Fast internet for Africa in 2010

Cheap and high-speed web access via satellite will be provided to millions of people in Africa and other emerging markets by 2010. Google and Europe’s biggest bank HSBC partnering with cable operator Liberty Global would provide the services. Three billion people are to benefit from the project.A group called O3b Networks – stands for the “other 3 billion” people who do not have access to the internet – are helping to roll out the project. Reuters reports say the project will provide high-speed backhaul for telecoms’ operators and Internet providers, which can then sell services to businesses and consumers.South African Finance Minister Trevor Manuel hailed the project at a conference in Germany on Monday. “The information gap is very real and clearly whatever we can do to close it must be encouraged,” Manuel told a news conference in Berlin on the U.N.-backed Millennium development goals.”Any initiative that can leapfrog over traditional means of getting information to people must be encouraged. Information is power and it supports democracy and it supports decision-making.”O3b networks said in a statement the satellites would be constructed by Thales Alenia Space and should be operational by the end of 2010. The company’s founder, Greg Wyler, told Reuters coverage would reach from Spain to South Africa, include most of South America, large parts of Asia and all South Pacific Islands. The project intends to offer fibre performance over satellite to parts of the world where it is not commercially viable or practical to deploy a fibre network.Because its satellites orbit earth at lower altitudes than those used to beam TV signals to homes, they work better for Internet access where latency — the amount of time it takes for bits of information to travel from source to destination — is an issue, Wyler said.The project is expected to cost $650 million until the launch, he said. Initial equity of $65 million has been raised, but the final mix of debt and equity has not been set. In some parts of the world, the company will compete with fibre-optic cables currently under construction — for instance, over a dozen cables have been announced connecting Africa to Europe, the Middle East and Asia.