Abuja: A business group, Open Space, a financial technology company, has unveiled new Ethical Finance products aimed at promoting inclusion, transparency, and shared prosperity. The Open Space Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Titus Ike, disclosed this at a news conference in Abuja with the caption, ‘Advancing Financial Inclusion Through Ethical and Innovation.’
According to News Agency of Nigeria, Ike said that the initiative was designed to make financial services more accessible, intelligent, and relevant, particularly to underserved Nigerians. He emphasized that ethical finance would focus on fairness, transparency, accountability, and trust in financial relationships. The initiative goes beyond providing financial products by connecting financing and investments to identifiable economic activities.
Ike explained that Open Space would offer products based on ‘Murabaha, Ijarah, Diminishing Musharakah, and Mudaraba structures.’ He detailed how ‘murabaha’ would enable customers to acquire assets through disclosed cost-plus-profit transactions rather than interest-based loans. Additionally, ‘ijarah’ would allow customers to access approved assets through leasing arrangements over agreed periods. These products could support SMEs, professionals, transport operators, healthcare providers, educational institutions, and agricultural enterprises.
The CEO highlighted that diminishing ‘musharakah’ would provide a pathway to asset ownership through a partnership between Open Space and customers, where customers would progressively purchase the company’s ownership units until they became sole owners. Mudaraba would allow customers to provide capital while Open Space manages investments in Shariah-compliant opportunities, with profits shared according to pre-agreed ratios. Investments could be made in SME financing, trade finance, leasing, and other asset-backed activities.
He stressed that ethical finance was not designed exclusively for a particular demographic, despite its Shariah-compliant structures, as people desire clarity about their financial relationships and the deployment of their money. Ike noted that technology and Artificial Intelligence (AI) would help make ethical finance more accessible and integrated into customers’ financial lives, with Open Space’s platform combining financial services and AI tools within one ecosystem.
The company’s ultimate goal is to make financial inclusion meaningful by enabling people to participate more fully in economic activities, supporting asset acquisition, business expansion, savings, investment, and wealth creation. Africa’s economic potential requires financial systems capable of serving people traditionally excluded from formal finance, and ethical finance presents an opportunity to combine financial inclusion, technology, innovation, and trust. Open Space plans to continue developing inclusive and transparent financial models, measuring success by its impact on lives, businesses, asset ownership, and economic opportunities.
The co-founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of the company, Ololade Otayemi, emphasized that the company views technology not just as a means of delivering financial services but as a system that helps people manage their finances better. The platform is built around a single customer financial system, integrating various financial services to allow customers to manage transactions, investments, and financial goals from one platform. AI and machine learning will be used to study financial behavior, monitor investments, identify unusual activities, and provide personalized financial experiences.
The Shariah Adviser, Open Space, Muhammad Mughal, stated that ethical finance is moving beyond a faith-based alternative to address broader concerns about fair, transparent, and responsible financial services. He noted the growth of the sector is creating opportunities for technology to make ethical finance more accessible to individuals, small businesses, and underserved communities. Fintech can reduce transaction costs, simplify customer onboarding, improve transparency, enable digital payments, and make ethical financial products available to a broader audience.
Mughal mentioned that Nigeria has a strong foundation for the growth of non-interest finance through regulators, banks, Takaful operators, microfinance institutions, and capital market players. The next stage is to make ethical financial products more practical and accessible through technology, particularly for those outside formal financial services.