Kathy Gibson reports from Ericsson Business Innovation Forum in Stockholm – Africa is ready to embrace mobile broadband, and the technology has the potential to drive massive economic and societal change.
In Africa, mobile penetration is happening. Ericsson president and CEO Hans Vestberg believes the continent will grow from 7-million broadband subscriptions today to 700-million in 2019.
“This is s 10-fold increase in mobile broadband users – and they will have access to the Internet, which is a huge transformation,” he says.
It’s not the network that will hold Africa back in terms of connectivity, he adds, but the cost of devices, which have traditionally not been subsidised. The prices are coming down, however, he says – and will soon be affordable for the majority of Africans.
“By watching the progression in the cost of the devices, we are able to calculate how people will adopt the technology,” Vestberg says. “Research shows that for every $10 the price of a handset comes down, a further 100-million people on earth will buy it. And, in Africa, they will buy it.”
Service providers need to be aware that the needs of users in Africa are very different from users in other geographies. “Bear in mind that people with start off with a device that gives them television, Internet, voice and Internet. It may be their banking device.
“The operators in Africa are doing all the basics right: they are rolling out the networks and getting the handsets out. They are also providing the new services that user demand. For instance, you may see operators in Africa moving into mobile banking.”
While first-world solutions like connected cars may not be a priority for the African market, Vestberg believes these kind of services may be available sooner than anticipated, in ways that the developers don’t necessarily imagine.
“For instance, cars are a scarce resource in much of Africa. But if you have a connected car, you can think about car sharing. We need to think differently and to innovate.”
Vestberg is passionate about ICT playing an important role in societal change, but is frustrated by the slow pace of adoption by many African environment.
“We still don’t see scale in applications like healthcare and education,” he says. “So why is it not happening? It always comes back to government issues. It’s government that needs to own things like education. We can show them what is possible, but they need to scale it our across the whole country.”
On the positive side, he believes that where government fails to deliver some of the needed solutions, citizens will drive these services themselves in a bottom-up manner.
“I think these things will happen anyway – someone will find a way to make it scale,” Vestberg says. “I don’t know exactly how it will happen, but all of the pillars will be in place, with the majority of Africans having connectivity within five to 10 years from now.
“The networks will have the capacity to deliver services – I am certain about that.
“I see such a tremendous opportunity, and believe the consumer will drive it.”
