Africa's ICT Entrepreneurs - On the Brink of the Long Summer of Love
5 March 2012
allAfrica.com - March 2, 2012
London — For over a decade, Africa's ICT entrepreneurs have struggled to make sense of how to innovate and make money on a continent that was largely connected to the outside world by satellite and extremely expensive fibre. Now with cheaper wholesale bandwidth and falling retail prices, the season is going from an unforgiving winter to perhaps a long Summer of Love. Russell Southwood looks at the changes afoot that are helping Africa's ICT entrepreneurs stand a better chance of success.
When we started Balancing Act 12 years ago, Africa's ICT entrepreneurs were talking about a whole range of services and applications but none of the basics - like bandwidth, a critical mass of users, transaction technologies and finance - were in place. Over the last 12 months, many different things have begun to fall into place under each of these headings. Launches like Eskimi and Spinlet have turned the usual entrepreneurial road map for Africa round a different way.
Category: ICT