Why we chose Melanie as a Fellow

Melanie has had a long career in the technology world; prior to starting Mobile Metrix, she worked in management for J.P. Morgan, International Data Group (IDG) and as an executive for Key Accounts at AT&T, and launched the Global Technology Corps, a "digital Peace Corps," with the U.S. Department of State. Through those experiences, she saw the huge untapped potential for uncounted data, and built Mobile Metrix as a way to gather data to tailor products to low-income consumers and build distribution networks.

More than 1 billion people have no official record of their existence. These "invisible" are the world's most vulnerable, including millions of unregistered newborns and adults without basic rights such as healthcare, property titles or voting registration. Because they are not registered, the uncounted poor do not figure into the public policy equations that divide up development assistance funds at a global level. Mobile Metrix develops, administers and analyzes surveys that provide detailed information about the uncounted and overlooked people living at the base of the pyramid. By bridging the gap between these communities and the organizations trying to reach them, Mobile Metrix is efficiently linking demand with supply