Mines was founded in 2014 by a small group of computer scientists working on an artificial intelligence research project at Stanford University. Having grown up in the developing world and understanding how difficult it is to get a loan, or a credit card, or even a month-to-month apartment in many countries, we decided to direct our energy and expertise towards solving one of the great social equality challenges of our time: access to finance.
We believe in sustainable impact, which requires a profitable business model, deep humility to the complexity and nuance of local cultures around the world, and a focus on both macro and micro economic outcomes. We also know technology alone is not enough to solve this problem at scale, so we’ve decided the best way to sustainably solve financial access is to work closely with domestic institutions to deliver world-class products tailored to their own markets.
Customers get best-in-class products, local businesses drive the revenue, and regulators have banking oversight so everybody wins.