M-PESA: Mobile Money for the “Unbanked” Turning Cellphones into 24-Hour Tellers in Kenya

Two authors have written this case study, each taking up one part of the story. The first section is written by Nick Hughes, a Vodafone executive who started this project in 2003 and now heads a mobile payments team with the task of growing the business globally. Nick led the efforts to get Vodafone focused and supportive at the very senior levels of the company in what seemed at the outset to be a fringe project.

The second section is written by Susie Lonie, an m-commerce expert who was brought into Kenya to work through the detailed design phase and project manage the overall delivery of the service from pilot into commercial operation. Susie describes the day-to-day obstacles that needed managing, many of which could never have been foreseen at the outset.