In just one year, Standard Bank of South Africa has opened over 8,000 “bank shops”, thanks to the use of cell phones to enable remote banking. With the use of cell phones, banks can avoid the high cost of brick and mortar bank branches or auto-teller machines, utilizing existing street-side convenience stores or tents. The cell phone based banking model is poised to open banking to some of the estimated 15,000,000 South Africans that do not have a bank account, but do have the means to save and spend. Read more
