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Movement, at last, to extend WiFi into unconnected communities

30th September 2016

By: Natasha Odendaal

Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

  

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WiFi is starting to shift into the limelight as the disruptive technology that is increasingly a critical element of the ‘always-on’, connected society; however, townships and citizens in the living standards measure (LSM) five and below category are, for the most part, being sidelined.

New research, supplied to Engineering News by BMI-TechKnowledge (BMI-T), shows WiFi as having “grown by stealth to dominate the global wireless data domain”.

South Africa currently boasts in excess of 900 000 fixed hot spots, the bulk of which, some 450 000 to 500 000, are based in the workplace, while another 350 000 to 400 000 WiFi access sites are installed in households.

There are also currently over 10 000 semi-public hot spots, mostly operated by commercial operators such as Telkom Mobile, Vast Networks, AlwaysOn and G-Connect, besides others, that are strategically deployed across shopping centres, hotels, airports and even aircraft.

Open public hot spots, where users can get some level of free access on public transport and public spaces, increased to around 2 100 by mid-2016.

The massive uptake of WiFi-enabled smartphones, which account for over half of all cellphones owned by those aged 15 and above, multiple device ownership and the increasing choice of tablets and phablets in the market have been identified as critical drivers in the uptake of WiFi services.

BMI-T also points to the rise of applications, cloud computing, the increase in hot spots and demand for free or low-cost bandwidth, the birth of wearable and machine devices and globally harmonised, unregulated, no-cost spectrum in several bands, with wide bandwidth adding to the rising popularity of the faster and more capable Wi-Fi technologies of today.

However, despite the expansive opportunities and commercial viability of WiFi, citizens falling into the LSM one to five category are mostly without access, WiFi Forum South Africa executive deputy chairperson Raj Wanniappa tells Engineering News.

“Only 1% of the economically active population have access to WiFi at the moment, because the traditional WiFi services providers have focused on the LSM five to ten crowd, meaning [deployment in] airports, hotels and shopping centres,” he says.

“We have only touched 1%. It is an embarrassing stat that means we have 99% still to go,” he stresses, pointing to commercial providers of the services’ lack of deployment to townships, community centres and libraries, besides others.

Wanniappa accuses the commercial WiFi operators undertaking projects of doing so on an “ad hoc opportunistic basis” and not really having in place a solid strategy to deliver WiFi services to LSM one to five, mostly under the premise that there is no commercial benefit.

However, the future lies within the lower LSM range, which also happens to be those that will most benefit from connectivity access. “We need hot spots in every single light pole, spaza shop, local clinic, train station and bus stop [to stimulate the economic value inherent in every township resident],” he adds.

Government’s attempts at intervention and WiFi deployment have not been as effective as they should be, with the selectiveness of deployment by the public sector meaning that large townships such as Diepsloot and the more established Soweto are largely favoured over less “sexy” regions such as Alexandra, Orange Farm, Tembisa and Olievenhoutbosch.

“[Service providers] will go to the place where they think everyone is. Even in Soweto, the only places that [providers] are installing WiFi is the famous Vilakazi street. Everyone wants it. Go ten streets away, there is nothing there,” Wanniappa points out, noting the disparity in WiFi roll-out.

SOME ACTIVITY
Meanwhile, there are some efforts under way to extend WiFi coverage into townships and Gauteng’s surrounding regions and correct unequal distribution.

Soweto-based nonprofit Soweto Wireless User Group provides free wireless solutions to one of Gauteng’s largest townships, with ambitions of filling the connectivity gap.

The group, founded in 2010, aims to unlock a freely accessible, reliable and efficient wireless network to provide surrounding previously disadvantaged communities with access to information and communication.

Government is also backing free WiFi initiatives such as Tshwane’s Project Isizwe, which was one of the first to be initiated, and various projects in the Western Cape, Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni and, imminently, eThekwini, with a public-sector push to expand this further across South Africa as part of the Department of Telecommunications and Postal Services South Africa Connect policy.

However, free does not necessarily mean good, Wanniappa notes, pointing out that, often the speeds are slower, the quality poor and the services unreliable, in addition to the limitation of use being restricted to certain websites of tasks, such as education or job-seeking.

Consequently, with the free WiFi service model now somewhat entrenched in a sector increasingly accustomed to free and subsidised access, companies have to seek out monetisation models.

Some players in the private sector, which are starting to play a critical role in the connectivity of the public, are moving to promote easily accessible, fee-based WiFi through afford- able pricing, free daily data to a point, quality services and speed and a handy user-friendly portal easily and freely accessible.

Open-access WiFi infrastructure provider Vast Networks, which already has some 6.5-million square metre WiFi coverage, has started to extend its services into townships.

Vast teamed up with open-access fibre network provider Link Africa, to deploy 100-km-plus of fibre-optic backbone to deliver 100 Mb/s services through hundreds of WiFi endpoints in two Gauteng townships this year, in a pilot project that it aims to eventually extend to more townships across South Africa if successful.

Vast CEO Grant Marais tells Engineering News that Vast and Link Africa will outfit local community centres, public transport and public spaces with low-cost WiFi, with 50 MB a person a day thrown in and free access to an exclusive Vast-developed portal containing news, a job-seeker section and entertainment, besides others.

As 50 to 60 sites go live this year, a myriad of opportunities await locals, including the use of local contractors and suppliers and equipping spaza shops that can not only be a distribution point for WiFi vouchers, but which consequently become more attractive to potential customers, he points out.

The project presents a particularly significant opportunity for entrepreneurs, as 1 MB of WiFi actually costs less than a quarter of the price of a GSM megabyte, thereby making it more affordable for those in the lower LSM range.

Link Africa has deployed its fibre network across several townships, including Soweto and KwaMashu, Ntuzuma, Phoenix, Verulam and Chatsworth in KwaZulu-Natal, leveraging the underground network of sewers, storm water drains and service ducts, says Link Africa special projects executive Andre Hoffmann.

Link Africa has plans to lay fibre in Alexandra, Diepsloot, Tembisa and Ekurhuleni, in Gauteng, and expand the capacity in major metros such as Cape Town.

“We have decided to use them through our Focus system. We are working together with the council to clean out the sewer, ducts and water drains, before installing the fibre and assisting with maintenance of the pipes at no cost to the taxpayer,” he explains.

The only way to make a difference and break the digital divide is to target all lower income areas in townships, with fibre-to-the-business to be made available to more established local businesses in need of more customised solutions, Hoffmann adds.

Initially, three Gauteng townships have been selected to be kitted out with WiFi services with fibre backhaul, with another three having been scoped – one in KwaZulu-Natal and two in the Western Cape.

“Being the first time that we are doing this, we wanted to choose somewhere fairly close . . . to get on the ground ourselves to understand [the environment] and take learnings, as no one else has done this before on this scale,” Marias concludes.

Edited by Creamer Media Reporter

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