Year in review 2013Consumer 2015
Emerging markets
Emerging markets are important to us – they account for 68% of our customers and 75% of the total call minutes across our networks. These markets are likely to become even more relevant due to a combination of strong population and economic growth, and the increase in mobile penetration.
Access to energy
Extending access to energy in remote regions without grid electricity enables more people to use our mobile services and brings wider social and environmental benefits. Our new solar-powered solution, ReadySet, is able to charge up to eight mobile phones per day and provide electric lighting. Entrepreneurs in Tanzania use ReadySet to earn around US$44 a month.
Extending our global presence with partner market agreements
We enter into partner market agreements with local mobile network operators in order to extend our global reach and better serve our global customers without the need for capital investment. Our partner markets community has grown rapidly to cover around 50 countries. During the year we established a partner agreement with Polkomtel in Poland and Zain Group, which extended our reach to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan and Iraq.
M-Shwari, Mobile banking
M-Shwari is a revolutionary new paperless banking product for M-Pesa customers, delivered by our associate Safaricom, in partnership with the Commercial Bank of Africa. This was launched in Kenya in November 2012. M-Shwari enables customers to save and borrow directly via their phone, while earning interest on the money saved. At 31 March 2013 1.2 million people were actively using the service in Kenya.