200 million people around the world are working and living in a country other than their home one. These migrants are remitting back home over $300 billion every year. Out of the 3.4 billion mobile subscribers worldwide, the vast vajority are prepaid. They perform 50 billion top-ups a year.

Prepaid mobile phones have dramatically improved the life of all its users. It has become a tool of economic empowerment in compensating for inadequate infrastructures, allowing information to move more freely and unleashing entrepreneurship. In emerging markets, the telecom industry contributes with an average of 4% to the GDP and over 60 million people draw part of their income from airtime reselling.

Mobile operators offer this innovative and differentiating service to their ethnic segment – an underserved market with a high telecom spending profile. Most of migrants own a mobile phone. Their average revenue per user (ARPU) is significantly higher than the ARPU of the rest of the population. This market has traditionally been overlooked and underserved by telecom operators. In developed countries, operators can now rely on TransferTo’s solid expertise to finally address the migrant markets. In emerging markets, operators have the opportunity to collect additional revenues from an affluent market.

Transferring airtime from a prepaid phone serves a different purpose when compared to transferring money. Airtime is sent as gift to family and friends on many occasions (religious celebrations, birthday, weddings...).

As the current remittance channels are inefficient for sending money amount below $20, migrants lack appropriate solutions to send small gift back home. By reloading the prepaid mobile phone of their relatives, TransferTo™ offers expatriate workers an innovative service enabling an easy and cost effective cross border sending of value from $1 to $20.  

In addition, airtime recipients greatly outnumber money transfer recipients. As an Indian money changer in Singapore, user of our service recently quoted: “money just for wife, top-up for wife, friends and family back home, I top up 4 times a month”.