The New Partnership for Africa`s Development (Nepad) e-schools` project, which recently won the Intelligent Community Visionary of the Year 2005 award, aims to connect 600 000 African schools to the Internet, primarily via satellite, over the next 10 years.
London-based Inmarsat is donating 50 broadband global area network (BGAN) terminals and airtime to the Nepad project.
BGAN is an IP and circuit-switched service, which offers high-bandwidth services at speeds up to half a megabit per second, says Inmarsat.
"Satellite communications are key to broadband access for many of these schools which are based in remote areas without a telecoms infrastructure," says Samer Halawi, Inmarsat`s regional director for the Middle East, Africa and Central Asia.
Orbiting network
Inmarsat made news this week by launching its second Inmarsat-4 (I-4) satellite from a launch pad in the Pacific Ocean.
Together with the first I-4, which was launched in March, Inmarsat claims it will be able to deliver its BGAN service to 85% of the world`s landmass.
The I-4, weighing in at just under six tons and the size of a double-decker bus, will "deliver simultaneous voice and 3G-compatible broadband data services to mobile users across North, Central and South America," the company says.
Built by EADS Astrium, the I-4s form part of an eight-year, $1.5 billion next-generation satellite network development.
"The successful launch of the second I-4 satellite means that Inmarsat now has the world`s most sophisticated commercial network for mobile voice and data services," says Andrew Sukawaty, CEO and chairman of Inmarsat.
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