Salutat

How to ensure communities to create shared prosperity? Empower them to create wealth for themselves. 

While self-employment is often the only solution to the most vulnerable populations, there is a significant gap in access to finance necessary for them to grow and prosper. 

We found the solution to creating access to quality finance for all in people who are already in communities: loan officers of microfinance institutions (MFIs). As regulated institutions, MFIs provide sustainable and ethical interest rates, unlike alternatives of loan sharks and digital lenders. 

Our solution makes loan officers bionic. With super-human efficiency and tools to support customers and prospects, loan officers become personal finance advisors and coaches for vulnerable individuals and communities, help them not only to access quality finance provided by MFIs, but also to use the finance effectively to create prosperity.

We scale by working with MFIs serving 200 million clients across the world.

Between 365-445 million MSMEs in emerging markets contribute to well over 60% of employment in emerging countries (WBG). However, access to quality finance remains significant issues, particularly for women microentrepreneurs. 

Without quality finance, desperate people who need to support the family go to unregulated finance providers, such as loan sharks and digital lenders who charge over 1000% interest rates. At the same time, traditional regulated lenders are struggling to survive against quick and easy solution they provide. 

In fact, MFIs are having a relationship management crisis. As the industry grew to reach over 200 million clients, each loan officer manage 100 to 300 customers. Many message customers on personal OTT channels (e.g. WhatsApp) thanks to increasing smartphone penetration and decreasing data cost. This creates risky un-auditable communications. While MFIs do have high standard operating guidelines, un-auditable communications result in harassment and fraud. In addition, various departments across the institutions reach customers for different reasons, such as marketing, accounting and audit. 

This situation created inefficient, non-compliant and uncoordinated customer communication, resulting in bad customer experience, making unregulated financial providers attractive. 

To creating access to quality finance for all, Salutat solves the issue of communication and customer relationship for MFIs.

We have two primary beneficiary populations: existing customers and prospect customers of our financial inclusion partners. We are currently working with microenterpreneurs in Myanmar and Zimbabwe through two of the biggest global MFI groups. 50 to 80 percent of them are women aged between 30 to 60 with family and children to support. Some are divorced or widowed as well. Their business types and sizes vary, but generally they are eligible to receive a loan of $300 to $10,000 and have 0 to 5 employees.  

We work with those two primary beneficiary populations through loan officers at our financial inclusion partners. We work directly and closely with pilot loan officers to constantly obtain their feedback. We also conduct surveys directly to customers to obtain direct feedback from them to ensure their participation in the solution. 

Our solution addresses beneficiary's needs in two ways. First, by creating efficient, auditable, and coordinated communications, customers enjoy more tailored customer services from loan officers. Second, based on the needs of the community, we create bite-sized learning content for loan officers to share via messaging system. This achieves on demand, targeted learning for customers to become eligible for the loan and grow their businesses.   

Salutat solution consists of two products: Salutat and Invisio. Salutat is a mobile application for loan officers while Invisio is a desktop solution for managers and other headquarter staff. 

Salutat is designed for and with loan officers to help them build relationships with customers efficiently and effectively. We achieve this in two ways: 1) AI-driven staff work plans and 2) psychology-driven personalized communication templates, in-chat bot and educational content. With the AI-driven work plans, loan officers can reallocate their time to costly in person meetings to calls and messages. At the same time, pre-scheduled personalized messages and a bot feature allow loan officers to send 4.5 times more messages with 30% less time spent on messaging. In other words, with the efficiency gain Salutat is providing, loan officers can serve twice as many customers as before. In addition, with handy bite-sized educational content, loan officers become financial advisors who do not just process loans, but work with customers to help them grow with the access to finance they are providing, or help them become loan-ready in the case of prospect customers. 

Invisio, on the other hand is designed for and with branch managers, management and other headquarters staff to coordinate communications to customers across the organization, and monitor and manage communication quality. Through Invisio, all communications made to customers are recorded and reported to the respective parties to coordinate their communication. The communications between customers, loan officers and any other staff are then analyzed using natural language processing (NLP), and create management information system (MIS) reports that combine loan outcome information, such as repayment and retention rates, and customer sentiment and risk analysis to inform the management on quality of customer relationship and capacity building needs. 

Overall, by making the customer communication more efficient, auditable and coordinated, Salutat system transforms the loan officers’ role in the community to merely providers of quality finance to economic and financial advisors who can help the community members to better access credits and use it to create economic growth for the customers and the community. Eventually, with better financial literacy and access, more people move away from dangerous and desperate methods of financing, such as loan sharks and digital lenders to regulated and sustainable finance provided by MFIs and other bank institutions. 

Our solution is innovative in thinking about how to maximize the human power.

We see access to finance not as a process, but as a system to empower vulnerable people. For the system to work, beneficiaries need to use the capital effectively. That what best loan officers do. 

While fully automated bots can reduce the operation costs, and make process efficient, for underserved, vulnerable people with various education level and social capital to maximize the impact of capital, it requires human interactions. Good loan officers can judge when people are being lazy in repyaing loan vs. when people are actually struggling in life to repay the loan. Good loan officers do not just provide capital, but give them tips of managing the business better, connect their customers with suppliers and thier potential customers. 

That's why we focus on maximizing the human power by making loan officers bionic and that's where our innovation lies.

We innovate the process of loan officers through automation, better tracking and monitoring, and pre-made content, which could be done only with technology. 

We develop a mobile app for loan officers to quickly pull information from the main data base, and upload new prospect information and communication information while offline. This data is then aggregated and analyzed on the desktop application managers use. 

We allow managers to have full transparency in all communications that happen between customers and any staff at the organization. To help managers pinpoint issues, we utilize big data anlytics and NLP. 

We also analyze conversations with loan officers and customers with NLP to better understand customer needs and recommend loan officers on content to share with the customers. 

Activities 

1. Loan officers communicate more using messaging channel of borrower's preference 

2. Loan officers can check core banking system info on their mobile app 

3. Loan officers can keep track of all interaction between customers and staff at the organization. 

4. Managers can monitor and track interactions between loan officers and customers. 

5. Loan officers can share learning content as they see fit for needs of borrowers. 

Outputs 

1. Borrowers enjoy more communication with loan officers (instead of once a month on repayment, they can ask questions, and talk to loan officers on a weekly basis). 

2. Less miscommunication amongst customers, loan officers and staff at the bank. 

3. Reduced risk for harassment, fraud and violent languages. 

4. Borrowers receive education content at the time they need help.  

Short-term Outcomes 

1. Better customer experience (positive NPS) 

2. More referrals 

3. More retention 

4. Higher repayments 

5. Lower delinquency 

Long-term Outcomes 

1. More people move out from dangerous methods of loan sharks and digital lenders. 

2. Borrowers do better in business, higher revenue and higher profit. 

3. Borrowers save money for sudden expenses. 

4. Borrowers invest in health and education for children. 

5. Borrowers achieve financial independence from their husbands.

We currently serve 50,000 customers through two of our financial inclusion partners. 

In one year, we plan to grow the number to 500,000 customers. We achive this by expanding to different countries of the two of our current parnters. We are currently closing MOUs with two other global MFI groups expecting to start operations with them in the next six months to a year. 

In five years, we plan to service 5 million customers with 10 - 20 MFI groups. 

We currently serve 50,000 customers through two of our financial inclusion partners. 

In one year, we plan to grow the number to 500,000 customers. We achive this by expanding to different countries of the two of our current parnters. We are currently closing MOUs with two other global MFI groups expecting to start operations with them in the next six months to a year. 

In five years, we plan to service 5 million customers with 10 - 20 MFI groups. 

Hiring 

The biggest challenge is to attract high quality talent at reasonable price. As we are a small, early stage startup, our ability to ensure long-term sustainability is limited. Also we do not have a brand name in tech like Google or Facebook. For this reason, even if we can provide a market price for a talent, it is difficult to attract high quality talent quickly. 

Having that said, we are receiving traction from engineers who are interested in impact and want to join and build a new product. 

Funding

While we do have a funding till 3rd quarter this year, and we are on track to raise the next round of funding, delay in raising fund could significantly impact our sustainability and growth. 

Implementation Success 

While we do have MFis and banks in our pipeline for the next year to build the next set of pilots and commercialized operation, the current implementation success could significantly impact the future attractiveness of our solution. To ensure the success of current implementations, we have an implementation team on the ground from our partners, and we work very closely and monitor the progress very closely. 

Hiring 

We are currently relying on linkedin search for recruiting. Our recent PR articles have been useful, but consistent and persisten approach is necessary. 

Funding 

We plan to raise $2 - 3 million VC funding in the next six months. Currently building up a pipeline of investors and in an early stage discussion with a few of them. We also have an agreement with the existing investors on top ups that could secure us 500k. 

Implementation Success 

To ensure the success of current implementations, we have an implementation team on the ground from our partners, and we work very closely and monitor the progress very closely. We have daily problem solving WhatsApp group with field coordinators, then weekly problem solving/brain storming session with an implementation manager of our partner and monthly progress update and large problem solving session with the senior management of the partner organization. We also plan to visit the implementation site for problem solving if necessary. 

N/A

Four full-time staff 

• Mike Driver (CEO/Co-founder) 
• Sam Upra (CTO/Co-founder) 
• Theerasan (Ta) Tonthongkam (Head of Apps) 
• Yurika Morita (Head of Product)

We belive we are uniquely positioned to solve the issue given our skills and backgrounds. 

Mike has extensive experience working with and investing in MFIs over the past ten years. Prior to founding Salutat, he worked for International Finance Corporation and Asian Development Bank focused on financial inclusion and investments in MFIs. He was also a WorldVision fellow in Indonesia worked closely with loan officers and customers of MFIs. Mike obtained MBA from Wharton with a focus in social enterpreneurship. 

Sam is the CTO and Cofounder. He has a bachelors in computer science from Thailand’s premier technology university. He is also a part-time masters candidate at Georgia Tech. Sam worked for Agoda/booking.com in the machine-learning team.  Sam leads the technology team and integration with clients. He also leads the machine-learning and AI development plans.

Ta is a passionate Android specialist with six years of experince. He has published many articles in Mediumand recently invited to speak at Google I/O Bangkok. 

Yurika has a background in finance and education technology operations. Prior to Salutat, she was a country manager for an eduction technology company, Quipper, launched and managed operations in Vietnam and Thailand. Yurika obtained MBA from Harvard Business School with a focus in the business at the base of pyramid. 

We are currently partnering with two global MFI groups. We are starting from one country for each of the MFI groups. 

The partnership process has three phases. 

First is the deepdive where our implementation team visit the team, work with the partner's implementation team to understand the existing process, pain points, and cultural and psychological nuances. 

Second, we implement a six-month pilot program with the initial country. We work extremely close with the partner's implementation team through WhatsApp group for daily problem solving and weekly and monthly calls with the management for progress updates and bigger problem solving. 

Lastly, once we create case studies and lessons from the pilot program, we discuss commercialization and wider rollout with the parnter. 

Our business model is B2B.

Clients 

Our clients are microfinance institutions and SME banks. They are usually operating in multiple countries with 50-500 loan officers in each country. We charge our service pr user (loan officer, or other staff). 

Customers 

Customers are borrowers of our clients. Usually one loan officer has 100-300 customers. 

Cost of service 

We estimate in a stable stage, the cost of operation would be around $60-75 per loan officer. 

Fee 

For commercialization, we plan to charge around $100 per user per annum. For pilots, we charge discounted price as pilots are joint product desgining process for us to learn how cleint users and end customers use the product. 

Product 

We offer mobile application to our loan officer users and desk top application to non-loan officer users, such as marketing person, operations person, and management. Desktop application is a web-based app. We provide clients with the link and login IDs. Mobile application is an android mobile application, we share with APK file with login details. 

Training 

During pilots, we provide train the trainer program to field coordinators in our partner organizations. The field coordinators then give training to loan officers. Eventually the training will be automated through video and easy how to steps. 

We charge our service based on the number of users. We currently generate revenue from the pilots we are running, and expect to be profitable in 2023.

Until 2023, our primary funding source would be VC funding. We are now building the pipeline of VC funding (both impact funds and non-impact funds). 

We are also seeking grant funding to build non-financial service content, such as financial literacy and entrepreneurship education content targeted for our benefitiary population. While some content will be create by our financial inclusion partners, we believe it is the most impactful component and needs to cross-subsidized for a bigger impact. 

Access to Talent

As our core technology lies in NLP, sentiment analysis, machine learning for SOP optimization, content recommendation, we need better access to talent. Being a small, early stage team in Asia, we are struggling to attract high quality talent from web developers to data scientist. This has been the biggest challenge of our growth. 

The time is ripe. We are starting pilots with 2000 end users, we are expecting to accumulate data quickly. With the Solve's network and name, we are hoping to overcome the barrier and attract high quality talent.  

PR

I learned about MIT Solve when I heard that Ruangguru, a competitor of my previous employer, won the competition. Since Ruangguru won the competition, they have gained huge momentum, and became one of the biggest video learning providers in Indonesia. We could really use the same level of momentum and PR Solve provided for them. 

Meet and connect with investors and cross-sector leaders

Lastly, we are always interested in connecting with socially minded investors Solve community attracts. We are particularly interested in philanthropic grant providers who can help us build content library for underserved population. 

We do believe that a big impact comes from shareable global content that could be used across multiple MFIs and SME banks. We do have access to some of the world's thought leaders in entrepreneurship education, such as Prof. Michael Frese, and Criterion for gender-specific content. We just need funding to accelerate this initiative and deliver the impact.

N/A

We would love to partner with the following three types of organizations 

Career fairs

We would like access to different career fairs targeting engineering talent.  

Conferences 

Specifically, we would be a good fit for social impact conferences, FinTech conferences, and development conferences. 

Philanthropic funders

We would like to partner with any philanthropic funders who can help us build content library to support and empower women customers. If the partner has expereince/network in entrepreneural education, that would be a great asset for us, but we also are ready to bring in world's leaders in entrepreneural education content. 

With the prize, we do want to strength our capacity of AI and machine learning. Specifically we are looking to build English, Spanish and Burmese NLP, sentiment analysis, SOP optimization and recommendation, as well as content recommendation. 

As we are collecting data from customers, we could really use the funding to hire and strengthen the capability. 

This will then help end users (women and vulnerable population) to have better user experience, and more automated service. 

We will use the price to create sharable, bite-size content that benefits women customers our clients have. 

After speaking to 500 customers of various MFIs, we have identified high impact content. 

• financial literacy (including what happens if you do not pay on time, what happens if you borrow too much, etc), 
• marketing (how to find customers, digital marketing using FB), 
• introducing new services/products (competitor analysis, needs assessment, risk assessment) 
• Personal Initiative (be self-starting, be resilient, be forward-looking) 
• Setting goals and planning

While there are many similar content available, given women tend to manage both family and business, with very little time to travel to attend pysical sessions, bite-size content women can learn any time they want have a big impact on access to knowledge, as well as the application of the knowledge. 

We also have a content partner who have a track record in training and improving business outcomes of enterpreneuers in emerging markets: Prof. Michale Frese. 

With the grant, we can start a basic library of English content to create and share, conduct impact assessment, and scale further.