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Africa to see bandwidth glut

Ranka Jovanovic
By Ranka Jovanovic, Editorial Director
Johannesburg, 10 May 2012

Supply of international capacity to Africa will soon outstrip demand and lead to price wars, according to Africa Analysis director, Dobek Pater.

Speaking at yesterday's launch of ITWeb Africa in Rosebank, Johannesburg, Pater noted that by 2014 total terminal connectivity out of Africa on submarine cables is expected to be more than 60Tbps with existing and planned cables.

However, he expressed concerns that it will be difficult to foresee if these cables will use their full capacity over their 20-year lifespans, as this will depend on demand.

He also revealed that the abundance of cables will possibly result in a bandwidth glut, but on a positive note, would result in further price decreases, beyond those expected.

“Price reductions are expected across all market segments, but most notably in the international and national segments due to greater competition and future installed capacity.”

Pater also highlighted that terrestrial fibre networks are being deployed on the continent nationally, regionally and in some of the large metros.

He said the past two years have seen significant growth in data centres in sub-Saharan markets such as Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria and SA. “These data centres tend to be concentrated in main business hubs and co-location services are the most popular, although not the most lucrative.”

Cloud services are also beginning to make an appearance in some of the key African markets, he noted. “However, it will be another four to five years before we arrive at economies of scale and cloud services can be viewed as a 'regular' service.”

Improving the telecoms environment remains a key driver, he stressed.

Africa's anticipated growth in data traffic per device will be considerably higher than the global average, but off a low base, he also noted. “This will be facilitated by greater bandwidth availability and lower retail prices of products or services.”

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