Telkom plans to connect Africa

By Rodney Weidemann for Telkom

Cairo, 07 May 2004

Telkom is using the ITU Telecom Africa 2004 conference in Cairo as a forum to engage other operators across the continent, with a view to building a better connected Africa.

The organisation hosted an informal meeting with representatives of several African countries, including Mozambique, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Botswana and Tanzania, where it laid out its vision for a connected Africa.

Among the reasons for seeking a better connected Africa were to fight poverty, stimulate economic growth, attract investment, strengthen NEPAD and the fact that there is a huge demand across the continent for Internet services.

"We want to see multi-service enabled networks and multi-network interoperability, as well as the provision of on-demand broadband capability, but it needs to be both affordable to the people and profitable for the networks," said Telkom chief technical officer, Reuben September.

"The key consideration is to have African operators connect the unconnected across the continent through African-based partnerships."

He said Telkom had already faced similar challenges to this in SA, and as such, is well qualified to drive this new initiative.

"We are now in a position to extend network coverage and connectivity on a country-by-country basis, in partnership with those nations` existing operators," said September.

"We have done our homework in this regard and have the experience. This is not a takeover strategy; rather it is a take-on-board strategy."

He said Telkom can offer a unique value proposition in a partnership arrangement of this nature, by being able to bring to the table network management skills, consultancy services and skills transfer.

Telkom is planning to host a workshop in SA in early June for interested African operators to discuss the way forward for connecting the continent.

"We want to focus on all the players, whether they are mobile, incumbents or rivals to the incumbents - basically we will welcome anyone who wants to play a role in this.

"It is about an African perspective, so we want as many players as possible to attend. This is about finding the winning formula that will see Africans connecting Africa for Africans."