Huge investment opportunities in ICTs: Expert
AN expert in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) says the country has immense investment opportunities in the sector, which ought to be exploited for economic growth.
Powertel Communications marketing manager Mr Prosper Mutswiri said there was a need to channel more investment towards the ICT sector as it has emerged as a key economic pillar with significant transformative impact on all production processes.
“Mobile investment is around US$59 million and US$22,4 million in fixed network as at 2018. So, there are huge opportunities of investing in Zimbabwe ICT as everything in manufacturing, commerce, and banking is centred on ICTs. Zimbabwe has the basic ICT laid infrastructure by all players and new investment in AI (Artificial Intelligence), IoT (Internet of Things), and LTE advanced and these should benefit potential investors as the market is ready for that,” he said.
Econet Wireless, NetOne, TelOne, Telecel and Powertel, among others, have recently been investing millions of dollars in network upgrades and green projects. Mr Mutsviri also noted that there was a need for the country to move towards becoming a digital economy to enhance its productivity efficiencies across sectors as was the case with developed countries across the globe.
“It is high time we look at smart cities (concept) opportunities, be it in mining through technologies as well as agriculture as these will alone facilitate economic development given that economic growth is now centred on technology,” he said.
ICTs have become a major driver of economic activity with businesses now investing more resources in modern technology development. This has generally opened a wider window of opportunity for investment in ICT infrastructure, software and manpower development.
The cross-cutting effect of ICTs has seen it take centre stage in top-level engagements locally and internationally. In the case of Zimbabwe, historically considered an agriculture and mining-based economy, ICTs have recently emerged as a key economic pillar with significant transformative impact on all production processes. Mr Mutsviri said there was a need for the country to catch up with its neighbouring countries in ICTs development.
“Zimbabwe is strategically located, talk of South Africa and Zambia. These two countries are already a step ahead of us when looking at their ICT infrastructure . . . If you look at the current investment in fibre optic cable and other technologies in ICT, Zimbabwe terminates into South Africa to international gateways.
“In our drive to foster infrastructure development we (PowerTel) have been participating at international summit expos so as to acquire new knowledge from our neighbouring countries and currently we are looking at how best we can construct a technological driven way to address the issue of energy shortages,” he said.
Powertel is a wholly owned subsidiary of Zesa Holdings, it is licensed with a Class A Internet Access Provider licence for operation in Zimbabwe. The company has over 3 000 kilometres of optical fibre cable in operation countrywide, having an equipped backbone capacity of Synchronous Transport Module (STM) 64.
It also has a Broadband Wireless network covering major parts of the country offering 3G services to mobile internet users.
Powertel is the first company to offer state-of-the-art Fibre Optic Synchronous Digital Hierarchy Transmission System (STM16) Harare-Plumtree route. The fibre has been extended into Botswana to interconnect with Bofinet of Botswana. It has also installed a fibre cable link from Harare to Mutare and into Mozambique through Seacom to the undersea extraterrestrial fibre cable linking Zimbabwe to the rest of the world.