The announcement last week that Naspers has put MWEB up for auction created a stir of surprise, but not shock. Arthur Goldstuck looks at the implications

Is the decision by Naspers to sell MWEB a vote of no confidence in the Internet? Hardly. If anything, it declares the opposite: a recognition that the Internet has become so pervasive, its best businesses will be built on what people do on the network, rather than on how people connect to it.

While it may not be a good thing for MWEB, it is probably a necessary thing as MWEB evolves from an ISP into a telecommunications company. MWEB is entering a new era in South African telecommunications and has little choice but to become an infrastructure owner – once the regulatory environment allows it. Naspers is traditionally in the content space, and has avoided owning the plumbing that makes it all work. It will be a painful divorce, but good for the kids.

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Posted in the category: News, Technology, Trends

Our sister web site, Gadget, today lifts the lid on the first consumer device that will be rolled out by Neotel, South Africa’s second network operator. Alluded to as a “converged device” in briefings earlier this week, it has emerged that it will be a phone with a high-speed Internet connection, providing “carrier grade” voice, as well as broadband data, to consumers in urban areas. Read more about it on the Gadget web site.

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Posted in the category: News, Technology

The South African Government’s intransigence in dealing with the energy crisis has a spectacular precedent: it’s failure of leadership in telecommunications. Ten years from now, however, no one should have to say “we told you so”. But there are 10 essential demands that have to be met, writes ARTHUR GOLDSTUCK

You don’t have to spend a decade analysing internet connectivity in South Africa to understand that the Government is the one organisation that does not have the strategic ability to connect South Africans.

Yet, the policy of the Government has been to have a stake in all entities that supply connectivity. The Minister of Communications has insisted that Government also have a share of any new undersea cables designed to deliver additional telecommunications capacity to South Africa. And, despite all the evidence that points to it being a bad move, other Government departments, too, are joining the rush for control of such capacity.

The result? Instead of having three or four global suppliers at the beginning of 2008, as had been the prospect as recently as a year ago, we will still have only the SAT3/SAFE cable, which is still controlled by Telkom.

However, the undersea cables represent only one aspect of the great disconnect in South Africa.

The following is a priority list of 10 essential demands for the health of telecommunications and internet connectivity in South Africa. In collaboration with colleagues and associates, helped along by participants in public debates at numerous conferences, the list has evolved over time, and will keep evolving. Keep reading →

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Posted in the category: Insight, Strategy, Technology

In real estate, you will have heard, there are only three rules: location, location and location.

In the emerging industry of mobile commerce, we hear the same argument. Much is made of the potential of location-based services (or LBS, in its inevitable acronymisation). The most profitable models for the delivery of mobile commerce services, say the experts, will be based on where users find themselves. Ergo, the most successful services should be the likes of:
Traveller services - business travellers wanting information on the destination where they’ve just arrived;

Entertainment information - users going out to movies or a meal wanting information on what is in the area where they find themselves;

Route information - directions on getting where you want to go from where you are;

Emergency services - alerting rescue, medical or police services on the location of someone in distress (for more examples, See IBM’s vision of LBS).

Aside from the last - which is more usually the province of public authorities rather than of commercial services - the problem with this vision is that much of it doesn’t make sense. Oh yes, it makes perfect sense from a technological perspective. This is what the technology can do, so why shouldn’t it be part of the promise?

Even academics are arguing that mobile commerce is dependent on Location on the one hand, and on Time on the other. In short, where users are, and when they are there.

But it is wrong, wrong, wrong. Keep reading →

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Posted in the category: Strategy, Technology, Trends

Technology brings jobs and financial stability, Paul Kagame, President of Rwanda, told a session of this week’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Discussing emerging technology and its impact on his country and the African continent, President Kagame spoke of his desire for Rwanda to prosper through technology.

He was speaking on the inaugural CES Industry Insider program on Technology and Emerging Countries at the Consumer Electronics Show. The program also featured Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the One Laptop Per Child project (OLPC) and the MIT Media Lab.

In his opening keynote address for the program, Negroponte explained OLPC’s goal of eliminating poverty in third-world countries through education. He declared that, since most of the nearly two-billion children in developing countries are poorly educated, “We must restore, introduce and create the passion for learning in children.” Keep reading →

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Posted in the category: Insight, News, Technology, Trends