My experience in actual financing in Africa, even aimed at low income, is that much of the supposed value added services aren ot actually demanded, for a variety of reasons ranging from (well founded) risk aversion to lack of real convenience. And further, all those speakers seriously underestimated the Anonymity Value of Cash in these economies, a value that the non-idealised consumer seems to see as Very Large.

I beg to differ with some of your conclusions. Banks make their money by taking deposits at a low interest rate and lending out the money at a higher interest rate thus making a profit on the spread. A money transfer system such as Mpesa does not interfere with this and thus should not be a threat. Money lubricates the economy and being able to transfer efficiently to where it is a win win for everyone.
You are correct that other things need to grow in addition to the ICT sector. But ICT helps other areas of productivity. Embrace technology my friend. It can only help.

I can even foresee a time where these companies will face problems similar to Kodak and Polaroid who assumed digital photography won’t supercede them since their products were superior when the technology came out. But alas as we all know, they were wiped out.

I suppose this explains why we don’t have anything like Mpesa in the UK!