CellBazaar: A Market in Your Pocket

Abstract

In the late 1990s, there was much prognostication about the sub-computer future. It would put leapfrog theory into action, allowing developing economies to catch up with industrialized nations in one generation. But despite all the publicity and investment, usable sub-computers have not become the holy grail. Only the educated middle class has adopted them. The mass of people, especially in the rural and suburban regions of developing economies, have not. The issues extend beyond expense and availability, because no usable technology has been developed for these potential users. We often hear media-friendly examples, like the fisherman who checks the weather forecast on the web. While these stories amuse people at conferences and NGO forums, the truth is that such users are rare. Most of the applications on computers have little utility for a sub-literate mass population.CellBazaar began with a classroom observation that looked at this weakness and the corollary of opportunity. Simply put, the mobile phone has become the ubiquitous computing device in developing countries. The meteoric growth of mobile phone users in emerging economies has superseded all analyst predictions and future scenarios. The mobile phone has replaced the computer as the fastestgrowing technology. Allowing people almost everywhere to stay in touch with family, friends, and customers, and fulfilling myriad other needs, the mobile phone has become the essential technology. In countries like Bangladesh, the adoption curves have been astonishingly rapid, displaying classic "hockey stick" patterns. To take full advantage of this opportunity, we launched the mobile phone based market called CellBazaar in Bangladesh.

The Little We Know: An Exploratory Literature Review on the Utility of Mobile Phone‐Enabled Services for Smallholder Farmers

“…Anecdotal evidence suggests that ‘virtual’ market places may need additional support measures if they are to reach smallholder famers. Reviewing past experiences with Cellbazaar , the founder Kamal Quadir and his colleague Naeem Mohaiemen reflect that uptake had been faster in urban than rural areas (Quadir and Mohaiemen, ). Reaching farmers was found to take some additional effort in the form of ‘human translation or help’ (p. 71), including training through public and private institutions.…”

Opportunities and Challenges of M-commerce Adoption in Bangladesh: An Empirical Study

“…Cell Bazaar, the unique application of Grameen Phone, facilitates the buying and selling of products over the mobile phone. It's becoming popular in Bangladesh achieving 1.5 million users and with 90,000 hits a day [62]. Similar services were also offered later by other mobile operators such as Banglalink and Robi [38,63].…”

Framing M4D: The Utility of Continuity and the Dual Heritage of “Mobiles and Development”

“…The outlines of a synthesis of "user choice" and "embedded directionality" frames are clear: some of the most intriguing recent M4D initiatives have created and deployed platforms that guide and enable distributed interaction in ways that lead to better development outcomes. These include virtual marketplaces, such as Manobi (David-Benz et al, 2006) and CellBazaar (Quadir and Mohaiemen, 2009); mobile money systems, like MPESA (Hughes and Lonie, 7 2007;Mas and Morawczynski, 2009;Morawczynski, 2009); and crowd-sourcing tools for election monitoring and disaster response, like Ushahidi (Hersman, 2010).…”