The Future of Financial Transactions In Nigeria

What is Mobile Money Operation?

Mobile Money Operation is a facility that allows people to use their cell phones and other hand-held devices to handle financial transactions from one to the other ends.

History Of Mobile Money In Africa.

The system was developed and ran by Sagentia from initial development to the 6 million customer mark. The pilot project was joint funded by the UK government Department for International Development (DFID) and Vodafone’s Kenyan affiliate Safricomm in 2003–2006 and commercially launched in 2007. The pilot was first used to disburse loans from Faulu (a Kenyan microfinance agency) to its clients and collect repayments. Additionally clients could deposit and withdraw cash from authorized M-PESA agents, make person-to-person (P2P) money transfers, purchase airtime for re-sale or personal use. The service has now been transitioned to be operationally run by IBM Global Services on behalf of Vodafone. The initial 3 markets (Kenya, Tanzania & Afghanistan) are hosted between Rackspace and Vodafone.

Concept of Mobile Money.

The initial concept of M-Pesa was to create a service which allowed microfinance borrowers to conveniently receive and repay loans using the network of Safaricom airtime resellers. This would enable microfinance M-Pesa is a branchless banking service, meaning that it is designed to enable users to complete basic banking transactions without the need to visit a bank branch. The continuing success of M-Pesa in Kenya has been due to the creation of a highly popular, affordable payment service with only limited involvement of a bank. institutions (MFIs) to offer more competitive loan rates to their users, as there is a reduced cost of dealing in cash. The users of the service would gain through being able to track their finances more easily. But when the service was trialled, customers adopted the service for a variety of alternative uses and complications arose with Faulu, the partnering MFI. M-Pesa was re-focused and launched with a different value proposition: sending remittances home across the country and making payments.

SUCCESS STORY AND COUNTRIES

Kenya

M-Pesa was first launched by the Kenyan MNO Safaricom, an affiliate of Vodafone, in March 2007.Kenya alone. As of November 2011, M-Pesa has over 14 million subscribers and well over 28,000 agents across the country. M-Pesa quickly captured a significant market share for cash transfers, and grew astoundingly quickly, capturing 6.5 million subscribers by May 2009 with 2 million daily transactions. The growth of the service forced formal banking institutions to take note of the new venture. In December 2008, a group of banks reportedly lobbied the Kenyan finance minister to audit M-Pesa, in an effort to at least slow the growth of the service. This ploy failed, as the audit found that the service was robust.  Txteagle, an "artificial intelligence" system, enables the 3 billion mobile phone subscribers living in the developing world to earn small amounts of money by completing simple tasks for companies who pay them in airtime or M-Pesa.

 

Tanzania

M-Pesa was launched in Tanzania by Vodacom in 2008 but its initial ability to attract customers fell short of expectations. Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP) analyzed the differences between the Kenyan and Tanzanian markets that contributed to slower-than-expected adoption of the service. Issues included population density, dominance (or lack thereof) of the mobile service providers, agent networks, marketing strategy, and pricing schemes. In 2010, the International Finance Corporation released a report which explored many of these issues in greater depth and analyzed the strategic changes that Vodacom has implemented to improve their market position. As of 2012, M-Pesa in Tanzania has nine million subscribers and recently undertook a major upgrade of its system.

 

Afghanistan

In 2008 Vodafone partnered with Roshan, Afghanistan's primary mobile operator, to provide M-Paisa, the local brand of the service. When the service was launched in Afghanistan, it was initially used to pay policemen's salary, which was set to be competitive with what the Taliban were earning. Soon after the product was launched, the Afghan National Police found that under the previous cash model, 10% of their workforce were ghost police officers who did not exist; their salaries had been pocketed by others. When corrected in the new system, many police officers believed that they had received a raise or that there had been a mistake, as their salaries rose significantly. The National Police discovered that there was so much corruption when payments had been made using the previous model that the policemen didn't know their true salary. The service has been so successful that it has been expanded to include limited merchant payments, peer-to-peer transfers, loan disbursements and payments.

 

South Africa

In September 2010 Vodacom and Nedbank announced the launch of the service in South Africa, where it is estimated that there are more than 13 million "economically active" people without a bank account. Since 2010, M-Pesa has been slow to gain a toehold in the South African market. When M-Pesa first launched, Vodacom projected that it would sign up 10 million users in the following three years. By May 2011, it had registered approximately 100,000 customers. The gap between expectations for M-Pesa's performance and its actual performance can be partly attributed to significant differences between the Kenyan and South African markets, including the banking regulations at the time of M-Pesa's launch in each country. According to MoneyWeb, a South African investment website, "A tough regulatory environment with regards to customer registration and the acquisition of outlets also compounded the company's troubles, as the local regulations are more stringent in comparison to our African counterparts. Lack of education and product understanding also hindered efforts in the initial roll out of the product." In June 2011, Vodacom and Nedbank launched a campaign to re-position M-Pesa, targeting the product to potential customers who have a higher Living Standard Measures (LSM) than were first targeted.

NIGERIA 

According to the world's GSM Association, fewer than 1 billion out of 6.5 billion people worldwide have bank accounts. At the same time, the penetration of mobile subscribers in emerging markets is increasing rapidly – with 85% of the next billion subscribers expected to come from areas such as Africa , Latin America and East Asia . However, the growth of mobile money services in emerging markets has been partially hindered by both the lack of interoperability between operators and potential regulatory concerns. Nigeria happens to be the most marketable of this business in the whole Africa if the statement made above will come to reality  then we believe  that is the reason why VTN/VCASH (www.virtualterminalnetwork.com) has come to make the dream a reality. VTN/VCASH is a Web/Mobile Platform that has been in operation since 2007. They also have a Patent Certificate pending in the United States for their innovation and also a RIMA award has been presented to them. They were authorized to power USA/Africa Trade Mission years ago. Among the Licensed MMO (mobile money operators) in Nigeria VTN happened to be the operator that possessed the most Innovative Infrastructures to replicate the success  story of M-PESA of Kenya in Nigeria in the area of Mobile Money Operation. 

According to the CEO of VTNetwork Ltd, they have provided ways of making from Tens of thousands to Millions of Naira working as VTN/VCASH Agents representing their services to the end users both banked and unbanked Nigerians with the aim later connecting Nigerians in sending and receiving money through VTN/VCASH mobile phone from urban to rural area and from abroad to. VTN/VCASH sees the ongoing world mobile money business as an opportunity to create wealth and provide employment for youth. Without argument you will agree with me that working as VTN/VCASH Agent is like you operating as a MINI Bank through your Laptop/Desktop computer with internet connectivity from your existing shop/office. You can also download their VTN/VCASH mobile application (VTN Mobile Pro) if you have phones that can receive downloadable applications such as Phones, Iphones, Ipad, Andriod and Blackberry. Also if you have just SMS enabled phone that can not receive any application then they provide to you an SMS Command to operate services like sending, receiving, balance checking , account loading (both from bank and through Scratch Card) and soon.

To get trained and become a Registered/Certified Agent to VTN/VCASH to offer a mobile money service to about 100 Million Nigerians click here