- Title: KENYA: Africa is the world's last major untapped market for Internet access
- Date: 15th November 2013
- Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (Swahili) JOHN MUTESH, LOCAL MUSICIAN SAYING: "The issue of me commuting to town was not working. I spent a lot on bus fare and I wasted time, yet I was not gaining anything. But here I do not have to go far. You see, I work around here and when I want to come here (to Mawingu) to do some work there is no problem. I can come here direct do my research when I wa
- Embargoed: 30th November 2013 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Kenya
- Country: Kenya
- Topics: Technology
- Reuters ID: LVAEIFF0AM9409VLIAQEDQ7C5R8A
- Story Text: It's been a busy year for Gakawa Secondary school in Nanyuki, Kenya. Eight months ago there was no electricity here - today, thanks to solar power, the institution has dozens of computers connected to the internet through an innovative project called "White Spaces".
The pilot scheme run by Microsoft and partners, including the government and Indigo Telecom, a Kenyan Internet Service Provider, offers affordable high-speed wireless broadband.
Africa is the world's last major untapped market for Internet access. Only 16 percent of its billion people use the Internet - half the penetration rate of Asia, according to the International Telecommunication Union.
At Gakawa, the learning experience for the 300 students that go to school here has changed tremendously.
Judi Muchoki says the easy access to exam revision material online has been the most notable improvement.
"It has helped me to do revision work. When we did not have computers I was not able to come copy some questions from the computers but now I am able to copy and be able to revise well," said student Judi Muchoki, who is in her third year.
Indigo is currently providing free Internet to schools but plans to charge those living in the surrounding community 1.50 US dollars per month for connectivity in future. It has provided the infrastructure - fibre, masts and radios - while Microsoft supplies the software and applications.
The project provides free wireless connection via unused parts of the TV spectrum known as "white spaces".
Television networks leave idle gaps between channels in order to protect themselves from interference from other networks. The technology uses these "white spaces" to transmit and receive wireless data signals.
The adapted TV radio waves can travel up to a 10-kilometre radius, making them ideal for connecting off-grid villages.
They penetrate walls better than mobile signals and they are cheap to provide: building a white spaces mast costs a tenth of the amount needed for a normal telecoms base station, experts say.
Most Africans who can access the Internet do so via mobile phones. This has pushed broadband usage to 11 percent this year from just 2 percent in 2010. But mobile phone companies are reluctant to build costly masts and networks in remote rural areas - meaning hundreds of millions of Africans have little prospect of ever going online.
Microsoft as well as Google, are chasing this massive new market, aiming to provide white space Internet access to rural swathes with no coverage and in megacities where overcrowding and built up areas can mean frustratingly poor phone reception.
The goal is to ultimately bring cheap broadband to the entire African continent as a more cost effective way to take Internet to the masses.
Tonia Kariuki, Microsoft 4Afrika marketing director, says the opportunitiy Africa provides - not just for business but for development of products and economies - through the Internet is an exciting prospect.
So when Indigo approached the software multinational with the idea for a pilot, they moved fast.
"We would want these people to have access to Microsoft services, devices and not just for the benefit of Microsoft, for the benefit of the whole community at large, including the ability for governments to provide services to the citizens, for students to have access to technology for education purposes and so on. And so when they approached us with the idea we thought that it was a very interesting disruptive technology that gave us the opportunity to kind of change the game in as far as access to affordable technology is concerned," said Tonia.
Microsoft has also deployed internet points in other parts of Nanyuki in the form of base stations known as "Mawingu" or Cloud in Swahili.
They use the same White Spaces technology to give anybody the chance to access the internet.
Thirty two-year-old John Mutesh works as a labourer in a nearby flower farm. He is also struggling to chase his dream of being a musician - spending time and money to travel to the nearest town centre to market his music.
Through the internet, he uploaded a music video and has already been contacted to perform at an event by a local promoter who saw his video on You Tube.
"The issue of me commuting to town was not working. I spent a lot on bus fare and I wasted time, yet I was not gaining anything. But here I do not have to go far. You see, I work around here and when I want to come here (to Mawingu) to do some work there is no problem. I can come here direct do my research when I want to," he said.
World Bank research shows that a 10 percent increase in broadband penetration can result in an extra 1.4 percentage points of annual economic growth.
While for companies like Microsoft, the logic of developing cheaper ways to access new customers is clear, the opportunity to mine information and talent to develop new content is also compelling.
"We believe in it from two ways right, so the first way is the role technology has to play in terms of bringing new socio-economic development to the people on the continent, but the second thing is the role that Africans have to play in terms of their impact on technology built by Africans for Africans to be consumed within Africa and in the rest of the world at large as well. And so from a Microsoft perspective, we see the real value in terms the amazing content, amazing product amazing access to information, resources, education, learning through and powered by our technology that's where opportunity lies for us," said Tonia.
Governments have largely welcomed the technology though some officials have expressed reservations about whether it could affect or cross into bandwidth reserved for the military, emergency services and air traffic control.
African regulators are also watching closely to allay concerns that broadcasters could be affected by interference.
One country, which Microsoft declined to name, has warned that the process to change its regulations could take another couple of years.
"There are some regulatory hurdles that we will have to overcome because it is new technology and with new technology there's always going to be a slow pace in terms of 'what do we do, how do we regulate this, what is the policy around it? And that is some of the work that we are trying to do now with the governments, in fact, part of the reason why we started in the east and southern Africa side is there was a stronger appetite to try out new things with the regulatory authorities, than it was, north and west Africa and we hope that that kind of opens up and we grow this," Tonia said.
Microsoft says it is in talks with 10 more African governments to start trials but will not say which ones or how much the tests will cost.
It is running similar pilot schemes in Tanzania and South Africa with the aim of launching commercial projects thereafter. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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