eServglobal has long provided merchants in developing countries with the technology that allows millions of pre-paid mobile phone users to top up their phone credit. But the company is now using this installed customer base to provide instant international mobile money transfers via its Homesend platform. As such, it is tapping a vast global market of two billion unbanked people.
- Leveraging existing customers
- Experienced bosses
- Still loss making
- Speculative
eServglobal already has a solid mobile money business, which includes electronic purchasing via an e-wallet, domestic money transfer, and pre-paid top-ups, which account for 75 per cent of its revenues. But its newer international remittance business aims to leverage on the existing vendor network to offer international money transfers that bypass banks completely (although transfers are still checked by anti-money-laundering agencies).