The GSMA Development Fund with the support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation 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 was available during Phase 1 to support commercially viable and sustainable mobile operator led projects that accelerated the speed at which mobile money services for the mass market in developing countries were deployed.

The focus of the Fund was 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 Working Group
A series of MMU Working Groups have been created to stimulate discussion and knowledge sharing around mobile money issues. There will be two primary MMU Working Group events, which will he held bi-annually, to share commercial experiences, workshop challenges identified by the industry and discuss potential solutions.

The next one will take place in Barcelona on February 28th, 2012 collocated with the GSMA Mobile World Congress.

In addition to the primary MMU Working Group events, the GSMA is also facilitating a series of smaller Working Groups which target specific industry segments and topics, for example, the MMU Grantee Working Group and the Regulatory Working Group, Membership of the MMU Working Group is open to members of the GSMA and other interested parties in the mobile money industry. If you are interested in participating, please contact mmu@gsm.org.

MMU and Regulation
In order to overcome the regulatory barriers associated with mobile money services, the programme involves a regulatory element that seeks to improve the capacity of mobile operators to address mobile money risks and to improve the dialogue between financial regulators and the mobile industry.