[kictanet] IG Discussions- Day 2 of 10: Infrastructure Issues-Submarine Cables

Tue Apr 28 11:21:55 EAT 2009

Dear Listers,

Good morning. I am happy to hear that it is raining in Kenya!

Mine are observations that I have gathered from one or two fora that I think
may be of interest.

Access - If this is looked at purely from an individual perspective then it
will be seen as low (Score 1) and clearly not realize the benefits of having
an undersea cable at all. There are already signs of high demand for
increased bandwidth if complaints from consumers today are anything to go
by. This must then feed the notion that with the undersea cable will find
ready users albeit of the corporate and SOHO ( Small office home office)
variety. This then in the appropriately competitively structured market will
trickle down to Apartment buildings and soon into Suburbs.

Further more with clever government subsidies targeting structured learning
institutions ( schools, universities, libraries) habit will be built and
carried over and soon demand hopefully will match supply.

I think with the proliferation of lower cost high end Mobile Phones into
Africa and the readily available Chinese wannabe models, Access will be
readily facilitated . This may not speak much for computer literacy but that
may be the price that we have to pay.

Affordability : This will be relative in my opinion. It will be two fold.
>From the perspective of the provider and from that of the user.  I am
certain the providers have their numbers worked out and it will now just be
a matter of waiting for the uptake from the consumers end.  And the end of
it all is unless one is running a BPO or a Media House it will be rather
interesting to see how business will respond to better priced internet
bandwidth when their main stay is emails? Even in the developed world the
internet is being curtailed during working hours as a result of the
distraction that work causes to staff who are busy on face book and chat. In
some extreme cases because of availability of internet on mobilephones some
employers are banking phones till tea break and lunch time, as all
communication can go on on email and landlines....So will majority of the
existing business ' jump on the bandwagon' when the seacables land? the jury
is still out on this one......

Content , here I disagree with the score given (1) this is because the
minute connectivity becomes available  & affordable then a lot of sharing
will begin and we will be pleasantly suprised as to the gems that may be
unlocked. Of course Content will in itself need to be shepherded and
managed, but I beleive I saw a post that alluded to an oncoming content
discussion so will hold my horses. I suspect that 'a monkey see monkey do'
approach will come into play as has been the case in the west where content
is concerned, once people see what it is all about and what covers the wide
scope of content we may as well lead Africa. After All Kenya is a reference
point for many in East, Central and parts of Southern Africa and with the
enterpreneuring spirit we are known for it will only be a matter of time. I
think the score should be a 2.

Ms Basly

On Tue, Apr 28, 2009 at 9:14 AM, Sam Gatere <sam.gatere at gmail.com> wrote:

> Walu
>
> Interesting ice breaker on the packet exchange -Internet- to keep the
> intellectual   community going!
>
> my Initial reactions on Access low impact seems to be a fairly accurate
> since the glorified undersea cables are actually top tear and not landing in
> my house or office! I think this needs to be demystified to the end user. In
> my view possible ways of getting access and broadband access to the end user
> would possibly be facilitated by triple play providers such as Zuku who are
> not only offering Internet and the only product  but other infotainment
> products.
>
> On affordability specifically to the Kenyan scenario I think the PPP
> (Public Private Partnership) model would ensure some form of Public Good
> service that safeguards the end user. and cushions them from being exploited
> by infrastructure investors. I would like to site the SEACOM venture that
> has the government and other players such as Safaricom who are private
> investors. As you know Safaricom already offers "broadband" Internet
> services. If they benefit from high speed Internet through this SEACOM
> partnership the end user in this case may actually enjoy faster, more
> reliable Internet access.
>
> When we talk about content and local content for that  matter...  I think
> this one is just a sorry or sad state of affairs. I agree content should be
> independent of infrastructure. As for our Local Universities developing
> digital content we need a whole e-education on the benefits of digitising
> knowledge and finding new ways of learning and delivering the same....
>
> It will be Interesting to hear what others have to say.
>
>
>
> Sam.
>
> On Tue, Apr 28, 2009 at 8:20 AM, John Walubengo <jwalu at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> Welcome to day 2. Hopefully it would be more interactive than
>> yesterday...I want to believe that the paralysis in our politics has not
>> infected and paralysed us. And just like during the cold war, scientists and
>> technocrats accross the divide continued to exchange internet packets
>> inspite of...
>>
>> Nway without too much digression, today we want to interrogate several
>> assumptions about the long awaited submarine cable(s) that are poised to hit
>> our coastal city of Mombasa.  SEACOM, TEAMs, EASsy are all expected to be
>> operational starting July 09 (SEACOM), TEAMS (Sep 09) and EASsy (2010?)
>>
>> Here's my take/opinion on their impact based on a scale of Low(1),
>> Moderate(2) and High(3)
>>
>> i) Access:- Score=1, Low Impact on Access
>> The undersea cable is a top-tier infrastructure that has no impact at the
>> (User) Access level.  User access level is a function of the maturity of the
>> domestic(local) infrastructure.  Unless this is developed proportionately,
>> we shall have an an awkward situation similar to a country with top-notch
>> Universities (Submarine cable) but no Primary and Secondary Schools to
>> provide the students (no Access)...
>>
>> ii) Affordability: Score= 2,Moderate Impact on Internet Service Costs.
>> Yes, the prices are likely to go down from the current retail levels of
>> about 2500USD per 1MB to btwn 500-1000USD per 1MB of bandwidth.  But I have
>> serious doubts if this prices will be sustained at these low levels because
>> the investors in these cables are not in it for fun - they have calculated
>> ROI targets that anticipate a huge uptake of the bandwidth.  In the likely
>> event that this uptake failes to happen, I see prices beginning to go up by
>> the end of the 1st year of the cable operation.  The investors in the cable
>> will then begin to milk the few subscribers who may have jumped onto the
>> highway in order to pay for the cost of the capital sunk into the cables.
>>  Yes, maybe I just cant get over the nasty SAT3  experience where the
>> submarine fiber cable landed in the West African region with little impact
>> on pricing.
>>
>> iii) Content: Score=1, Low Impact on Content.
>> Incidentally, digital content should be independent of infrastructure.  I
>> mean, we do not need the submarine cable for our Lecturers at the
>> universities to have their notes in digital form. We do not need the
>> submarine cable to digitize government records.  Content is intricately
>> related to eventual cost of Internet Service and ideally should be fully
>> developed before the submarine cable.
>>
>> iv) Quality. Score=2, Moderate Impact on Internet Quality.
>> "Broadband Quality of Internet" is what every service provider is
>> screaming about. But Broadband standard in .KE is way off the mark when
>> compared to India or Europe. I will remain sceptical until proven otherwise
>> but I forsee the undersea cable having moderate impact on quality because of
>> our poorly managed domestic User and  Telco networks. Most Telco networks
>> that will act as gateways to the submarine cable are full of Viruses, Spam,
>> Proxies, and ill-configured Servers, Routers and Switches that introduce
>> congestion and bottlenecks rather facilate broadband access to the Submarine
>> cable.
>>
>> We have today to hear your views on this...and the floor is open.
>>
>> walu.
>>
>>
>>
>>
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