More from Davos
February 1st, 2010
“Obopay, founded by Carol Realini, particularly struck my imagination, and was enthusiastically explained by Tom Standage …the opportunity was clear enough, without Standage’s endorsement. Obopay offered people who had never had a credit or cheque card the means to send money to relatives, or pay for utilities or food using their phones.
“Half of the world’s adults [or 2.5 billion people] have no access to banking,” Realini said. Obopay, and companies like it, could empower those people, making them more economically productive, and overturn banking. That’s the kind of thing I look to technology to achieve.” – Jason Pontin, Editor in Chief and Publisher of Technology Review
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This has been a great event for mobile banking and Obopay. Mobile Banking is discussed in many sessions and conversations. Yesterday I attended a private workgroup on Mobile Banking. Since it is private I am not allowed to discuss it but I believe the WEF will write a report that I will hopefully be able to share with all of you.
The Technology Pioneers program is a dream come true for a entrepreneur; recognition and a chance to build a very broad and deep network around the world.
It is hard to get into a rhythm at Davos. The day starts early and ends when participant just can’t stay awake any longer. I have not yet made it past 11PM – but the evening activities go way later – until around 2 PM. On the first few days I wanted to do everything. Then I realized that was impossible so I have now settled into an approach that is 1/3 sessions, 1/3 preset 1-1 meetings, 1/3 general networking.
I can’t say enough how full every day has been. And how amazing. Almost all of the corporate attendees are CEO’s. I have had an opportunity to talk to CEO’s of 3 major Mobile Operators, 2 of the world’s biggest banks, and many others. Not only do you meet them, you connect with them. We are all here as “equals” so the normal barriers between people breakdown. It is a unique gathering.
I am not sure what I was thinking but at one technical pioneer event there was an “incident”. There was a journalist – who will go unnamed – who was berating a technical pioneer. This journalist didn’t understand or appreciate the value of the tech pioneers business. So I got up and told the journalist that he was out of line and to back off. He really was out of line and also I think he didn’t understand the business because he couldn’t even imaging the environment of an emerging market. His context was so stuck in Silicon Valley. Time for Silicon Valley to open up its view of the world and understand the emerging markets and the next 3 B consumers.
(If someone from Obopay’s PR agency was at this meeting they would have wanted to put duck tape over my mouth. This is not the kind of thing a entrepreneur and CEO should be doing with a major journalist. I just couldn’t sit by and let this go on without speaking up.)
At that same meeting there was a process where the attendees selected those tech pioneers whose companies were the “best”. The criteria was subjective – but I think the most important factors were – was this going to be a large global successful business and was this business going to change the world. I’ll am happy to report the results – Obopay was selected as one of the top pioneers.
Jason Pontin, Editor in Chief and Publisher of Technology Review, wrote an article about this – check it out.
Davos Day 2: OboPay Is One of the Fairest
The attendees of the World Economic Forum chose the startups they like most.
Entry Filed under: Blogside with Carol Realini
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