Kabir Kumar

Kabir Kumar leads Omidyar Network’s global policy and ecosystem building efforts. He is a former Senior Financial Sector Specialist at CGAP, where he led CGAP’s Digital Finance Plus initiative and coordinated efforts in key markets in South Asia. Kabir helped launch CGAP's program on technology-enabled business models for financial services and worked closely with some of the pioneering implementations in the mobile financial services space.

Kabir has been an adviser to banks, mobile network operators, technology companies, and investors in over 15 countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. His work has been quoted in numerous media outlets including CNN, The Banker, Economist, and NPR. He has a dual master's degree in public administration and international relations from the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. He can be found on LinkedIn and Twitter.

By Kabir Kumar

Blog

Can India Achieve Universal Digital Financial Inclusion?

India's Prime Minister has launched an ambitious financial inclusion program aimed at reaching 75 million people with bank accounts and subsequently government transfers, insurance, pensions and credit.
Blog

2015 Set to be Big Year for Digital Financial Inclusion in India

Key regulatory moves in India during 2014 were digital finance game-changers.
Blog

Mobile Money in Pakistan: From OTC to Accounts, Part 2

Despite the continued dominance of agent-assisted OTC transactions in Pakistan, it is not all doom and gloom. We note four recent developments that just might trigger a rapid expansion in mobile account usage in 2015.
Blog

Mobile Money in Pakistan: From OTC to Accounts, Part 1

The latest data from the Intermedia Financial Inclusion Insights survey suggests that providers continue to focus on basic over-the-counter (OTC) services. Kabir Kumar and Dan Radcliffe discuss lessons learned from the survey and Pakistan’s potential for digital financial inclusion.
Research

Access to Energy via Digital Finance: Models for Innovation

Globally, over 1.3 billion people lack access to electricity, and another 1 billion people have unreliable connections to national electricity grids. Startup energy enterprises are leveraging digital finance to deliver modern energy to the poor, sold on a pay-as-you-go basis.