MMU Programme

The GSMA Development Fund has initiated the Mobile Money for the Unbanked (MMU) programme to accelerate the availability of mobile money services to the unbanked and those living on less than US$2 per day.

Bringing together mobile operators in developing countries, banks, microfinance institutions, governments, development organisations and the private sector, MMU has the goal of reaching 20 million previously unbanked people with mobile financial services by 2012.

MMU Fund

A US$5 million Fund is available over a period of two years to support commercially viable and sustainable mobile operator led projects that accelerate the speed at which mobile money services for the mass market in developing countries are deployed.

The focus of the Fund is upon:

• Supporting commercially viable projects
• Providing a quick response and straight forward grant process
• Ensuring that mobile services are targeted at base of the pyramid customers
• Knowledge sharing

MMU Team

Gavin Krugel

Gavin is a Director at the GSM Association where he is responsible for mobile money strategy development, as well as leading  the Mobile Money for the Unbanked initiative. Gavin also led the GSMA’s Mobile Money Transfer initiative which involved 40  mobile operators representing more than 100 markets and 1 billion consumers globally.

As one of the forefathers of mobile financial services, Gavin has been behind some of the best known mobile banking implementations in the world, and founded the boutique consulting firm TroyTyla to serve this niche industry.

Gavin has twelve years of experience in global payment systems and banking products, and has helped develop, implement and manage several successful payment products and solutions. He has held positions at banks such as Standard Bank, Absa Bank and Investec Private Bank in South Africa, as well as global companies such as MasterCard and EDS.

He is currently completing his Masters Degree at GGSB (Grenoble Graduate School of Business),  France.

Seema Desai

Seema is Programme Manager for the MMU programme, responsible for managing the day-to-day programme activities and ensuring that all delivery is clearly aligned with the programme’s objectives.

Prior to joining the GSMA in March 2009, Seema managed a large portion of the Retail Savings P&L for one of the UK’s largest retail banks. Seema has also been a Manager at Accenture, within their strategy consulting division, where she focussed mainly on Financial Services and has worked with a number of FTSE 100 companies. During her 6 years at Accenture, Seema also completed two secondments to Accenture Development Partnerships, a non-profit arm of Accenture that provides business consulting to NGOs and donor organisations. She managed capacity building projects for existing NGOs in the field, and has also managed new start up projects such as the creation of an innovative social franchising network in India. She has also worked in Trinidad and Uganda. Seema holds a 1st Class Honours degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University.

Seema has travelled all over the world – and her rock shoes almost always come with her these days. Or her ice axes and crampons, depending on the conditions.

Marina Solin

Marina is Regulatory Director for the MMU programme and previously provided regulatory consultancy to the Mobile Money Transfer programme.

She has over ten years of experience in dealing with regulatory issues on behalf of the telecoms industry.

Prior to joining the GSMA, Marina worked  on a European Commission project providing the regulatory analysis for accession negotiations of Eastern European countries in the field of telecoms. She also worked for Deutsche Telekom in Brussels, where she was responsible for lobbying the European Community institutions on interconnection and unbundling of the local loop. As Chair of the GSM Europe M-Commerce Working Group, Marina was also involved in lobbying the European Community institutions on m-commerce related issues such as mobile payments, data protection and copyright.

Marina has completed the Sloan Fellowship Programme at the London Business School.

Paul Leishman

Paul is Knowledge Manager for the MMU programme. He is responsible for leading the development and dissemination of commercial content, including business strategy analyses focused on mobile money business models, and case studies profiling key success factors of deployments.

Prior to joining the GSMA, Paul was a Consultant at a Toronto-based firm, primarily supporting a mobile handset manufacturer during the opportunity assessment phase of a new service launch in developing and developed markets. Before this, Paul worked on the Strategic Planning & Execution team at Canadian operator, TELUS Mobility, and earned an HBA (honours business administration) with distinction from the Richard Ivey School of Business.

Neil Davidson

Neil Davidson is the Business Development Manager for the Mobile Money for the Unbanked programme at the GSM Association. In this role he supports mobile network operators that have been awarded grants from the MMU Fund as they develop and deploy mobile money services.

Neil’s background and professional interest is in businesses that benefit the poor. Prior to joining the MMU programme, Neil worked for Kenya’s second-largest microfinance institution, K-Rep Bank, and as a consultant at McKinsey & Co., where he advised a leading retail bank in Nigeria and to a logistics conglomerate in South Africa.

Neil holds a bachelor’s degree and an MBA from Harvard University.

Camilo  Tellez

Camilo is the MMU Programme Coordinator.  Prior to joining the GSMA, he worked as a researcher in the technology for emerging markets team  at Microsoft Labs in Bangalore and the Operations and Country Services Unit of the World Bank in Washington D.C.
He holds a master’s degree in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and a master’s degree in Information systems from the London School of Economics and Political Science.