly without disrupting their existing stack.


About NymCard

NymCard is a leading payments infrastructure company licensed by the Central Bank of the UAE (CBUAE), providing the technology behind card issuing, payment processing, and money movement for financial institutions, fintechs, and enterprises across the CEMEA region.

 
 
 
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