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Pitch

Access financial and non-financial services at negligible cost wherever you are, whenever you want.


Description

Summary / Résumé

BITKwacha Money offers a comprehensive set of financial and non-financial services on a single electronic interface.

We enable consumers to store funds and pay for a wide range of services, offer affordable P2P/P2B/ B2B/G2P local and international transfers, give access to loyalty programs in local businesses and analyze user’s incomes and expenses using Artificial Intelligence.


What actions do you propose? / Quelles actions proposez-vous?

Unbanked and undocumented individuals have no easy way to store and transfer assets.

  • No single view for available financial and non-financial services (insurance, credit, etc.).
  • Want to make online purchases but have only cash
  • Pay extremely high transaction fees.

MSMEs and service providers spend too much time/money chasing customers and processing transactions when they would rather be selling products.

  • 80 – 90% lower cost from providing digital rather than physical accounts.(McKinsey, 2016)

We are proposing to develop Digital Wallet and crypto-currency as a simple tool for multi-purpose payments

“Access credit and climate-risk insurance at negligible cost wherever you are, whenever you want”

https://imgur.com/JK68jyC

BITKwacha Money Wallet Crypto-wallet app

https://imgur.com/P62M239

List of features:

  • Multisig wallet; set-up a shared account that needs private keys from multiple people to confirm a transaction.
  • Users can unlock the app with a security code or fingerprint scan
  • Private key is stored on the client side
  • Set-up a 12-word mnemonic, which should be recorded to backup the wallet
  • Make global P2P, P2B, B2B, and G2P transfers using cryptocurrencies (BITKwachaCoin, UtilicomPowerCoin, RecyclebotWasteCoin, Bitcoin, Ether, etc.)
  • Single electronic interface to local financial and non-financial service providers.
  • Top-up account with cash, through BITKwacha Exchange, cash agents, POS machine, and ATMs.
  • Ability to manage commissions for all types of transactions
  • Integration of popular service providers to pay for airtime, electricity, water, insurance, subsidies, etc.
  • Merchant payments with a virtual card within the app.
  • Map of affiliated agents, POS machines and ATMs.

BITKwachaCoin (BKC) – ERC 20 Token built on the Ethereum protocol.

https://imgur.com/0bxyEOe

  • Users can make transfer at negligible cost, without any intermediaries.

BITKwacha Crypto Exchange Autonomous, immutable and fully transparent cryptocurrency exchange

https://imgur.com/2khFebz

  • Holds zero balance on the exchange.
  • Everything is viewable starting from order lists and ending with our coin reserves.

Weather-Indexed Automated Insurance Smart Contract Autonomous, immutable and fully transparent distributed climate-risk insurance contract.

https://imgur.com/JK68jyC

  • Protects against loss of assets due to damage caused by droughts, floods and storms using real-world data.
    • Users pay micro-premiums and automatically receive a pay-out when the weather in their location exceeds certain limits within a given timeframe.
    • Information about the weather is automatically fed into the program from satellite observations, IoT–enabled weather monitoring devices and local weather stations.
  • Funds are held and controlled by the code.

 

 

 


Which types of stakeholders are involved, in which way? / Quels types de parties prenantes sont impliqués, de quelle façon?

Consumers:

  • Save time; securely transfer funds almost instantly.
  • Save money; traders/service providers compete for their business
  • Great job; traders/service provider work hard for great reviews (gain access to loan and insurance products with a hassle-free application process and rapid turnaround time.)

MSMEs:

  • Save time; less time processing payments, accounting and acquiring customers
  • Save Money; gain powerful insights for retaining customers and boosting sales
  • More money; more time and funds invested in core business.
  • Grow faster; access loan and insurance products with a hassle-free application process and rapid turnaround time

Service providers:

  • Save time; less time processing payments, accounting and acquiring customers
  • Save money; gain powerful insights for retaining customers and boosting sales; more time serving customer needs.
  • Grow faster; more customers + great insights = more work


How could the actions be scaled up at the neighborhood or city level? / Comment serait-il possible d'augmenter la portée des actions à l'échelle des quartiers ou de la ville?

How we make money

We charge users a nominal monthly subscription fee.

  • No charge for sending/receiving/depositing/withdrawing funds
  • 1% transaction fee to exchange cryptocurrencies

Our growth strategy is as follows:

Marketing and Sales (Acquiring customers):

  • Online marketing inc. SEM, SEO, SMM, daily deals
  • Refer-a-friend discounts for consumers
  • Volume/loyalty discounts for consumers and agents
  • Incentive program for HR and office managers

Customer Service (Keeping customers):

  • Dedicated customer service representatives for each DMA
  • BITKwacha staffed community message board for consumer (public) and agents (login required)

Product development (Staying competitive):

  • Customer Development Advisory Board to drive consumer features
  • Product Development Advisory Board to drive Wallet and Exchange features
  • Add cryptocurrencies
  • Add smart contracts
  • Add quantum swap across blockchains

Key Metrics: https://imgur.com/QhwmHts

Financials: https://imgur.com/5m0kCxg

Timeline: https://imgur.com/cX08qmy


What impact will these actions have on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to climate change? / Quels impacts auront ces actions sur la réduction des émissions de gaz à effet de serre et l'adaptation aux changements climatiques?

Today:

  • 60% of global population dependent on Agriculture
  • ~2 billion adults—or 45% of the world’s adult population, majority women—do not have access to basic financial
  • 200 million SMEs have no or insufficient access to credit (McKinsey,2016)
  • $2.1 trillion to $2.6 trillion credit gap to SMEs in developing economies.(World Bank, 2014)
  • $250 billion to $300 billion /year economic losses from natural hazard-induced disasters (FAO, 2015)
  • 84% of damage and losses caused by drought absorbed by agricultural sector (FAO, 2015)

 

A multi-purpose digital Wallet and cryptocurrency could remove multiple barriers to inclusion.

  • Expand financial inclusion and climate-risk insurance to previously unserved segments.
  • Allow MSMEs to use their own data to track key patterns for gauging a firm’s financial health, such as:
    • Overall sales volumes 
    • Transactions from unique customers
    • Frequency of supplier payments
    • Bestselling products
    • Stock-keeping units (SKUs)
    • Variance over time (day, week or month) or seasonality
  • Allow both private and institutional lenders to harness digital and alternative data trails to gauge risk, improve underwriting and offer borrowers unsecured loans at high margins.


What are the other environmental, economic or social benefits? / Quels sont les autres bénéfices environnementaux, économiques et sociaux?

  • Access to a bank account and banking services for the hitherto unbanked and undocumented;banks can better understand the financing needs and spending patterns of the financially excluded;
  • Price transparency, market information and safe alternative to cash;
  • Saved travel and opportunity costs; convenient and secure payroll payments and B2B supply chain payments.
  • New transaction flow that optimizes costs of servicing distribution and enhances customer loyalty generated
  • Potential to acquire and serve new clients from the growing middle class and informal sector unlocked,
  • Cost-efficient access for even lower income clients beyond the reach of mainstream banks enabled, with multiple benefits including; improved livelihoods, health, and education.


What are the most innovative aspects and main strengths of this approach? / Quels sont les aspects novateurs et les principales forces de cette approche?

  • Anyone can use BITKwacha’s Wallet and crypto-currency to send money globally almost instantly and with very low fees.
  • BITKwacha Money automates the rules and execution of contracts with real-world information automatically fed into the program, and funds held and controlled by the code.
    • Minimizes risks and administration costs versus paper money.
    • Data is verified and secured using cryptography.


What are the proposal’s projected costs? / Quels sont les coûts projetés de la proposition?

Bootstrapped by founders through customer development and MVP/proof of concept, the project costs to date include;

  • Creating the BITKwachaCoin ERC 20 Token on Ropsten Test Network (approximately 10 hours)
  • Creating BITKwacha Money Wallet prototype (approximately 240 hours)
  • Creating BITKwacha Crypto Exchange prototypes (approximately 80 hours)
  • Time creating Weather-Indexed Automated Insurance Smart Contract (approximately 120 hours)
  • Creating BITKwachaCoin ICO Test Page (approximately 40 hours)
  • The time in writing this proposal (approximately 20 hours).

Based on a typical hourly rate for a professional engineer, project costs to date would total in dollars an estimated $24,500 – $122,500.

We are seeking $50,000 seed funding (target close by EOQ3), so we can:

  • Reach 100,000 subscribers
  • Scale/refine marketing/customer acquisition
  • Scale customer service
  • Scale infrastructure

The proposed budget is as follows:

Customer creation      $15,000 30%

Other Direct Costs        $2,000  4%

PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT    $23,000 46%

  • Create BITKwachaCoin ERC 20 Toke n                 
  • Install exchange front-end on server                 
  • Test and debug Wallet                  
  • Test and debug BITKwachaCoin Token on Ethereum Main Networks                   
  • Test and debug BITKwacha Exchange                  
  • Publish BITKwachaCoin on BITKwacha Exchange             
  • Publish Wallet app on Playstore and iStore                  
  • Publish BITKwachaMoney ICO Test Website               

Equipment       $10,000 20%

TOTAL $50,000


What are the potential challenges or obstacles? / Quels sont les défis ou les obstacles potentiels?

  • Low uptake of electronic payments by MSMEs, and mobile broadband connectivity.
  • Regulation on crypto-currency and micro-finance.
  • No or inadequate growth funding.


About the authors / À propos des auteur(e)s

Chifungu Samazaka


References / Références

  1. Mckinsey Global Institute (2018). Digital Finance For All: Powering Inclusive Growth In Emerging Economies. [online] Available at: https://www.mckinsey.com/. [Accessed March 10. 2018].
  2. World Bank. 2016. Innovation in electronic payment adoption : the case of small retailers (English). Washington, D.C. : World Bank Group. http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/765851467037506667/ Innovation-in-electronic-payment-adoption-the-case-of-small-retailers
  3. Asli Demirguc-Kunt, Leora Klapper, Dorothe Singer, and Peter Van Oudheusden, “The Global Findex Database 2014: Measuring Financial Inclusion around the World”. Policy Research Working Paper 7255, World Bank, Washington, D.C.
  4. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. (2018). The impact of disasters on agriculture and food security. [online] Available at: http://41.77.4.164:6510/www.fao.org/3/a-i5128e.pdf [Accessed 5 Jan. 2018].