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Next on the list was Len Pienaar, CEO of Mobile and Transact Solutions. He presented the situation in South Africa and the adoption of mobile banking services in the country.
Here’s what we’ve learned from his presentation:
- Mobile banking in South Africa has taken off and keeps growing like crazy.
- Customers could top-up airtime, pay utilities, data and SMS bundles.
- They also ventured in the payment space. On the slide, we’ve seen a number of online retailers that are using the platform.
- Moreover, they also tried cross selling financial products with mixed success. Opening of savings accounts and micro loans proved successful, while transactional products were not.
- They managed to replicate the model in 5 other countries in Africa.
- Demographics wise, mobile banking is mostly used by younger users, aged between 19 and 40 years.
- Len concluded with some research data, saying that people trust the service, but have concerns on WAP login-related issues, availability and reliability of the service.
That’s it from Len. Next comes Carol from Obopay…
[Image from Flickr]
About The Author
Dusan Belic
Dusan has been using smartphones since their introduction and is now following the latest trends in the industry. The "convergence" is what he's most excited about, and writing about it is the next logical thing to do. He thinks that using a smartphone is what everyone who cares about their time should do. In addition to his interests in mobile phones, Dusan also loves to experiment with the latest web and mobile 2.0 services. The idea of accessing and managing your information from any device no matter where you are simply amazes him. Whether it's an online to-do list, note taking service or a video sharing social network, he's there to try it out. He admits though, he's still searching for the ultimate web-based organizational tool, which "sings" perfectly with the mobile PIM application. Dusan used to run SymbianWatch.com which later became part of IntoMobile. He lives in Serbia, South-East Europe, from where he edits the site on a daily basis.
