Providing solutions to some of the continent’s most pressing problems can be such a fulfilling venture. This fulfilment mostly comes after you have developed a solution to a problem people did not readily acknowledge they had and then it goes on to achieve widespread acceptance. That is the story of our app in focus this week: M-Payer. M-Payer is a mobile and web solution that lets businesses accept and track any form of payment, be it mobile money or cash.
Overview
The mobile phone is growing to become a massive virtual machine in the hands of users, as it is increasingly equipped to do various impressive things. Add being able to monitor your financial transactions and efficiently organize your patronage as a business, then you would be attaining almost magical levels in maximizing the use of the mobile phone. Also, providing the option of doing all of that on a computer, M-Payer equips businesses with the correct tools to grow their efficiency, and at the same time grow their customers, with the right targets.
Peculiar Problem It Solves
M-Payer has come into the mobile money scene to solve interoperability, aggregation and integration of mobile money. However, prior to Zege technologies invention of M-Payer, enterprises, especially those which had a high number of transactions, would have to wait for up to three days in order for mobile payments made by their customers to reflect in their systems. Until that point, small and medium businesses did not have the opportunity of using such a robust tool.
Unique Feature
M-Payer serves as a tool which helps businesses manage and view the activities of the business, including income, expenses, performance of different products and services, while also helping them to equally manage customer information. This could further help them to better analyze, segment and engage effectively with wide-ranging aspects of their market. All of this is done on a mobile phone or on a computer. It also provides a platform which allows businesses to back up their transactions, analyze customers and engage with them intelligently.
Value Proposition
M-Payer was developed by Kariuki Gathitu, a Kenyan IT graduate and software designer, also the mastermind behind a company called Zege Technologies. The project, which took off in July 2010, has a backup website that shows how subscribers can pay bills, receive cash and transfer funds in a matter of minutes with just a few taps on a mobile. M-Payer might even signal the end of the “cheque-in-clearing” culture which has ruined many small African businesses that already operate on tiny margins, with little or no access to bank credit.
Potential Coverage
M-Payer is presently based in Kenya. Since mobile money already works in Kenya, with the likes of M-Pesa, this seems like an efficient model. There is also the potential of expanding across Africa and to other continents already considering the idea of implementing mobile money as a viable option for financial transactions. Having emerged as the second of five winners at this year’s Global Forum, M-Payer is loaded with immense potential to conquer the world.
Critique
Although it might hope to eventually phase out the cash culture someday, for now it depends somewhat on M-Pesa to facilitate its own processes. While M-Pesa is quite reliable and also has a very wide coverage, it has its own challenges, especially with banking the unbanked. As such, depending on another player to enhance work-flow would definitely come with its own kinks. They might want to consider creating and clearly highlighting their own in-built process of converting cash into the mobile currency option, which can then be duly used for transactions.
Conclusion
Closing with the words of Cyril Ramaphosa, a South African business mogul, “no action is too small when it comes to changing the world…I’m inspired every time I meet an entrepreneur who is succeeding against all odds.” While some may have said that it is hard to innovate around Africa, apps like M-Payer continuously prove that you could still come up with game changers in these our times.
Do check out other apps that have been featured in this series – Zimbile, PriceCheck, and Saya.
