MOKOGI: Submarine cable infrastructure key for digital economies

This year, there is a high expectation in telecommunications that developing countries will ante-up their roles in global digital leadership. An ambition propped by low-hanging fruits – the continent’s soaring smartphone use and broadband penetration, predicted at 760 million phones and a 15-fold mobile data traffic increase by 2020.

But, what infrastructure will support this next phase?

In the immediate future, effective business models will be hinged on increased connectivity driven by an appetite for quality mobile consumer content and rise in cloud computing. The arrival of juggernauts like Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft that gobble at least 70 percent in global traffic is also noteworthy.

Additionally, new fangled technologies such as 5G, Virtual reality/Augmented Reality (VR/AR) and Internet of Things (IoT) are becoming the global vogue. Further, the growing influence for big data analytics and the economics of the flow of data across the world is, of it already hasn’t gained traction.

All these technologies point to an increased demand for data. This can only be achieved through further investments in new networks with essential speed and greater capacity for growth.

In the last decade or so, there have been tangible efforts by African governments and telecommunication partners to invest in submarine cable networks with spawned transformative impact. In fact, according to Submarine Cable Networks, a cable industry repository, out of the 38 countries that have a seashore, 37 have at least one additional submarine cable landing.

These countries and regions have significantly seen reduced costs of international bandwidth, increased bandwidth consumption, unique demand generation and a much-needed democratisation of broadband Internet access.

With time, this has been attributable to the correlation of top Foreign Domestic Investment (FDI) inflows into the African continent, primarily in the telecommunications, media and technology sector, as opposed to the two traditional sectors: commodities and agriculture.

Kenya for instance reported a 68 percent increase in inward investment projects in 2017. The country’s fast-growing technology sector continued to draw foreign investor interest. Telecommunications, Media and Technology FDI projects in Kenya increased by 44 percent compared with 2016, according to Ernst Young’s Attractiveness Program Africa, 2018, giving credence to even more investment in sector, for more benefits.

The next horizon economy seeks to leverage the benefits of investment of submarine cables – a safe, affordable, fast and transparent Internet, to steer these countries to a digital economy that leverages the Internet to churn out solutions to existential problems in key sectors of the economy like education, manufacturing, food security, healthcare and finance. This is the closest it gets to gulf the digital divide towards economic and social inclusion.

Possibly, the most vital lesson picked from the last ten years of cable investment in the quest to build an Internet economy is that a single international connection is not enough.