Illegal Bypass - CSG

Illegal Bypass – a major threat to Mobile Operators and Licensed Gateways in Africa

Written by Robert Wiesheu CSG International

Fraud is a huge problem for mobile operators around the world, estimated to cause revenue losses of $46.3 Billion (USD) annually of total telecom revenues, according to the 2013 Global Fraud Loss Survey by the Communications Fraud Control Association (CFCA).

Illegal bypass termination is the single largest interconnect fraud issue, and in many countries, the international termination rate (ITR) is considerably higher than the local (retail) termination rate to a mobile number in the country. This makes it profitable to bypass the licensed international operator when terminating calls in the country so that the lower local rate is paid instead of the ITR. This practice is illegal in most countries and causes significant problems for many operators due to lost revenues.

For fraudsters, it’s only too easy to get started. Setting up a SIM Box (GSM gateway) is simple; standard equipment can be acquired easily enough over the internet. The calls are typically routed via an internet connection to the SIM Box residing in the terminating country that converts the call into a local mobile call. Another variant of illegal bypass is when fixed line equipment, a so called Leaky PBX, is used to convert the call to a local call.

Illegal Bypass - The scale of the problem in Africa

Fraudulent ‘SIM Box Termination’ of international incoming calls, also referred to as 'Carrier Bypass Fraud', is a major challenge for Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) and licensed International Gateway Operators (IGW), resulting in poor customer experience and consequent churn as well as lost revenue. It is estimated that in some countries as many as 70% of all incoming international calls are terminated fraudulently. The CFCA estimates in its report that USD $2 Billion are lost yearly due to SIM Box fraud alone. This not only impacts operators but also the tax authorities of the affected countries as taxes due on international traffic cannot be collected.

In Kenya, it is estimated that the government and operators lost in 2013 alone an average of US $440,000 per month due to fraudulent bypass activities. A similar picture can be painted in Ghana, where the government reported that SIM box fraud has cost them US $5.8 million in stolen taxes per year. Only in January 2015, an alleged SIM Box fraudster was arrested in Ghana who had 21,232 SIM cards from one of local operators in possession. The activities of the fraudsters had led to a revenue loss of $33 million dollars within a five to seven month period, police told the media.

Beyond direct revenue loss, other consequences of SIM Box Fraud include missing or incorrect Calling Line Identifier (CLI) as well as degraded voice quality both of which will lead to further revenue loss for the licensed operator.

Illegal Bypass – Fightback strategy

Bypass fraud is more prevalent in the countries where the cost of terminating an international call is higher than that of a national call. The most effective way to eradicate illegal bypass is therefore to harmonize international and national termination rates. However, this solution is as obvious as impractical, so operators are beginning to deploy solutions that tackle the problem from different angles: either pro-actively with test-call based systems or by capturing live traffic data in order to identify suspicious call patterns.

The most effective way to combat bypass fraud is to combine these solutions in a way whereby SIM Box numbers identified by the test call solution are used by the live traffic analysis tool to fine-tune the search patterns and to cut off any illegal numbers.

Using this technique, an operator in Northern Africa was able to make significant strides towards minimizing illegal bypass fraud in their network. The operator estimated that around 3% of their international incoming voice traffic was terminated illegally as a local call, and that their monthly losses accumulated to around $350k. Proactively identifying and blocking the illegal traffic therefore helped to halt revenue leakage in excess of $4 Million per year.

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“Innovation and customer experience are what keeps us relevant” Interview of Patrick Benon, CEO Orange Botswana

Patrick Benon is CEO of Orange in Botswana. He will be joining a keynote panel on targeting underserved communities at AfricaCom next month, alongside representatives of Facebook, Mozilla, Atlantique Telecom and Vodacom. 

He shares his experience of the challenges and opportunities in Botswana’s market ahead of the event.

AfricaCom: What is Orange’s position in Botswana’s market?

Patrick Benon: Orange Botswana is the leader in mobile money (Orange Money) in the country, commanding 65% of the mobile money market share. In totality, Orange has more than 1 million subscribers, occupying the second position in terms of voice and data market share. We believe in addressing and answering the ever changing needs and expectations of our customers by being at the forefront of cutting edge innovation and technology which is evident from the following;

·                     Being the first to introduce  4G technology in 2015

·                     Introduction of a Visa Card linked to Orange Money account in 2013,

·                     Being the only Operator  in Botswana to offer  airtime credit  

·                     And the latest innovation which is the launch of the Orange Money mobile application which allows easy access and management of Orange money account.

A: What makes Botswana a unique market to work in compared to others in Africa?

PB: In a lot of African markets, the mobile industry is still growing, however, in Botswana the mobile penetration stands at more than 150% of the population. The mobile market is mature with little to no prospects of growth and the voice revenue and traffic is on the decline. Even though the mobile penetration rate is high, the data market is only starting to grow, with penetration still below 50% of the population. In this sense the market presents a unique challenge which requires the operators to adopt both a growth strategy for data and a mature/declining strategy for Voice. Operators also have to seek alternative sources of revenue as data revenue is not yet growing to the extent to which it can replace the decline in voice revenue.

This has resulted in all the operators shifting their focus towards investment in high speed data and Value Added Services. The good news is that Botswana has an enabling regulatory environment which supports the operators’ ambitions of diversifying their business. The regulators have been able to allocate operators the required spectrum for them to launch high speed internet such as 3G and LTE as well as authorise the introduction of mobile money when other markets were still hesitant to embrace these technologies.

A: What have been you biggest challenges and best rewards since joining Orange Botswana?

PB: Clearly the biggest challenge is maintaining and growing the business profitability in a highly saturated market and finding alternative avenues of revenue to replace the legacy mobile business.

The country has been experiencing power shortages which affect the quality of the network. This has prompted operators to find alternative sources of energy to keep the services working during the power outages.

Rewards: Orange deployed LTE in record time with excellent quality of service.

A: How important is staff management in your business? 

PB: Creating a sustainable and conducive environment for staff is top priority for operators. As our biggest asset and productivity drivers, employees need the right frame of mind to deliver the best possible customer experience to our customers. They need to be motivated to understanding the importance of delivering excellent service, the impact it has on the business and to love what they do and be excellent brand ambassadors on a daily basis. Operators can easily achieve this through not only adapting to the right organisational culture but also through skill improvement and motivation for employees. It is why becoming an employer of choice is a top priority for us at Orange.

We experience skills shortages mainly on the IT and VAS side of business. As technology evolves it is important to re-skill our people through consistent training for them to be able to adapt to the new technology skill trends. Therefore, consistent, relevant, timely training is critical to maintain skills levels in the company. It is also important to establish training Partnerships with universities and colleges to create a pool of potential employees. 

A: What new technologies will bring most benefits to consumers and to operators?

PB:

-          Mobile money: 80% African population is said to be unbanked, so expanding services for mobile money by building a wider ecosystem and agent network will greatly benefit the consumers. Mobile money continues to prove its ability to close the financial inclusion gap and eradicate poverty amongst low income households. It’s an affordable, safe and convenient method through which the unbanked can fully enjoy financial services.  Even though opening up mobile money too many players needs firm regulation and monitoring to prevent fraud and money laundering I am of the view that this approach provides a profitable diversification strategy for operators with potential for growth and creation of highest stakeholder value.

-          Improved data speeds: Governments are striving for accessibility and affordable internet connectivity for citizens, more so that the traditional way of communication is rapidly shifting from voice and sms to data. It therefore becomes imperative for operators and government to review bandwidth capabilities as well as re-alignment of costs for data. The improvement and investment in data speeds and capacity such as LTE 4G will address needs of the modern African who heavily relies on data to function on a daily basis (for work, simple communication, productivity and even trade). Operators in turn will also benefit from this new revenue stream.

A: What are your priorities in terms of delivering excellent customer experience in Botswana?

PB: Delivering excellent customer service is a strategic priority for Orange Botswana. In this industry, it’s all about customer experience; from the moment a customer enters our service points to the quality of network coverage. In fact, both innovation and customer experience are what keeps us relevant, but best customer experience will help us keep our current customers and acquire new ones. It is for this reason therefore that we have deliberately put customer experience at the forefront of our 5 year organisation strategy.  

The new organizational strategy, simply termed Essentials 2020 is a global strategic plan for the Orange Group which kick-started this year and will run until 2020. To ensure delivery of this strategy, we have introduced a new Customer Experience Department, whose sole mandate is to look into ways of improving and enhancing customer experience within the whole company.

A: How can telecom operators support innovation within their company and within the wider ecosystem?

PB: Given the popularity and penetration for mobile phones, the world is now looking to telecom operators to support and cascade innovation to the population. Mobile devices have become important vehicles that can be used to provide innovative services. And operators have the right infrastructure and connectivity to facilitate innovation.

The opportunity here exists in various ways;

·                     Leadership through innovation by developing value added services that bring convenience and solve people’s everyday life challenges

·                     Partnering with innovators to provide inclusive technology for innovation

·                     Supporting and nurturing technology incubators with potential to completely shift way of doing things especially for service delivery

Some of the immediate technical assistance that operators can offer to bolster innovation is to provide integration into systems such as billing platforms for e-commerce and sms exchange platforms for those using sms to reach their clientele.  

 A: What do you think will be this year’s most game-changing development in Africa’s telecoms?

PB: The launch of LTE in African countries will change the African telecom landscape as more people will experience new internet speeds and capabilities that previous technologies couldn’t reach.

In terms of supporting other industries and having precise and personalized services, telecoms operators could take advantage of big data available to them for social behavior campaigns and marketing. 

On sustainability, I foresee e-waste management policies and reforms being implemented

A: In your opinion what are the most interesting debates to expect at AfricaCom this year?

PB: Customer experience, Mobile money, Data Security, Data for Productivity

Hear more from Patrick Benon in the Vision for Africa keynote on Thursday 19^th November. To view the programme click here.

Role of Big Data by Aliasgher Dalal, Director of Architecture – Data Analytics, Sigma Software Solutions

Big Data is garnering a lot of attention these days. The long-term value of big data with analytics is well understood and promises to capture a larger and larger share of business services. The billing systems appear to similarly benefit from the advent of big data. In fact, telecommunication systems, where large volumes of data are generated, are well suited for big data. Analytics play an important role in billing systems by providing insights into the operational, marketing and financial performance of the operator’s system, allowing executives to make data driven decisions.

Marketing needs ways to generate a wide array of analytical insights rapidly on the fly and cost effectively. Traditional approaches using Data marts or Data warehouses fall far short of meeting these expectations.

The traditional analytics approach poses several challenges. For one, the traditional approach is bound by rigid data models requiring extensive data definitions. A typical process to obtain useful analytics in a traditional data mart solution is as follows:

·        Define use case(s),

·        Identify associated data source(s)

·        Define data model

·        Develop ETL solution to ingest and populate

·        Develop queries to obtain analytics

In summary, the traditional analytics approach is inflexible, cost prohibitive (i.e. resource intensive), time consuming and out of synch with present day demands.In addition, it is not suited to manipulate large amounts of data, especially if the analytics must be obtained on streams of real-time data compared to archived data. 

On the other hand, big data offers capabilities that promise to handle these challenges effectively.

·         Ability to handle large  volume of data – data approaching tera, peta, exa and zeta bytes are handled using big data technologies

·         Ability to handle real-time analytics – big data technologies like Spark can perform useful analytics on data in real-time.

·         Flexible and dynamic – non-traditional database with dynamic schemas and flat structures allow data from varied sources to be ingested and made available for analytics without having a clear understanding of specific use cases. The analytics can be run on data as use cases are identified. This is a very flexible and inexpensive approach to generate analytics.

·         Cost effective – initial data preparation work is substantially reduced thereby making the big data approach cost effective. 

Interview with Charles Niehaus, Consultant in Mobile Money at the International Finance Corporation

Charles Niehaus is Consultant Mobile Money at the InternationalFinance Corporation (IFC), part of World Bank Group. He will be a speaker in the Mobile Money programme at AfricaCom this year, with a case study on achieving interoperability through mobile financial services in Tanzania. Here’s a chance to hear from him before the event

AfricaCom: Tanzania has led the way with interoperability. What role have IFC played in facilitating this process ?  

Charles Niehaus: IFC has been the neutral broker for the industry on mobile money interoperability. This involved initial engagement with the operators to gauge interest, liaising with the Central Bank of Tanzania to facilitate an industry led process, initiating a market demand study to asses interest from consumers and agents, all leading up to facilitated workshops which unpacked the details around exactly what interoperability means and how it could work.

 A: Interoperability was once perceived as a technical challenge but in Tanzania it would appear that creating a set of regulations has been the main facilitator – who has been involved in the process?

CN: Technology enables interoperability to happen, but without a set of overarching rules operators have little legal certainty on how the business or interoperability will work. The process in Tanzania covered facilitated workshops which unpacked firstly which use cases to start with, and once these were agreed each use case was broken down into the traditional components that scheme rules or ACH rules cover. These included the participation criteria, business models, clearing and settlement arrangements, disputes, and risk and loss allocation. The outcome was a set of rules for each use case which all participants who decide to join the interoperability scheme adhere to. It is important to note that the operating rules and payment regulations are not the same thing and often get confused. Payment Regulations are set at a market level for all participants in the national payments environment, while operating rules for a particular payment scheme have to adhere to the national payment regulations but are only enforceable between the participants.

A: Have all of the operators in Tanzania bought in to these set of regulations ?  

CN: The rules (not regulation) for Person to Person transfers have been signed and implemented by Airtel, Tigo and Zantel. Vodacom is in the process of joining but has not signed to date (Sep 2015).

A: What role did the Bank of Tanzania play in facilitating the development of interoperability in Tanzania ?

CN: The regulations in Tanzania created an enabling environment for industry participants to create a set of practical and applicable rules. BoT endorsed the process. It is important to note that BoT did not mandate the process or implementation as other central banks have done.

A: How does interoperability facilitate financial inclusion ?

CN: Interoperability is a means to an end and not and end in itself. Whilst mobile money interoperability is still in its infancy, parallel industries have shown that interoperability increases uptake and transaction volume. From a financial inclusion perspective this would mean more access points and transactional availability for individuals as well as adding to the journey of cash digitisation.

A: Is Tanzania now enjoying the mobile money boom that Kenya had and which other African countries do you think might be able to embrace interoperability in the future ?

CN: Many African markets have tried to replicate the Kenyan example with varying levels of success. The recently published World Bank Group Findex 2014 data show a very positive development in Tanzania with regards to financial inclusion, with 40 percent of the population now with access to a formal bank account compared to 17 percent in 2011. In some regards, Tanzania’s journey has been even faster than that of Kenya and Tanzania was the first industry-led and decided interoperability implementation in Africa (the others were primarily regulatory mandated or vendor driven). It may still be premature to agree what the exact correct approach to interoperability will be, but to date Tanzania is showing promising signs and is a step towards even greater progress.

 The Mobile Money programme will take place on Tuesday 17th and Wednesday 18th November at AfricaCom (CTICC, Cape Town, South Africa). 

Interview with Dave Woolnough, Nedbank Ltd

Dave Woolnough is Executive: Digital and Mobile Retail at NedbankLimited. He will be joining a Regulatory Panel on nurturing innovation whilst maintaining regulation, part of the Mobile Money programme at AfricaCom. He shares his views ahead of the event.

AfricaCom: How does your company fit in the mobile money eco-system and what are its future ambitions?

Dave Woolnough: As a large Banking Institution, Nedbank utilises its own and other third party solutions. Mobile money is a key enabler in Nedbank’s strategy. Future ambitions are to enhance existing capabilities and partner smartly with leading market players.

A: What would you say are the main challenges that mobile financial services in Africa need to overcome in the short to mid-term?

DW: Interoperability across solutions: we can’t have ‘thousands’ of different applications with different capabilities and fulfilment processes. Short term need to drive up adoption from the consumers and the merchants, adoption is still very low in Africa. Need to solve for the lower end of the market. Mobile money solutions in South Africa are largely for Middle Market clients.

A: Has the talk of cashless societies been overhyped and how do you view the role of cash in society in the short to mid-term?

DW: No, I do believe a form of cashless society will be a reality in time. The financial institutions who embrace this and get high adoption will have a competitive edge.

A: How do you feel regulators should foster innovation in the mobile payment space? Is there too much flexibility or too much regulation at present?

DW: There is a lot of regulation, which I believe could be more practically applied to the various channels. The bigger problem is that the regulation is not consistently applied across all service providers.

A: What are the biggest challenges and opportunities to banks with the evolution of the mobile money revolution ?

DW: The bank who really gets this right and can service all segments of the market will have a significant strategic advantage.

The Mobile Money programme will take place on Tuesday 17th and Wednesday 18th November at AfricaCom (CTICC, Cape Town, South Africa). 

Telecoms Academy Executive Training at AfricaCom 2015 - 16-20 November 2015, Cape Town

We are pleased to announce that Telecoms Academy will be running the Telecoms Mini MBA executive training programme alongside this year's AfricaCom 2015.

TELECOMS MINI MBA
16-20 November 2015, Cape Town at AfricaCom

The Telecoms Mini MBA is a 5-day university accredited telecoms management programme from the leaders in telecom training, analysis and research. The programme has been attended by over 5,000 professionals from 350 companies worldwide. Some of the leading operators, vendors, services, and regulators in the global telecoms industry have sent delegates to the programme.

It is highly participative, focusing on real business, technology and industry issues and designed to give you a critical understanding of the key competency areas required for success within the telecommunications industry – enabling you to make more informed and commercially viable strategic decisions. The business simulation is the vehicle through which we maximise the competency development and ensure ideas on strategic implementation can be tested and appraised.

The programme covers the five key competency areas of:
- Strategy & Business Environment
- Technology
- Finance
- Leadership & People Management
- Marketing & Customer Focus

Special Guest Speaker: Alan Knott-Craig Jr, Founder of Project Isizwe

We are also pleased to announce that Alan Knott-Craig Jr. will be guest speaker at the Telecoms Mini MBA. He will give a unique insight into what Project Isizwe does; how many people now have Internet access through it; who uses the Internet through its coverage and what they use it for; how the business model works; what the municipalities are charged; and his plans for rolling out outside of South Africa.

Information about the Telecoms Mini MBA and details of how to register can be found at:
http://www.telecomsacademy.com/telecoms_business/school-of-telecoms-management/telecoms-mini-mba/telecoms-mini-mba-5-day-africacom/

“MFS in Africa need to keep welcoming innovation” Interview of Elizabeth Rossiello, Bitpesa

Elizabeth Rossiello is CEO and founder of Bitpesa, the first company in the world to link mobile money to Bitcoin. Based in Kenya since 2009, she knows financial services from the Mara to the Board room. 

Elisabeth will join a panel discussion on the future of international remittance services in the Mobile Money programme at AfricaComthis year. She share her thoughts on the subject ahead of the event.

AfricaCom: When and why did BitPesa start and how has your growth been since inception?

Elizabeth Rossiello: BitPesa was founded in Kenya in October 2013 just before Bitcoin gained global attention.  Since then we have expanded into 4 countries (Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Nigeria) and had over $2M in transactions in the last few months.  We have connected into some of the best mobile money systems across the continent, as well as gained direct access to bank accounts.  Many international businesses use us to pay salaries to their staff in sub-Saharan Africa, making it easier and more efficient to do business in the region.  Some of them have expanded into new countries because our infrastructure was available.

A: What does bitPesa offer the man on the street in East Africa and how has it been received ?

ER: A way to grow their business.  Using BitPesa, they can order things internationally, pay suppliers abroad, or receive payments or salaries from global employers.  It brings East and West Africans into the global marketplace at a low-cost, with a low-barrier to entry. 

A: What would you say are the main challenges that mobile financial services in Africa need to overcome in the short to mid-term?

ER: MFS in Africa need to keep welcoming innovation.  While the African mobile money story was groundbreaking, innovation did not stop thereafter. There are new types of internet/cloud based payments systems, open source apps, and decentralized systems that are pushing the boundary on what we now know.  I think the incredible success of some mobile money systems has made some hesitant to change.   

A: Has the talk of cashless societies been over-hyped and how do you view the role of cash in society in the short to mid-term?

ER: In the last 7 years living in Kenya, I have used increasingly less cash every day.  In fact, I can go months without touching cash. This is the same as when I travel to NY. There are certainly some countries I travel to, like Nigeria, where cashless transactions are everywhere over a certain minimum amount, but there is still no omnipresent low-value cashless transfer system.  As data costs and smartphone penetration increase I think cashless societies are a sure bet in the next 5 years. 

A: How do you feel regulators should foster innovation in the mobile payment space? Is there too much flexibility or too much regulation at present?

ER: It certainly depends on the country and regulator. However, I would love to see more open dialogue between regulators and start-ups working on the latest innovation.  It can be quite difficult to receive clear guidance from some regulators, despite our best efforts to communicate and reach out.  While many regulators do not immediately outlaw innovation if there is no explicit guideline, companies can spend years without any clear statement from regulators.  This affects how investors and new entrants view the ecosystem and scares away potential vectors of growth. 

A: What are the biggest challenges and opportunities to BitPesa with the evolution of the mobile money revolution ?

ER: We are excited to see mobile money ecosystems continue to grow.  We work with and depend on several different mobile money ecosystems and find it very complimentary to our own business.  I would love to see MNOs be more open to start-ups and let them also have open avenues to work together and cooperate on new products. 

A: What will be the focus of your discussions at Mobile Money at Africa Com  ?

ER: I would like to share a bit about the development of global regulation on distributed ledger systems, like Bitcoin, and discuss the traction our company has made in terms of complementing local mobile money ecosystems.  

The Mobile Money programme will take place on Tuesday 17th and Wednesday 18th November at AfricaCom (CTICC, Cape Town, South Africa). For more information on topics covered and speakers click here

"Telecoms in Africa can help make a significant difference to people’s lives” Interview of Tony Dolton, CEO Unitel Angola

Tony Dolton is CEO of Unitel in Angola.  He will be joining a keynote panel discussion on the second day of the event on how LTE is changing the digital landscape, alongside representatives of other operators such as Vodacom and MTC in Namibia.
He answers a few questions on the market ahead of the event.

AfricaCom: What is your Unitel's position in Africa’s market?

Tony Dolton: Unitel is the number one telecom operator in Angola, with over 11M  subscribers and a market share in excess of 80%. We aim to be among the largest independently owned operators in Africa, and to do so we believe in innovation and technological differentiation, combined with unrivalled quality of service. The 450 Mbps LTE downlink speed demonstration we carried out recently together with our investment in national and metropolitan fibre networks is evidence of our willingness and commitment to be at the forefront of technology in Africa.
Unitel’s goal is to enable the development of businesses and people based on high quality and high-speed connectivity.

A. What do you think will be this year’s most game-changing development in Africa’s telecom?

TD: Not so much game changing but the continued evolution of Big data together with more highly accessible broadband capacity at higher speeds will allow more innovation and greater opportunity for Africa.

A. What services will enable telecom operators to generate revenue from data?

TD: With higher speeds and bandwidth and more reliable services, the Mobile Telecoms operators in Africa have the opportunity to reach into the more traditional fixed line services in the Enterprise area and to develop new revenue streams such as VPN’s or Closed User Groups, as well as M2M, ICT and traditional data services. To offer affordable Enterprise services in areas of low fixed coverage should be the objective of all Mobile operators.
In the consumer segment, the Mobile operators still have some way to go to get customers using data and this can be achieved by providing the right pricing, affordable but good quality devices and the content that will drive usage. However to grow this area we must also provide the support to help educate potential customers of the value that data services can bring to their personal and business lives.  We strongly believe that there is much that can be learnt from the OTT suppliers in providing content as a service rather than content in terms of Mega Bytes or Giga Bytes.

A. What will be the impact of the digital transition on the telecoms and media sector?

TD: The big impact is of course the convergence of content and delivery and the need to be “connected always” which implies significant additional investments into the network infrastructure.  To make this affordable from a cost perspective the Mobile operators need to focus on greater efficiency and better delivery services.

A. What are the regulatory requirements for improving affordable access to broadband?

TD: Although in Angola there are no specific regulatory requirements for improving affordable access to broadband, similar to a significant number of countries, the Government has approved and published in 2011 the White Book for the sector. Herein it is clear that generalized access to broadband is an immediate challenge and necessary to reduce the asymmetry of Angola compared to other countries with a more consolidated stage of socioeconomic development.

A. How can telecom and digital brands create more value for African consumers?

TD: Mobile operators in Africa have a significant opportunity, through engagement with our customers to fully understand how we can enable them to connect, grow, learn and to develop their communities, businesses and relationships. 
Africa is a hugely culturally diverse, colorful and challenging continent that struggles in the provision of many of the basic services, such as good health and good education. The telecoms sector can help make a significant difference to people’s lives:
- through providing local and relevant information everywhere -  national music, sports and local content
- by providing services that can help in people daily lives, such as as mobile money, e-learning, m-health, school and university connectivity, virtual classrooms for remote areas and support for SME activity (agriculture, fishery, small technological businesses, etc.)

A. How can operators support innovation within their organizations and in the wider ecosystem?

TD: Innovation is at the heart of our organization and it is our aim to not only promote innovation in our own business but also promote innovation with our products and services to inspire our customers.  Whilst we all have a responsibility to create a culture of innovation we have set up a small dedicated team who are responsible for the promotion and encouragement of innovation across the organization and they also work with universities and small local start-up businesses in Angola to develop new ideas and concepts

A. How can the communications needs of enterprises be met in order to sustain economic growth in the region?

TD: There is an insatiable thirst for higher speeds and bigger bandwidths and the development and growth of the ICT sector is critical to the continued development of the continent.  This includes the continued expansion of the cable interconnection in and out of Africa, to drive down the cost of delivery.  To meet this increasing demand we must invest not just in our networks but also in the people of Africa.  We must insist that our product suppliers localize expertise in the continent, that we develop the ability to train locally and that the universities are doing the right courses for ICT.  The development of ICT skills and abilities is one of our greatest challenges at the moment.  

For more details on the AfricaCom programme download the brochure here.

Getting the next billion connected - Interview of John Bernard, Mozilla

John Bernard has been leading the global marketing team at Mozilla since 2012.

This year he is joining AfricaCom to be part of a keynote panel discussion on targeting underserved communities.

He shares his views on the market ahead of the event.

 

AfricaCom: What is Firefox’s position in Africa’s market?

John Bernard: We have a strategy for Firefox OS targeting emerging markets and delivering a smartphone experience for consumers buying their first smartphone under $100. Africa, with the number of new connections every year and the huge appetite for accessing the Web represents a number of strategic markets for Mozilla.

A: What do you think will be this year’s most game-changing development in Africa’s telecoms?

JB: An Operator or company who can help solve the issue of providing a network to the most remote parts of Africa will be something for attendees to sit up and take notice of. This is a growing area of connecting communities within the region.

A: How can telecom and digital brands create more value for African consumers?

JB: Firefox OS offers a customised and easy to use experience appropriate to consumers at the entry-level smartphone segment, as has been seen with the demand of the KLIF device launched this year with Orange. Firefox OS leverages the power of the Web, to scale the user experience and, as an open source project, any individual or organisation can extend and adapt the platform. Orange put the mobile internet within reach of millions more people, otherwise not previously addressed, with the launch of the KLIF with a new breakthrough digital offer across its significant African footprint.

A: How can operators support innovation within their organisations and in the wider ecosystem?

JB: We announced this year partnering with Orange, to bring Firefox OS to Africa and the Middle East as part of a new digital offer. This was achieved in collaboration with ALCATEL ONETOUCH expanding mobile internet access with the 3.5-inch Orange KLIF Smartphone, launched in 13 African countries to date. Here, Orange are seen to support innovation by providing an affordable, easy-to-use first-time smartphone experience with the ability to surf the web, use email, and communicate within the continent.
The Orange Klif digital offer started from under US$40, inclusive of data, voice and text bundle and sets a new benchmark in price that acted as a major catalyst for smartphone and data adoption across the region.

A: In your opinion what are the most interesting debates to expect at AfricaCom this year?

JB: As mentioned, solving the issue of providing a network to the most remote parts of Africa will be an interesting topic, what role IoT plays and finally who will be the big content winner: local apps or the big-named global content providers.

Top sessions John recommends at AfricaCom 2015:
-       Innovation Leadership Panel: How to support a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship in digital Africa? (day 1 keynote)
-       Transforming operators’ models to succeed in the digital economy (day 2 keynote)
-       Targeting underserved communities: strategies to deliver digital communications across Africa  (day 3 keynote)

For more information on the Vision for Africa keynotes check the AfricaCom programme here.