Invisible Giant
22 million users. Half of Colombia's adults.
In the Global South, the incumbent bank's most important product can be the mobile bank it lets leave home.
Sometimes the fastest way to bank a country is to let a small team leave the bank.
In 2016, Bancolombia let a team build a branchless bank that lived on the phone. Nequi grew up inside the group, earned its own finance-company license, and stepped out on its own from Medellin. Around 22 million people now bank, save, and pay through it - close to half of Colombia's adults - opening an account in minutes with no queue and no minimum the informal earner could not clear.
The decision that mattered: build the mobile bank as a separate thing, then let it stand on its own.
In the Global South, the incumbent's most important product can be the mobile bank it lets leave home.
Source: Nequi; Superintendencia Financiera de Colombia, 2024.