NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Vodafone India which operates the mobile payment service M-Pesa through its wholly owned subsidiary Mobile Commerce Solutions Ltd (MCSL), has completed the pan-India rollout of the service in March 2014, about one year since its India launch and about 16 months after the initial announcement. The company has disclosed this in its earnings results for the quarter ended March 31, 2014 (Q4-FY14).

Vodafone India had also mentioned this last month during the M-Pesa launch in Andhra Pradesh (we missed it then). It claims the service is now available across 60,000 agent outlets, covering over 1.2 million customers pan-India. However, there is currently no information how many users are actively using this service or how it is performing in terms of transactions or amount transacted.

In comparison, M-Pesa’s competitor Airtel Money had reported to have an active base of 1.7 million for Q4-FY14, up from 1.3 million in the previous quarter. The total number of transactions was at 38 million, up 25.8% quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) while the amount transacted was at Rs 1,364.2 crore for the quarter, up 10.2% growth QoQ.

Cash Disbursement Pilots: Last month, Vodafone had mentioned that it was currently in the process of enabling National Rural Health Mission (NHM) disbursements in Bihar and Jharkhand on a pilot basis. It had also stated plans of enabling money disbursement through Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) through M-Pesa.