Mar

29

Technology and Changing the World: Trends roundup - March 29, 2008

Filed Under business, changing the world, entrepreneurship, microfinance, mobile, passion, poverty, regular reads, startup, technology, things to ponder about | Leave a Comment

This post consists of my “value-added” thoughts on David Kirkpatrick’s article on Fortune here.

Since I love all things technology and passionately believe that it wields the power to change the world, these numbers are just plain interesting to me. I’ve overlayed on the data some general technology trends on Web 2.0 startups, venture capital, microfinance and poverty, all cleverly slapped into one big fat blog post. Why? Because they’re all inter-connected, and I haven’t written anything all this week (been so darn busy lately!) Off we go.

Indonesia:
- 1 in 100 owns a PC
- 1 in 1,000 has broadband Internet
- 63 million cell phone subscribers, representing 27% of the population (of 234 million)
- Annual cell phone subscription growth rate: 36%

India:
- 166 million cell phone users
- Last year’s cell phone subscription growth rate was 84.5%

Switzerland:
- The Swiss have 85.1 PCs per 100 persons, beating the United States at 80.3 PCs per 100 persons

Global PC penetration is 12.9 for every 100 people. Room for growth? You bet. Many of PC owners are obviously in well developed countries, and not poor countries with lots of people. OLPC’s efforts to reach the billions at the BoP will move the needle here, if they succeed. Not forgetting the “middle” market, more of those who are neither rich nor poor will also buy computers and get on the internet. (Better start loading up on some PC stocks!) But wait, am I sure that the middle-class is not going to get poorer and not buy computers? Well the stats from Hans Rosling’s TED talk show that the overall trend here is that the world is slowly digging itself out of poverty, and I take comfort in that. Actually, read on below as I describe another trend that supports that.

Now, for some cell phone stats:

United States:
- 77.4 subscribers per 100 people
- Everywhere in Europe (except Turkey) exceeds penetration in US. Italy is at a whopping 135.1 cellphone subscribers per 100 persons.
- Hong Kong beats the US in penetration too, at 135.3

The global average is 41.6 per 100 people.

Cellphone usage growth in fast growing markets last year*:
- Peru: 57%
- Vietnam: 114%
- Pakistan: 170%
- Ukraine: 185%

*numbers might be fuzzy, but they show a general trend

What’s also important to note about this upward trend in adoption is that mobile phones were the crucial piece that first enabled the poor in Bangladesh to get out of poverty (see section on Village Phone). Women built business models around it and turned it into a source of income. These days, mobile phones are also playing another role in microfinance: enabling the transfer of money and information over, well, mobile phones! In poor countries, a brick-and-mortar bank branches with ATMs are hard to come by (ditto for computers and broadband), so mobile phones are serving this unmet need, facilitating microfinance and thus helping reduce poverty.

Other interesting stats:
- 1.3 billion of global population connected to the Internet, compound annual growth of 20.3% for past 8 years.
- Internet ad spending of $40 billion is only 6.6% of global total of $605 billion and is growing at 33%. (Ha, I should double down on this little company while I can!)

Data from 2008 Global Internet Snapshot compiled by Imran Khan, senior analyst at JP Morgan. (hmm, can anyone get me access to that full report?)

That’s why medium and big tech companies can weather the unfavorable US economy trend by going abroad. Fruit trees in your backyard not yielding? Then go after the greener pastures outside of your backyard too. It’s called diversifying. That’s the other thing I love about software is that it’s not a physical object–a computer scientist can create value with merely a laptop (and some coffee!) The cost of making that first software copy is the most expensive, then every other subsequent copy ad infinitum is basically free. This is just the nature of information economics, and has obviously served Microsoft very well. Actually, tiny tech startups can do this too — by leveraging the distribution power of this thing they call the internets.
Read more

Mar

22

The missing middle: SME

Filed Under changing the world, microfinance, poverty, wokai | Leave a Comment

Food for thought: In rich countries, SME’s (small and medium enterprises) represent more than 50% of the country’s GDP and 2/3 of the jobs in private sector. This engine for growth that sits between microenterprises and large corporations is clearly missing, a hamper on a poor country’s effort to bail itself out of poverty.

Google’s success is also because they had access to finance and well developed capital markets. SME’s in poor countries lack access to both. Google strives to bring these opportunities available to silicon valley entrepreneurs and take them global. A global silicon valley, imagine that! Silicon valleys that span nations, uniting the world :)

Opportunities are difficult to come by when you just simply don’t have them. It’s like looking for a job when you have no experience, having all your prospective employers say, “show me some experience.” Likewise, this is a catch-22. I have to say, I know this first hand … and I absolutely value opportunity, never taking it for granted. The one thing worse than wasting money is wasting human potential.

This short video clip says it all. The stories are typical. An entrepreneur goes to the local bank, wanting a loan to open a school and educate children. Banks say, “show me 2-3 years of your cash-flow.”

Cash flow?!?!!!
Read more

Jan

12

Poverty myths busted by Grameenphone

Filed Under changing the world, microfinance, mobile, poverty, things to ponder about, wokai | Leave a Comment

Myth: Government needs to provide economically viable services
What Grameenphone proved: Private companies can provide them

Myth: Government needs to subsidize private companies
What Grameenphone proved: Private companies can help government with taxes

Myth: Poor people are recipients
What Grameenphone proved: The poor are a resource

Myth: The poor are uneducated and can’t do much
What Grameenphone proved: They are eager learners and capable survivors

Myth: Poor countries need aid
What Grameenphone proved: Businesses raise GNP far more than aid

From the a slide at Iqbal Quadir’s TED talk.

Coincidentally, Courtney from Wokai has just posted her thoughts on this CNN article about mobile money transfers taking off in Kenya–where not everyone has a bank account or even a home address. I believe the saying that creativity can’t flourish without constraints is true. In well off countries like the United States, *everyone* has a bank account and home address, so it’s quite natural to see why the average normal person would care much about being able to conduct banking sans a bank account or home address.

Mobile/cellular technology is a great example. What cell phone users are offered here in the US make us look we’re still living in the stone age–when compared to oh say, Japan.

Sometimes having good things in life can be a burden, in the sense that they might block you from seeing other opportunities. Ever felt that way?
Read more

Nov

23

If at least one person on this life has breathed easier, ..

Filed Under changing the world, microfinance, quotes, san diego, startup, things to remind myself, wokai | Leave a Comment

And today’s quote is .. *drumroll*

To laugh often and much, to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children, to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends, to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others, to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch… to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded!”

–- Ralph Waldo Emerson

And on a related quote, by an unknown author:

“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the number of moments that take our breath away.”

Speaking of changing the world, the non-profit microfinance startup, Wokai, that I am currently assisting on a volunteer basis is having it’s inaugural meet-and-greet for the San Diego team (and anyone interested). We’re hosting it tomorrow at Roger’s place at 2pm PST. Contact me for details (I’m not going to randomly posting someone’s home address on the web!)

Sep

17

Third-world stats and myths

Filed Under changing the world, did you know, ideas, microfinance, passion, people i like, things to ponder about, winds of change | Leave a Comment

The following TED video clip is AWESOME. 20 minutes well worth your time, I personally guarantee it.

Key points for myself:

  • It’s better to be healthy first, then wealthy later (vs. the other way around)
  • GDP per capita is tied directly to infant mortality rate
  • We’re moving towards 1 world, 3rd world countries are slowly pushing out of poverty
  • Cookie-cutter approaches don’t always work, 1 size fits all cannot be applied everywhere
  • Some people are unwilling to share data that can help change the world
  • $100 dollar OLPC initiative is truly changing the world

Amazingly cool graphs! Makes me believe even more in why the non-profit microfinance I am helping out with can really make the world a better place. I would love to one day meet Hans Rosling in person.

Sep

9

Change the world! (with a non-profit microfinance startup)

Filed Under changing the world, microfinance, poverty, san diego, startup, wokai | 4 Comments

I’ve just got back to town from LA (that’s Los Angeles, not Louisiana’s state code — I’ve had someone mix the two up before), and I’m catching up on a couple of things, hence my inability to post to this blog as frequent as I would like. I’ve also been busy shopping for schtuff for my upcoming Europe get-lost-and-sleep-in-an-alley backpacking trip, what a learning experience, but that’s a talk for another time.

In the mean time, I haven’t mentioned this before here, but I am helping out with a non-profit microfinance startup based in Beijing, whose goal is to reduce poverty in China. Currently, I’m seeking for volunteers in San Diego. This is a great way to gain some experience! I’ve just posted an ad on sandiego.craigslist, so I thought I’d cross post here too.

www.wokai.org

Wokai is a nonprofit organization working to build the microfinance sector in China. We envision a China in which no individual is denied choices and opportunities due to the inaccessibility of financial capital. Our mission is to enable Chinese microentrepreneurs to lift themselves from poverty.

We are looking for dedicated, passionate volunteers to help with our PR efforts. If you are interested in learning about microfinance and gaining experience in the nonprofit sector, please contact me