Group items tagged

BelCash Technology Solution PLC has partnered with two banks to launch HelloCash mobile money services in Ethiopia. Launched in partnership with Lion International Bank and Somali Micro Finance, the service will provide financial services to all Ethiopians

BelCash Technology Solution PLC has partnered with two banks to launch HelloCash mobile money services in Ethiopia. Launched in partnership with Lion International Bank and Somali Micro Finance, the service will provide financial services to all Ethiopians. It will enable existing and potential customers of Lion International Bank and Somali Micro Finance to carry out transactions in four key areas of financial transactions: Deposit, Withdraw, Transfer and make payments.

Key standouts of HelloCash include its interoperability and shared infrastructure features. The system is designed for multiple banks and MFIs to be interconnected and offer mobile money services to their respective customers. This allows partnering financial institutions to share each other’s agent and branch networks to serve each other’s customers.

JUMO claimed it has helped disburse over $1.6-billion in funding to small and micro enterprises and is growing its base of savings products.

JUMO currently partners with financial service providers and mobile network operators to provide credit and savings solutions in Pakistan, Ghana, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya and Zambia.

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) estimates that 40% of small and micro enterprises in the formal sector in developing countries have an unmet financing need of $5.2-trillion every year.

JUMO builds its credit profiles using behavioral data gathered from mobile wallets, cell phones and transaction data.

JUMO is a transaction and predictive technology platform that partners with mobile network operators and banks to offer customers microloans and access to savings and insurance products. They are currently active in six markets – Ghana, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia and Pakistan – with plans to soon launch in India, Bangladesh, Côte d’Ivoire and Nigeria. JUMO has helped disburse over $1.6 billion in funding to small and micro enterprises, and has helped connect over 15 million people to credit and savings services.

Over the last four years, our service has allowed the Ethiopian population to access the following services using their mobile phones:Health advice (HelloDoctor)Market access (HelloMarket / HelloGebeya)Labour market access (HelloJobs / HelloSera)Legal advice (HelloLawyer / HelloTebeka)Mobile Trade service (HelloBroker/ HelloDelela)And, since February 2015, in partnership with select Ethiopian banks and micro finance institutions;

Hellomarket will be the platform used for local transactions, enabling buyers to order, deliver and pay for goods through electronic banking services. Belcash has signed an agreement with DHL Express, a Germany company, for logistics services.

For buyers abroad, Belcash introduced Helloshop, a platform that allows domestic products to be ordered through the firm’s portal and the payment to be processed through Mastercard Payment Gateway Services.

“This will make foreign currency flow through the proper channels to local banks,” said Zewdu Assefa, deputy CEO of Belcash Ethiopia. “The seller receives the Birr equivalent of the amount earned in foreign currency.”

FarmDrive generates real-time credit reports for small farmers, allowing them to access loans from financial institutions and agricultural input providers via mobile phone. 

FarmDrive collects expense and revenue data from farmers via SMS and combines it with satellite imaging, remote sensing technology and alternative data points (e.g., soil analysis, weather forecasts) to create detailed yield estimates and assess credit risk.

n 2012, the micro-lending institute Kiva partnered with Kenya’s Strathmore University to offer tuition loans to low-income students. The loans were crowdfunded by Kiva and distributed by Strathmore University, who selected applicants based on the criteria of having high academic performance and coming from a low-income household, among other requirements. From 2012 to 2018, Kiva fundraised USD 762,675, which was distributed to 84 students who received an average loan of USD 9,004. The program ended in 2018 because the delinquency rate had risen to 14.65%, with many students being unable to pay back their loan owing to scarce job opportunities after graduation (Kiva, 2018).

In 2012, the micro-lending institute Kiva partnered with Kenya’s Strathmore University to offer tuition loans to low-income students. The loans were crowdfunded by Kiva and distributed by Strathmore University, who selected applicants based on the criteria of having high academic performance and coming from a low-income household, among other requirements. From 2012 to 2018, Kiva fundraised USD 762,675, which was distributed to 84 students who received an average loan of USD 9,004

Our customers are in emerging markets across Africa and Asia. Most of them are micro and small to medium enterprises who need instant access to finance so they can grow and invest. So far we’ve served more than 10 million customers and disbursed over 40 million loans – and the numbers are rising daily.

The government regulates Ethiopia’s telecommunications market, meaning that there is only one telecom provider and others are not allowed. Both BelCash and M-birr are strictly technology providers. M-Birr General Manager Thierry Artaud sees the regulated market as a benefit.

Dutch company BelCash is focused on mobile banking, working in partnership with banks to provide easier access to finance through bank accounts. Ireland-based M-Birr is a mobile money service that works with micro finance institutions where no registration at a bank is needed.

Over the last four years, our service has allowed the Ethiopian population to access the following services using their mobile phones: Health advice (HelloDoctor)Market access (HelloMarket / HelloGebeya)Labour market access (HelloJobs / HelloSera)Legal advice (HelloLawyer / HelloTebeka)Mobile Trade service (HelloBroker/ HelloDelela)And, since February 2015, in partnership with select Ethiopian banks and micro finance institutions;Financial Inclusion (HelloCash)

To help unlock the potential of Ethiopia through the digitalization of essential services, such as finance, healthcare and education. To help drive sustainable and inclusive growth though digitalization. We believe digitalization will lower transaction costs and bring essential services to the reach of the poor. It bypasses the conventional time consuming and capital intensive build-up of fixed assets (banks branches, school buildings and clinics).

Bismart Insurance enables the uninsured African population to access Insurance through co-creating relevant products with existing affinity groups like saccos, schools, welfare groups, Micro-finance institutions etc and connecting them to insurance companies through technology.  At Bismart platform customers are able to reveiw and rate their insurance providers based on their experience, this forces insurance players to compete in giving our customers the best customer experience.

At Bismart platform customers are able to reveiw and rate their insurance providers based on their experience, this forces insurance players to compete in giving our customers the best customer experience.We enable customers to compare insurance policies from muiltiple providers not just based on price but based on benefits, exclusions and other customers reviews.

Hailed as the “Kenyan technology success story”, many have claimed M-PESA to be a testimony to the greatness of the East African country’s technology scene, producing world-class technology companies that rival those in South Africa. However, is the acclaimed mobile money service really Kenyan at all? The answer is no. M-PESA is British.

By any stretch of the currently available facts, the service that accounts for more than 60 percent of Kenya’s GDP in transactions was conceived by British professionals. The company commissioned with developing the idea, Sagentia, into a workable technology was British. Additionally, the company that owns the intellectual property rights to the idea, Vodafone, is British and, lastly, it was funded in its initial stages by the British Government.

Nyagaka Anyona Ouko, a Kenyan from Nairobi, claims he is the innovator of M-Pesa and claims that Vodafone and its representatives stole the idea of Mobile Cash Transfer from him.

Our Cropchain and LendIt platforms solve these two problems. Cropchain is our user-friendly integrated agricultural supply chain management platform that allows organizations to manage everything in the agricultural supply chain from outgrower schemes, logistics, traceability to digital trading, quality assurance and data analytics. LendIt, our financial inclusion platform enables farmers access digital services such mobile money payments for commodities sold, micro-lending/input financing, crop insurance and pension scheme for the informal sector.

Our Cropchain and LendIt platforms solve these two problems. Cropchain is our user-friendly integrated agricultural supply chain management platform that allows organizations to manage everything in the agricultural supply chain from outgrower schemes, logistics, traceability to digital trading, quality assurance and data analytics. LendIt, our financial inclusion platform enables farmers access digital services such mobile money payments for commodities sold, micro-lending/input financing, crop insurance and pension scheme for the informal sector.

Onboarding smallholder farmers onto the AgroCenta platform. Agents visit communities where smallholder farmers who deal in sorghum, rice, maize, millet and soybean are registered onto the AgroCenta platform to trade. Agents also work with farmer based organizations (FBOs) to carry out trading activities. 2 Facilitating trade deals on behalf of Smallholder farmers. Agents deal with buyers who wish to purchase directly from smallholder farmers. AgroCenta agents are trained in the field of technology, sales and marketing to effectively help smallholder farmers who have little or no knowledge of technology trade easily. 3 Gathering market information and statistical data. Agents are assigned to major trading markets across the country to collate data on market pricing for various commodities. This information is relayed to smallholder farmers via Voice technologies in languages they read and understand.

Latest News on M-Pesa | Cointelegraph

M-Pesa is Kenyan mobile, phone-based payment service provider for the mobile companies’ customers. M-Pesa is a money transfer service that, additionally, provides financing and micro-financing operations. The company was launched in 2007 by the two largest mobile network operators in Kenya and Tanzania. In 2013, M-Pesa in Africa became available for money transfers in Bitcoin, which are very popular among Kenyan and other African countries’ citizens due to their national currencies’ hyperinflation. Initially, M-Pesa was developed for Kenyan and other African citizens who don’t have access to ATMs or bank accounts to send or receive money, but the service has now reached Afghanistan and some European countries.

CEO of Jumo, Andrew Watkins-Ball, comments: “We have a proven business model, evidenced in the strategic partnerships we have built with forward-thinking banks, mobile money operators and partners like Uber."

Since launch in 2014, more than 10 million people have saved or borrowed on the Jumo platform, with nearly 70% of these being micro and small business owners across Africa and Asia. To date, the company has originated almost US$1 billion in loans and maintained savings growth of over 50% month-on-month on its platform, which manages over 45 million customer interactions per month.

Jumo currently has offices in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ghana, Zambia, Pakistan, United Kingdom, Singapore and South Africa. It set up its Asia Pacific headquarters in Singapore earlier in the year and has plans to enter several new Asian markets in 2019.

Devant l’incapacité des institutions financières à répondre à ses besoins, Ahmed Wadi, diplômé en informatique et start-uppeur en herbe, a tout simplement décidé de créer le service qui lui manquait lui-même. Inspiré des modèles traditionnels de micro-crédits, les Gemeyas, il a réinventé le principe grâce au digital, étendant ainsi leurs nombreux avantages à qui que ce soit, et de manière sécurisée.

Since 2017, AgroCenta has successfully completed two rounds of funding to the tune of $750,000 to expand operations in Ghana. In 2017, AgroCenta won the Seedstars Global Competition against other 72 startups from emerging markets across the globe. AgroCenta has grown its farmer base to 45,000 providing additional services of access to finance for smallholder farmers, bringing smallholder farmers onto the financial sector to enjoy services such as crop insurance, micro lending/input financing, mobile payments through mobile money and finally pensions schemes targeted at farmers and beneficiaries in the informal sector with special attention to women and youth. Since 2017, AgroCenta has helped over 28,000 farmers sell over 20,000MT of commodities to large, medium and small scale buyers across the country.   In December 2018, AgroCenta won a grant of $250,000 from GSMA Ecosystem Accelerator Fund to further build its financial inclusion platform AgroPay targeted at rural smallholder farmers.

Machine learning is a critical component of this process, as it allows us to enhance our predictive ability to better identify these qualifying customers. As a result, we are making significant strides towards our goal of creating the world’s leanest and lowest-cost banking infrastructure. This helps our bank partners offer loans at the lowest possible rate, and it helps our customers to achieve higher-yield savings. We’ve proven that our model works. Twelve million customers in Africa and Asia have saved or borrowed on the JUMO platform, and roughly 70% of these customers are micro and small businesses. We’re incredibly proud of our progress so far – but we know there’s more we can do.

To test our approach, we looked at Ghana, running new and advanced machine learning algorithms on signals associated with a pool of lending applicants. The goal was to identify combinations of signals — from income size and deposit frequency to mobile phone battery life and mobile wallet transaction patterns — that would serve as more accurate indicators of likely fraud than existing models.

Our Digital Banking business is anchored on a transactional banking model  with the following key services – Micro-loans, Savings, Agent Banking (designed to reach the previously excluded), Device Financing and Diaspora Banking. The Digital Bank’s flagship platform is branded “Square”.   The Square Mobile App is an integrated mobile banking solution that gives customers the ability to transact wherever they are, on services such as bill payments, funds transfer, banking services, nano loans, airtime and so forth. In line with our Diaspora thrust, we have also launched the Square World App, targeting diaspora customers anywhere in the world, offering remittances, and other suite of services as if they were back home