Visa last week announced a strategic investment in YellowPepper, a mobile payments company in Latin America, to help accelerate innovation in digital payment technology.

Visa said the YellowPepper investment is the first such one for it in the region and "reinforces a shared vision for increasing usage of mobile payments throughout Latin American and the Caribbean," according to a press release.

Visa and YellowPepper initially established a multi-year partnership in 2017.

Visa said preliminary efforts of this investment will focus on growing opportunities for tokenized payments, increasing access to Visa APIs and expanding the use of push payments via Visa Direct.

"Through our investment in YellowPepper, we want to bring the best of Visa's technology and capabilities to a broader set of partners and clients across the region," Eduardo Coello, regional president for Visa Latin America and the Caribbean, said in a release. "Visa is always looking for new investments that allow us to accelerate innovation for our clients, finding new ways to support our clients' technology. YellowPepper's extensive experience in the region and the strength of their existing client base makes them an ideal partner to build the future of payments."