O3B Details Plan for Satellite-Based Bandwidth For Africa

slash-sa writes "O3B Networks has been quietly preparing itself over the last 12 months for the moment last week when it announced that it was going to be offering cheap, low-latency satellite bandwidth that can cover any part of Africa by 2010. It has put in place early finance with Google, Liberty Global and HSBC. Here are more details from the entrepreneur behind the project, Greg Wyler."

Comments

Boom time

[gevreet]

With many african states effectively landlocked and with poor or insecure infrastructure this could be the data boom that africa has been waiting for. That is if it isn't choked off by self serving governments.

Re:Boom time

[bschorr]

Well, what would you prefer to see instead?

Re:Boom time

[Kintanon]

I would prefer to see most of the interference with local economies stopped. UN food donations destroyed the economic viability of local farmers and put them out of work. Continued interference and improved prenatal care from UN medics and US Missionaries is resulting in more babies being surviving. US missionaries reinforcing the local taboo against condoms has done nothing to help the birth rates or slow the spread of AIDS on the continent. The result is a place where the average life span for people who survive past 3 years old is around 19 with almost no one living beyond 35.
Not to mention that a large portion of all of the actual useful aid like medical supplies is confiscated by warlords for their own use. If we REALLY wanted to help Africa we would be sending in the occasional team of Marines to obliterate warlord camps and airdropping condoms with instructions and a good story about how wearing them will protect you from demons. The birth rate will decline, a large part of the population will die and the remaining people will actually have enough to eat.
All of these things are more useful than broadband internet, but that doesn't mean broadband internet is bad. Giving villages access to a larger view of the planet can only help things really. Even if it's not the best or most immediate help.

Re:Cheap?

[Technician]

"Low latency satellite bandwidth at USD 500 a Mbps or less by 2010"

Due to speed, time, distance physics, geostationary is high latency simply due to the speed of light and the distance out to the geostationary belt.

Because they're approximately 5 times closer to the earth than geo-satellites, the latency is reduced by approximately five times. It's a constellation of satellites?

That leaves low earth orbit. Low earth orbit means dopplar shift and high power or real time tracking.

Maybe for businesses..

Or maybe ISP's who then run WiMax.

Re:Cheap?

[TooMuchToDo]

Should've just dragged fiber.

Re:Cheap?

[Anonymous Coward]

You'll need those guards to protect the cable after it's buried too, or the local "entrepreneurs" will just dig it up and sell it.

Might work

[djupedal]

...since the Chinese are already putting together the ground systems - WIMAX, etc. ZTE has been there since 2006...

Mobiles not laptops

[MosesJones]

I know that we are techies and we like computers but seriously do we think that the internet is the best thing to get into Africa in a hurry? If you look at what mobile phones have done in terms of communication and micro-payments then its hard to see the point of pushing expensive ($500 in a continent where people live on less than $1 a day) internet access as an important thing. Get the mobile phone network out first. This has the advantage of being lower power and with a built in infrastructure that can help micro-payments.

Arguing for VOIP and other internet based services as a way that internet access would be better ignores some of the basic economics and the experience of most 3rd world countries in the success of mobile phone communications in helping to raise people up out of poverty. Basic communications (voice) is the first step here.

So its good that its being done, but it would be nice to see one of these high profile cases actually support an existing approach that is working rather than always going after the "everyone must have a computer" scenario that makes sense for people sitting in an office in California.

 

Re:Mobiles not laptops

[cong06]

Have you ever been to Africa?
Imagine this:
A group of people that want to promote a good organization in the poorest Area of Tanzania. They want a website so they can get support from Americans who are willing to help their cause. Their website will have to be American based because the internet in Africa is terrible, and the fact that they have to connect to it through Cell phones makes it worse.
Instead this organization has a representative (that's traveling anyway) Upload the data in Kenya where internet is more reliable.

Now Imagine this:
A student wants to learn all he can at an affordable price. Text books are expensive and internet is basically not available (and even more expensive). The cheapest way is to have a friend from the states ship CD's of data that the student can then look over.

And this:
A Town wants to start an internet cafe, a source of income as well as development for the town. The two options are cellphone usb cards so that the computers hook up to a cellphone provider and use it as their internet (cheap set up, expensive use, price per MB) or Satellite (expensive set up, expensive use, price per Month). Said town is expected to go through a boom with an international airport about to open leading tourists right into the Serengeti. If the internet could be harnessed, this could mean a good economic boom for the town, and the money getting funneled right into the developmental project.

From my experience in Mugumu, I'd love to have this help them out. (and the airport probably won't yet be finished by 2010)

Re:Mobiles not laptops

[jotok]

You are woefully uninformed about Africa and you are reading into this venture.

There are places where people are living on next to nothing, but there are also relatively stable places that would benefit immensely from cheap internet as an enabling factor (Ghana, Nairobi, Joburg) for education and business. Look at what hooking up Pune has done for India.

It seems like any time anyone suggests investing in the tech sector anywhere in Africa, some doofus comes along and links to the Onion's "Tribesman uses modem to crush nut" or talks about how we should focus on "feeding people," whatever that means. You're basically arguing that we shouldn't improve the economy because we need to help the poor instead.

If you want to get educated, App+Frica is a good place to start.

Re:Mobiles not laptops

[batje]

I live in Uganda, which is the target audience for these satellites. We have 4 mobile providers, all providing GSM services. Mobile services are covered. What is not provided for is cheap IP. 500USD a month for 1 MB is Cheap. Currently the satellite prices are as much as 9000USD. Which is what our ISP would pay. Imagine our pricing or bandwidth sharing scheme! I am currently on a 64Kbps line for 175USD a month. I have a good deal. While the costs and access to communication services have improved tremendously over the last 10 years, there is a very real and true need for the next step. The step where people here can tap into the immense amount of knowledge that the human species is documenting on the Internet. That knowledge, for a great deal, is out of reach of most people here. And it is that knowledge that will eventually lead to the changes here that are so badly needed. This o3b initiative is the most beautiful gift to the African continent, ever.

Impractical.

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Should've just dragged fiber.

Do you have any idea how the logistic problems with trying to lay fibre from Satelites down to Africa?

First you've got to fire your rocket carrying the fibre up, get it to loop over the satellite without destroying it, then have the rocket carefully navigate back to your chosen destination.

No - wireless is a better solution with satellites IMHO.

say hello to the next generation of call centers.

[timmarhy]

you know what all this bandwidth will be aimed at don't you, given the super cheap labor in africa. call centers and telemarketers. not necessarily a bad thing as it'll bring wealth into the nations that embrace it, but incredibility annoying to everyone else.

Re:Cheap?

[Hurricane78]

Luckily they come up with their own solutions. Like sharing one mobile phone per town.
It's very sad when you think, what potential is lost down there. Africa has many natural resources, which in itself should make it a pretty rich continent.
But the Internet is a huge chance for them, because you can live in your hut in the middle of an oasis in the Sahara, and still make money as a service business. You only need a brain, an Internet connection, and enough food/water to survive, until you got enough information from the net, to be able to provide and sell those services. Don't think they're unable to quickly understand the Internet, just because it's completely new to them. If it's a child, it does not matter. Give it a year, or less, and it's up to our level.

Oh, I forgot the language barrier. So let's summarize:

Give a teen a laptop like the OLPC, with solar power, full Internet access and an included language course, and in a matter of five years, he's rocking the town. In 10 years he can support others in his town. In 20 years he can bring his town to wealth.

I always found sending food down to be close to murdering children, because in the end, it will not raise their natural resources avaliable to *them*, and there will just be more children to starve... or we would have to send even more food and make them even more dependent.... Two morally very questionable things to do...

Oh well... or we could stop the stranglehold of the WTO...

Harder then it seems, trust me

[jiggerdot]

I currently work for a company providing IP communications via satellite (both inclined and geostationary). Most of our customers are in Africa, and include some of the biggest ISPs in the more developed regions. since the bandwidth market there has been exploding in the last several years. So I know what I'm talking about when I say this guy sounds VERY optimistic.

The idea of using low earth orbit satellites is great as the latency on geostationary is indeed horrible. you're looking at a minimum of 500ms just to reach the ISP installation (in the US and Europe, in our case) and the RTT to your destination on top of that.If you run into another satellite link on the way, that's 1000ms minimum. so 123ms sounds terrific. BUT:

1) The guy flippantly says "If they want a gigabit, we'll give them a gigabit". For a gigabit, you'll need to work several transponders, with some insane modulation scheme (highest practical I've seen is 16psk, they'll need something MUCH more dense). The higher they go, the more error prone they get.

2) LEO will require tracking, or very high power. which means either a very powerful HPA (for the small links - the ones without the 3.5 meter dish) or a very fast tracking system for the large links with the dish. And what happens when you have to switch satellites?

3) They're looking to solve the last-mile issue with WiMax. This will interfere with C-band transmissions, so I'm assuming they will go with Ku-Band or higher, which is extremll sensitive to rain fade. Africa has quite a lot of rain. Combine this with point no. 1, and you're in trouble.

4) The article indicates they will give the customer a VAST or transmission station and all is good. It is not. Africa is not a nice place. equipment gets stolen and sabotaged. This is from sad experience. And if you do not have techs on the ground (which are very hard to find, at least competent ones) you're stuck either telling the customer "sucks to be you" or trying to support him through the phone with the replacement of a transmitter, which is a bit like trying to help someone fix an engine by correspondence.

5) The human factor - Without sounding too patronizing, the guys in Africa (even the more professional ones) need a LOT of hand holding. I truly hope they have a big and competent support department and NOC staff at the ready, who can understand garbled English through a bad phone connection, as these guys will want help with everything. From helping to identify which device in the network is causing congestion on the link, to "IP experts" who will be brought in to bring up a BGP session and will not know how to access the router, and will want your help in resetting the password step-by-step. You can, of course, tell them to manage their own networks, but you WILL lose customers. That's a lesson we learned the hard way.

In short, good luck to them, but if they truly think the technical challenges are the only ones, they're in for a very nasty surprise.

Re:Cheap?

[Hurricane78]

Yeah. Run right into it. :(

Normally, I would refrain from calling slashdotters idiots. We are well educated, we know more than the average Joe, we are proud of our intellect... ...yet we are just simple humans, who in bad times can not withstand the full consequences of how much this world beats us down, and survive.
It is this psychological protection of the own reality, that we talked about some hours/days ago, right here on slashdot that protects us from breaking down. And it's a wise tactic, because we in fact survied.
But deep down, we all know... strange lost votes in our proud 1st world countries, our own people captured and tortured for no reason, people of the highest ranks, lying to us, or suddenly forgetting everything, cameras watching every step, the whole population having one foot in the jail because of laws that nobody can know of follow anymore, companies selling hard drugs as calmatives to our childern, and that bribery suddenly is called "lobbying", and we even have to die in wars for interest that go against our own...

I know, I know... you are thinking "It's not *that* bad. You are overreacting. You are wrong! Troll! I can't see this shit!". And I agree.
This is out protection system kicking in, right there. And you can let it go all the way. Accuse me of whatever insult you know.
Because after all is said and done, and it's quiet inside, the feeling of what you really think and feel is going on, is strongest.

Give yourself the time. This is where your intelligence starts thinking up new ways to look away from what you just felt. Observe it as it happens. Knowing of your protection system, and not forgetting what you saw in that quiet moment.

Because then you gain the power to look around the protective layer, if you choose to, without it breaking down your world.
And if protection kicks in again, just justify your reality by knowing that you will not ignore it, because you're way to intelligent and able, to let it slide and live like the cattle, like the average Joe.

I hope, then you - the (wise) people - will rule the country again.

Re:Sell this short if you can. It will make you ri

[hcdejong]

You're going to need a LOT of fibre to connect even 10% of African households (that's 50 million people).

Also, "More than 90% of the population lives close to the coast." does not seem to be supported by this map of population density.

Re:Why Bother?

[timmarhy]

let me guess, thats your way of saying the white man done it?

seriously that excuse isn't going to cut it forever. Crime and corruption committed by black people to other black people is NOT the rest of the worlds fault no matter what twisted logic you try apply.

Re:space elevator

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Once you lay the fibre not only do you have high speed Internet, you have a space elevator as well.

Not to mention the effects a high-fibre satellite will have on our gastrointestinal tubes health!