Customer-Centric Business Model Design for Financial Inclusion
The Challenge Digital financial services (DFS) seek to bridge the chasm between the structures, policies and institutions of the formal economy, and the cash intensive informal and rural economy. Current day approaches tend to take the perspective of the service providers when assessing the market opportunity and the needs of the intended customers. And so […]
Tsunami of change – design, brands, marketing and the mobile phone
In the 10 short months since I wrote on the market forces influencing the global mobile phone market, and the implications of the democratization of innovation whose early, weak signals I could already foresee, matters have come to a head. I had written: The locus of innovation in handset design, product planning and market strategy […]
Uncertainty and The Prepaid Economy: Time and Money
Uncertainty characterizes the entire global Prepaid Economy and is the underlying driver for decision making. Systems are unreliable Inadequate infrastructure, variability in basic services (will we have electricity this morning?), obsolete or incomplete systems; all of these, and more, are part and parcel of life in the emerging regions of the world. Will we wake […]
Perspective: Critical Analysis of The African Hype Cycle by Gartner
The very fact that this hype cycle exists is a signal of the increased importance and visibility of the African continent’s place in the global landscape for technology. Released recently by Gartner, the 2015 Hype Cycle for ICT in Africa, is far more interesting for its depiction of the perspective and worldview of Gartner’s analysts […]
Lessons for Formal Finance from Informal financial services
On one of my many field explorations on rural financial services, I found out, that for one mama biashara, as soon as payment checks in, she withdraws all her funds from her local coffee SACCO account, and spreads it out via micro-deposits across her more than 5 local informal savings groups (from right to […]
Introducing The Global Prepaid Economy
This week, that venerable newspaper The Financial Times, published an original piece of writing on the World Economic Forum’s Agenda blog. Its not a reprint from their own publication. It proposes the end of “Emerging Markets” (EM) as we know them: Now, commentators say, it is the world’s mental map that is in dire need […]
3 Myths of Financial Inclusion
This article has been co-authored with Michael Kimani @pesa_africa Banking the unbanked is very popular right now, as financial inclusion is seen as a key milestone on the path to development. In parallel, a plethora of “cashless” or “cash lite” solutions have begun permeating the cash intensive informal economy. These can be broadly described as […]
My African Twitter: Social Media and Its Role in the Emergence of African Economies
Social Media Day 2015 is as good a day as any to finally get around to completing this post I’ve been meaning to write for almost half a year now. It is based on my personal experience and observations, supported by a few relevant links. African Twitter is unlike any social media I’ve experienced. In […]
How I Use My Phone – Extracting consumer insights from purchasing patterns
The Mobile Experience Center of the Co-Creation Hub in Lagos, Nigeria conducted a survey series – How I Use My Phone – where they looked at phone use among university students, white collar professionals, blue collar workers and market traders*. I’ve screen-capped the section on airtime purchase patterns from each infographic to analyze a little […]
The importance of the agent/customer relationship for successful financial inclusion
The role of agent networks in East Africa’s mobile money and mobile banking roll-outs is widely documented; as an intermediary, a kiosk exchange point – accepting deposits for e-money/ withdrawals for cash and usajili (registration). “. . .as the first point of contact, human agents help bridge the gap between a high-tech service and low-literacy […]
