The Synergies between Mobile, Energy and Water Access: Asia

This document presents a detailed approach to current mobile-enabled energy and water initiatives, business models, and opportunities for the mobile sector in Asia. Key takeaways include:

• As population growth puts increasing pressure on urban utilities to deliver efficient and reliable services, mobile channels such as remote monitoring through mobile networks, mobile payments, and/or mobile services can play a key role in increasing the flow of information between the service providers and their customers, while improving payment efficiency;
• Mobile-enabled energy pay-as-you-go (PAYG) solutions could prove disruptive as a model to acquire clean power systems for low-income populations that are unable to afford such solutions without external financial support. The success of energy service companies (ESCOs) will be based on accessing working capital to finance these PAYG solutions and creating or partnering with efficient distributors to better reach and serve their customers;
• From digital currencies to mobile money services, the availability of mobile financial services for payments, financing, and savings could be critical to unlock further potential of mobile-enabled utility services. While providing new tools to entrepreneurs and NGOs to serve unbanked populations, these services represent an important new revenue stream for mobile operators in highly competitive environments.