Its 6AM and Clive Makumbe just arrived in Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare. He has traveled 300 kilometers, from his small farm in Masvingo, just to withdraw money. Banks in his town are dry as Zimbabwe suffers cash shortages. When we bump into each other, this is the sixth bank he has tried to get money from.
“I am preparing for the planting season because that’s how we survive. I ordered farming supplies but I haven’t been able to make payment for over a week because there is no money, that’s why I decided to take a bus and come here,” says Makumbe.
Once again, he is out of luck. This bank has money, but he can only withdraw $100 per day. He needs $2,200 to pay a supplier.
His only hope is mobile money.
“I am going to ask friends to lend me whatever they have, so that I can give my supplier at least half of the money I owe, so I can begin working. I know if they send it via EcoCash, I will be able to get it because EcoCash always has cash, unlike the banks.”
Like most mobile money services in Africa, EcoCash helps the unbanked save and move money through their phones.  According to Makumbe, in Zimbabwe, it’s better than a bank.
“Banks are unreliable. It’s so bad that we can’t send money out of the country even via internet banking. You have to do long applications to even be able to do that. Most of our suppliers are out of the country and paying them is a nightmare and some of them don’t want to do business with us anymore.”
With EcoCash, Zimbabweans can withdraw money from any MasterCard ATM in the world, they can make payments to one another through the mobile service and they often have cash available for withdrawal. Now they can also save some money on their phones.
“Zimbabwe has a poor savings culture. People don’t trust banks. A decade of hyperinflation left people’s savings in bank accounts wiped off to almost zero and now with bond notes coming, the same will happen.”
With EcoCash’s mobile wallet, which already has more than 1.5 million customers earning interest on all amounts starting from as small as $1, Makumbe says he and his friends always know they have money that they have access to when needed.
“We have a club of six where we each contribute $50 a month. We can track all transactions through our phones and when we need the money, at least there is a guarantee that you can get all of it without limits. We plan to buy groceries and share them at the end of the year,” says Makumbe.
“Group savings culture for specific purposes or asset investment is a common phenomenon in Zimbabwe, but the target segment is largely unrecognized and underappreciated. EcoCash Savings Club is intended to reward this diligent savings behavior, as well as become an enabler for access to other services, such as mobile credit. It also offers an opportunity to extend EcoCash mobile money agency businesses to groups of people that are creditworthy, but have been long marginalized,” says Natalie Jabangwe-Morris, Chief Executive of EcoCash.
Mobile money services thrive in most parts of the continent.
According to Sebastian Wolf, a Uganda-based economist for the International Growth Centre, the increase in mobile money transactions has increased the rate at which money is used as well as the money multiplier.
“This has made inflation in East Africa more difficult to predict and would argue for choosing inflation targeting over reserve-money targeting in East Africa. In terms of inflation, mobile money seems to bring gain without pain,” he says.
By making small commissions on millions and millions of transactions, mobile money is big business in Africa. Data also shows big opportunities for boosting financial inclusion among women and poor people, according to the Global Findex.
For MTN, a South African mobile service provider, the product’s revenue increased by 40.8% and performed well in Uganda, Ghana, Rwanda and Benin. Although successful in most parts of the continent, mobile money has failed in South Africa. MTN has pulled the plug on its local mobile money business. The problem is three quarters of South Africans have bank accounts. Vodacom also scrapped its M-Pesa service in South Africa after a disappointing take-up among users.
“Vodacom’s decision is based on the fact that the business sustainability of M-Pesa is predicated on achieving a critical mass of users. Based on our revised projections and high levels of financial inclusion in South Africa, there is little prospect of the M-Pesa product achieving this in its current format in the mid-term,” says Shameel Joosub, Vodacom CEO in a statement.
It was a smart decision.
Earlier this year, Vodacom only had 76,000 active users in South Africa compared to 9.7 million mobile money users across Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique and Lesotho at the end of 2015. Revenue from M-Pesa in the financial year 2015/16 grew by 19% to R1.63 billion ($114 million), while Vodacom’s group revenue climbed 7.5%.
“We remain of the opinion that opportunities exist in the financial services environment and we will continue to explore these,” says Joosub.
And they are.
In other parts of the continent, Vodacom is trying to squeeze more revenue out of the financial service sector by encouraging users to sign up for M-Pawa, a mobile banking service. Already, it says, 15% of its money base is signed for M-Pawa. In Bangladesh, the fastest-growing financial services company is a mobile money provider called bKash. Less than four years after launching, it processes about two million transactions per day, with a total value of nearly $1 billion each month.
“By 2030, two billion people who don’t have a bank account today will be storing money and making payment with their phones. And by then, mobile money providers will be offering the full range of financial services, from interest-bearing savings accounts to credit to insurance,” says Bill and Melinda Gates in their annual letter.
With mobile money, people like Makumbe may not need to go back into town ever again.

Banking At Your  Fingertips

Consumer services and industries are overtaking resource extraction as the most attractive investment area in Africa, a trend that is being overlooked by many global investors.
According to the African Development Bank (AfDB), consumer spending amounted to $680 billion in 2008 – up from $150 million in 2000 – and comprising nearly a quarter of the continent’s gross domestic product. It is set to nearly quadruple to $2.2 trillion by 2030, with sub-Saharan Africa making up the lion’s share of spending.
This puts the region on course to become the world’s fastest-growing consumer market over the next two decades, says UK-based research company Capital Economics. Spending will be driven by the continent’s rapid population growth, rising real incomes, increased urbanization and better access to financial services.
Africa’s population is currently estimated at one billion and is expected to more than double to 2.4 billion by 2050, making it bigger than India and China combined. The key question is whether the continent’s strong pace of economic growth and development can create the employment and living standards necessary to support the anticipated surge in consumer demand. So far, the omens are good.
The AfDB believes that Africa’s middle class – those earning between $2 and $20 a day – will climb to 1.1 billion, or 42% of the population, by 2060. That compares to 350 million, or 34%, at present.
“Consumerism in Africa is a really big opportunity over the medium – to long-term – there are lots of people looking to buy lots of things. Huge parts of Africa are under-represented in terms of daily items – this is underplayed to some extent,” says Simon Venables, deals leader for Africa at PricewaterhouseCoopers.
Nonetheless, rapid growth of investment into consumer products and industries on the continent has already begun, according to Ernst &amp; Young (EY). In 2007, extractive industries represented 8% of foreign direct investment (FDI) projects and 26% of capital invested in Africa; in 2012, it was only 2% of projects and 12% of capital – despite the booming oil and gas sectors.
In comparison, services accounted for 70% of projects in 2012, up from 45% in 2007, while manufacturing activities accounted for 43% of capital invested in 2012, up from 22% in 2007. In an EY survey of 500 business leaders last year, mining and metals was still perceived as the sector with the highest growth potential in Africa, but the number who believe this, dropped to 26% from 38%. In contrast, interest in African infrastructure projects is increasing rapidly, with 21% of respondents identifying this as a growth sector versus 14% in 2012 and only 4% in 2011.
“These changing perceptions of relative sector attractiveness in Africa reflect the changing fundamentals of many African economies,” says Mark Otty, EY’s area managing partner for Europe, the Middle East, India and Africa. This included “the diversification of sources of growth – the increasing contribution of services and the growing consumer class – and of the actual FDI flowing into these economies.”
Overall, Africa’s appeal as an investment destination has been growing in recent years, in step with its average annual pace of growth of 5% during the past decade. FDI flows to Africa increased by 5% to $50 billion in 2012, while global FDI fell by 18%, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. The global financial crisis placed the continent on investors’ radar screens as its economic performance outshone many other global regions.
Global consultancy firms such as PwC, EY and KPMG have all reported a significant increase in enquiries about Africa’s investment potential in the past year.
KPMG Africa chairman Yunus Suleman says that telecommunications remains a big growth area as the continent still has the lowest teledensity rate. Financial services offer another opportunity – there are four bank branches per 100,000 people on the continent compared with up to 18 in other emerging regions. Health care is attractive, as is agriculture, since the continent has 60% of the world’s unused arable land.
Africa’s poor infrastructure is both a challenge and an opportunity for investment – the AfDB estimates that it needs $93 billion a year, mainly in transport and power generation. This has already taken off. In 2012 there were 800 infrastructure projects worth an estimated $700 billion in Africa.
Nonetheless there are other big barriers to investment on the continent, with negative perceptions still globally entrenched. The EY survey showed that 86% of businesses in Africa rate the continent as the second most attractive regional destination after Asia, while those with no business presence rank Africa as the least attractive.
“We are seeing some realism creeping in but distant and uninformed investors with no knowledge of emerging markets will find it difficult to get the risk/reward balance right,” says Venables.

More Middle Class Means Money

Sola Owoloja has been working in the business for five years; he understands how to please. He had to transport a comb from New York to Johannesburg. It must have been a very special comb. He naturally said: “Yes”. You have to.
The patron staying at a Johannesburg hotel had left the comb, given to her by her dying mother, in a hair salon in New York. West Chauffeurs got in touch with the New York hotel and within 48 hours the comb was hand delivered to the patron.
Running around, chauffeuring, catering to and cajoling the rich is what makes concierge services pay. On another occasion, a patron asked to deliver an elephant across the Atlantic to the United States as a gift to his daughter. Luckily, the request was not followed through, again Owoloja would have said: “Yes”.
“Integrity is very important. If you make a promise to your guest, you have to keep that promise. We made a promise to our guests. We will bend, we’re flexible. We’ll do anything to keep them satisfied,” says Owoloja.
In 2008, Owoloja and Kagiso Dumasi saw a gap in the market for a concierge company in South Africa that would cater for the needs of wealthy travelers. Owoloja oversees the operational, financial and recruitment side of the business, while Dumasi looks after the marketing.
West Chauffeurs can make dinner reservations; find scarce theater tickets and presents in a hurry, as well as deliver combs.
Nigerian-born Owoloja learnt early on at home, in Lagos, that you have to do business however you can.
In Lagos, while in his twenties, he dabbled in the supermarket business with a friend. He moved to South Africa with the hope of running an oil services company, but failed. He moved back home but later returned to South Africa to start a business with the little entrepreneurial experience under his belt.
“When the chips are down, in the face of adversity and massive challenges, you need to still inspire people to get them to see beyond the challenges of the day,” says Owoloja.
Their Johannesburg business prospered through a link to Quintessentially, a global luxury lifestyle company, known for its high net-worth clients.
With a little help from the National Empowerment Fund, West Chauffeurs increased its fleet from two cars to eight, after making more than R1 million ($108,800) in its second year.
They relocated from the central business district of Sandton to another affluent suburb, Melrose Arch. This opened up the business meetings market. The company had to swear its drivers to secrecy as many deals were struck on the road.
Towards the end of that year, an opportunity came to run the travel desk for two new five-star hotels in Cape Town but it all went downhill from there. The two found that they had expanded too quickly.
They had entered into unfamiliar territory, in an international tourist city that has well-established hotels. West Chauffeurs found itself exposed, a small business that relied too much on the hotels for guests for business. The two new hotels were unable to fill up enough rooms to secure business for West Chauffeurs. The Johannesburg office had to keep Cape Town afloat.
“For a small company, expansion should be managed very carefully. We were profitable in our first year, but we did not think through that move carefully. We expanded very quickly without the structures to manage the expansion in terms of cash flow, record keeping,” says Owoloja.
At the end of each month the business was short of around 65% of their costs, which they had to source from the profit made during the previous year.
“It dried up very quickly. We tried to get overdrafts, personal funds to pay salaries but it was quite difficult. We picked up heavy losses in Cape Town but yes those are lessons learnt. They were painful,” he adds with a chuckle.
Owoloja says a big mistake was for the company to go without a management account and financial statements for nearly a year.
But that’s all in the past now. In early 2011, West Chauffeurs packed up office in Cape Town and focused on business at its headquarters in Johannesburg, where the company was doing well.
They signed a contract to run the travel desk for the five-star African Pride’s Melrose Arch Hotel located in the trendy precinct. Again, they struggled with being too small and having to run a high occupancy hotel with demanding clients. The hotels patrons were skeptical about making use of their services because they were much smaller than established car rental companies.
Through it all, things started to look up. The company now turns over nearly $800,000 annually.
“We went from nothing to quite a bit. There’s this very nice feeling that comes with making things work,” says Owoloja.
West Chauffeurs currently has twelve cars and employs 17 drivers and consultants. They drive clients from First Bank of Nigeria, Liberty Life and Barclays, to mention but a few.
One of their biggest achievements was beating more established companies to drive members traveling with the British Lions during their rugby tour to South Africa in 2009.
The softly spoken Owoloja says they are wary of leaping without looking, the scars of the Cape Town run deep. For now, their plans are to grow other services within the West Chauffeur brand in Johannesburg and capture the leisure market.
Surely, when the time is right, the answer will be: “Yes”.

Tag: Services

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