HOW HIGH-SPEED CONNECTIVITY IS GOING TO CHANGE THE WAY SOUTH AFRICANS DO BUSINESS
Fibre has the potential to bring transformational change to both metro and outlying urban areas, says Fibreco CEO, Simon Harvey.
South Africa is still behind globally regarding Internet speed and cost, and investing in broadband penetration can enable access to information and act as a lever for the economy. A 10% increase in broadband penetration in low and middle-income countries can result in a 1.38% increase in economic growth. Highspeed connections and increased access generate major economic growth and rapid job creation – but it needs to be affordable.
Since inception in 2009, Fibreco’s mission has been to provide direct access to infrastructure to lower the cost of connectivity in SA. Fibreco still has this vision in mind and is now ramping up its efforts to enable delivery of capacity to end users across the country.
Improving connectivity for both the public and private sectors will have a positive socio-economic impact on the country and help to meet the nation’s aspirations for world-class broadband connectivity. Yet fibre penetration in South Africa currently tends to focus on the country’s main metro areas.
Fibreco, however, is focusing on expanding its network to the areas along its route that need more connectivity. The Fibreco network already spans over 4,000 km and has 52 points of presence, and its open-access pricing model is paving the way for lower broadband costs.
Harvey says the company is looking to build out Fibre from these points of presence over the next three years for not only bigger cities like Bloemfontein, but also smaller ones such as Kroonstad.
Cloud adoption is ramping up, thus further increasing demand for high-speed connectivity. Companies will move simple services, like email and voice, to a cloudbased service instead of onsite PABX or email servers. “With access to high-speed connectivity, businesses in outlying areas will be able to start making better use of cloud services and will improve their communication with clients, whether local or international, especially with rich video conference facilities,” says Harvey.
Fibreco’s access connectivity allows service providers in these areas to connect buildings, malls or office complexes using a combination of multi-medium access, including fibre and wireless access solutions.
While fibre is its core business, Fibreco is technologyagnostic when it comes to access connectivity and can deploy wireless and fibre solutions for access connectivity depending on the terrain and customer requirements.
“Many offices have their infrastructure on site, and more and more businesses are going to move that infrastructure to the cloud,” Harvey adds. “In smaller, outlying towns, many businesses don’t have the capacity to employ a dedicated IT professional permanently, and so they will see the movement to the to the cloud as an attractive alternative.” ■