The GSMA publishes MMU 2012 Annual Report

It is a well-established fact that mobile money represents the biggest opportunity to increase financial inclusion in emerging markets. That was true four years ago, when a handful of mobile money deployments were advancing a new frontier for financial inclusion. And it’s true today, when there are over 140 live deployments around the world.

This annual report contains MMU’s research that has been produced over the last 12 months [1]. How to design and implement agent training, how to manage fraud & risk and how to build successful organization structures at each stage of a mobile money deployment are all areas in which mobile money managers have indicated that they need support. In response, MMU has gathered insights and best practices from existing deployments and adjacent industries to promote tried-and-tested methods for addressing these issues.

MMU’s research also looks ahead to “second generation” challenges. We believe that in the future, mobile money services will chose to open up to external parties in ways that create value for customers as well as commercial value for each entity involved in providing the service. Our research provides a framework for examining how interoperability could create such value, what examples exist today and how we expect the industry to move forward. Interoperability has become a topic for which the question is not ‘if’ but ‘when’.

The industry has come a long way and continues towards its goals.   MMU will continue its support by identifying and sharing best practices, engaging directly with deployments, training practitioners, convening the industry for discussion and facilitating dialogue with regulatory bodies and standard setters. We look forward to more opportunities to help the industry achieve greater scale and fulfill the potential of mobile technology for financial inclusion.

Download the 2012 Annual Report