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

Innovative business models & Digitalization

The WSBI has conducted two research reports tracking the progress of retail and savings banks in their financial inclusion efforts across Africa ( 2018 , 2019 ). These reports found that challenges persist around driving client centricity within the institution as well as the formation of partnerships across institutions to offer more low cost effective products.

In 2020 and 2021, the research efforts are focusing on finding solutions to these challenges. The research focus has thus turned to producing a series of case studies, each of which focuses on one theme that an institution may focus on to drive its response to the challenges outlined above. The case studies are:

1. COVID-19 in Africa – Customer, FSP and regulator perspectives: The first case study looks at the impact of COVID-19 on institutions and the retail financial services market. Whilst it does not propose solutions similar to the other case studies, it helps frame the additional challenges that institutions faced during the upheaval that accompanied the pandemic. 
2. Leveraging mobile for the low income market: The mobile phone is becoming ubiquitous across Africa. Its full potential to offer financial services has however not been entirely exploited. What lessons exist for FSPs that are looking at leveraging mobile engagements with their customers in Africa.
3. Innovative business models and partnerships: Financial services providers have many options to partner with other institutions to enhance their offering to the market and achieve cost effective scale. What have been some of the successful innovative models applied across Africa?
4. Serving customers effectively through digitization : Digital is touted as more efficient, simple and effective. How have institutions gone about driving digital transformation of their own internal systems, as well as their client engagements. Are there lessons to be had for institutions embarking on a digitization journey?
5. Financial services for a specific market – Agriculture: The African economy has a large agricultural sector that plays a key role in its economic development, as well as the livelihood of its people. What have FSPs been doing to target this key market
6. Tentative – Client centricity and new data: The final case study is tentatively scheduled to focus on designing truly customer-centric products by leveraging information that has been previously unused by FSPs.

Please join us for a discussion on the third and fourth case studies – where these studies will be presented and debated across the African membership. The agenda for the discussion is outlined below.

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15.00 – Welcome

15.05 – Introduction

Overview of the State of the Industry research series

15.15 – Business models for the mass market

What options are available for an FSP operating in the low-income market?

When is which option ideally deployed?

3.30 p.m. – Digitization to serve low-income customers             

Digitization in context, more than a channel

Take-aways from institutions that successfully implemented digitization

15.45 – Case study – ABB

Barid-Cash, a successful case of digitization across a business

Partnerships, how has it served ABB?

16.00 – Discussion

16.15 – Conclusions

Time: 15:00 CEST l 9:00 AM EST