Facebook announced yesterday that South Africa will benefit from its satellite internet project to be launched in partnership with Internet.org. Mark Zuckerberg posted the update on his Facebook wall yesterday.
Facebook has been exploring ways to use aircraft and satellites to beam internet access down into communities from the sky. The aim is to connect people living in remote regions, traditional connectivity infrastructure is often difficult and not viable.
"As part of our collaboration with Eutelsat, a new satellite called AMOS-6 is going to provide internet coverage to large parts of Sub-Saharan Africa. The AMOS-6 satellite is under construction now and will launch in 2016 into a geostationary orbit that will cover large parts of West, East and Southern Africa. We’re going to work with local partners across these regions to help communities begin accessing internet services provided through satellite," said Zuckerber in a statement.
According to Global Connectivity Index, South Africa is currently ranked at number 33 out of 50 countries.
“South Africa’s strength lies in their potential of the ICT sector and a better customer service compared to other African nations. It has Africa’s largest telecom network dominated by mobile telephony, and mobile Internet and smartphones are driving m-Commerce uptake,” Huawei said in its 2015 report.
It is believed that the rollout of the internet satellite will improve South Africa's connectivity and its ranking.
“South Africa’s strength lies in their potential of the ICT sector and a better customer service compared to other African nations. It has Africa’s largest telecom network dominated by mobile telephony, and mobile Internet and smartphones are driving m-Commerce uptake,” Huawei said in its 2015 report.
It is believed that the rollout of the internet satellite will improve South Africa's connectivity and its ranking.