The social business side of Telenor

While Telenor's sister concern, Grameenphone, may still be perceived as a telecom company, the organisation's reach has spread far beyond that. In a way, it is a bigger social business than anything else, with one of its underlying aims being that of empowering societies everywhere. Since what was deemed as a doomed foray into emerging markets such as Bangladesh and Myanmar, among others, Telenor hasn't blazed a trail only but chalked out maps on entirely uncharted destinations. At the Telenor HQ in Fornebu, Norway, we caught up with two individuals who spoke about their unique positions and the way forward for Telenor. 

First in line was Anna Dræge Hognestad, the Telenor Group Head of Education. The first question one needed answered was what the position really entailed. What did education have to do with a telecommunication company? "We want to make good services within education, based on the needs of the market," Anna began, explaining how one of Telenor's main aims is to empower societies and education was one of the best ways to do so. "Right now, there are a lot of exciting things happening here, especially if you look at our work in Bangladesh. Before undertaking the venture, we laid a firm groundwork," she said. Anna explained how they began by discussing with a lot of startups based in Norway and Singapore to develop the right tools for mobile educational services while also conducting a survey in Bangladesh to identify the needs of the market. "One of our concerns was the low SSC passing rates, especially in the subjects of Math and English. These were the hardest subjects and thus we focused on developing material targeting this area," she further elaborated. 

Anna then went on to explain how they were still very new in the field but the project went on with full steam, despite being launched on a test basis first. "The service we launched in Bangladesh is called MyStudy, which is kind of my baby," Anna said with a laugh, summing up how much the project really means to her. MyStudy has currently been launched across 10 schools in Bangladesh, with content created by a team of teachers aided and selected by Bangladesh's largest circulating Bangla daily, Prothom Alo. The content is based on the Bangladeshi curriculum, with numerous engaging audio and video clips helping to make education more fun, interactive and accessible. 

"The idea is to develop products and come out with them quickly but also to thoroughly test the product before a commercial launch. We test markets to find out if the products are sustainable and whether the customers like it because it is hard to get it perfect at the very first time. Now, we track how our users use the applications, what audios they listen to, which videos are frequently watched and this way we can decide what the customers like and don't like," Anna said. When asked about the focus on education, Anna said that this was an area where students had demand and the reliance of home tutors showed that there remains a big gap between education and those who need it. She further stated that work doesn't end with content given to users but Telenor actively advises institutions about how to best use the application and strives to make it accessible with better quality materials. 

Where the entire idea of a telecom offering education is different, the next item would have been too had Telenor not already pioneered it. Mobile Banking and Financial services truly is the way forward and here again Telenor is leading the pack.  Tine Wollebæk, Head of Mobile Financial Services, offered us some key insights in Telenor's presence in this sector. She began by speaking of Easypaisa, Telenor's form of mobile financial services that started in Pakistan. Easypaisa was introduced by Telenor Pakistan in collaboration with Tameer Microfinance Bank in 2009 with the aim to bring financial inclusion to Pakistan. In a country where only 15% of the population have bank accounts, mobile banking, encouraged by the respective central bank would help to make matters of finance more convenient. 

"Initially, we started off with basic mobile banking, which was sending money between people. People with a Telenor sim card could register an account and begin transactions. Our over-the-counter services were one that was encouraged the most," Tine began. Soon, the service added bill service and this was because it was identified that people wasted a lot of time queuing up mobile bill payment helped eliminate this bottleneck of sorts. Soon, the service began the government disbursement programme and NGO disbursement programme, with amounts of 5-10 dollars, which would be hard to distribute physically. 

"Now, with the success of Easypaisa, we are looking towards the Bangladesh market, where we have MobiBank, to do something similar. In Bangladesh, online e-commerce is growing and we have seen that while retailers want money upon order, customers want to pay after getting the product, so we are trying to make the idea of online payments both easy, fast and efficient for all parties," Tine added. She pointed out how they tried a new thing in Pakistan during Black Friday of this year with a bunch of e-commerce merchants and the idea really took off. "We figured people wanted online payment option and we were right. Of course, we also realise that Bangladesh is a cash-based society but if you can digitalize money, society becomes more efficient," she said. Tine added that there plenty of challenges but eventually convenience should triumph above all. 

Speaking to these individuals, it was clear that Telenor had plans, not only for Bangladesh but across all markets and the Telenor name was soon to grow. It isn't a stretch to say that Telenor may go on to become one of the most dominant firms in numerous markets with their far reaching sight and evolving plans. For the Bangladeshi market though, it seems a game changer is about to take place and one that we can all look forward to.