Gates Foundation Presents: Crucial Areas of Fintech Innovation for the Bottom of the Pyramid

February 1, 2016
Jake Kendall | Gates Foundation

The promise and scale of mobile money has ignited huge interest in digital finance products in emerging markets, and is genuinely transforming these countries by providing access to formal financial services to low-income users. The GSMA now tracks over 250 deployments of mobile money with 300m clients, 100m of which are active on a 30 day basis – and growing fast. However, low profitability, large losses, and the outright failure of many Digital Financial Service (DFS) launches can be traced back to difficult barriers and frictions. Many of these challenges could be addressed by high potential emerging technologies but often the requisite translation of these technologies from the lab or from other sectors into usable tools is not happening with the necessary urgency. The Gates Foundation will discuss 6 major pain points (Fraud and cyber-attacks; Proximity payments; Identity and on-boarding; Advanced analytics for risk scoring and product development; retail agent recruitment, training, and management; Financial management and budgeting by end users) we see in the digital financial services ecosystem that call out for breakthrough innovation. We will also discuss our research agenda and early experimentation in these areas and seek feedback and potential partnerships to further our mission.

Speaker Details

Jake Kendall is a Deputy Director on the Financial Services for the Poor team working with the Research and Emerging Technologies initiative. His work focuses on managing and coordinating the research activities of FSP including managing FSP’s major research grants and engaging with the researcher community. Previous to joining the Foundation, he spent time as a researcher with the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP) housed in the World Bank. He holds a PhD in Economics from UC Santa Cruz and a BS in Physics from MIT. Just after graduating from MIT he volunteered for two years in Zambia as a fisheries extension agent with the US Peace Corps. He has also worked as a Brand Analyst for a major advertising firm, a technical salesperson for two high tech start-ups, and, throughout his youth, a salmon fisherman in Alaska.