Mobile telecommunications in developing countries part 2
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Transcript of Mobile telecommunications in developing countries part 2
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Windfred MFUH
Centre for Management Under Regulation
Warwick Business School
Mobile Telephony in Africa: Impact on the development of Small Businesses in Cameroon, Uganda & Nigeria
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Growth in Mobile Telephony Services
• Explosive: – There are twice as many mobile owners in developing
countries as in industrialised countries. www.id21.org
• 92% of small business owners surveyed in coverage areas of Cameroon, Uganda and Nigeria Owned mobile phones and use them daily.
• 57% of Sub-Saharan Africans live within a mobile signal, simply improving efficiency of existing markets can provide access to a further 40% of the population.
• Only just about 3% of population will require government subsidies of around US$ 2.1 billion to have access (ITU, 2007).
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Why explosive growth?• Failure of Landlines• Favourable investment
climate• Lack of basic
communication infrastructures, such as roads
• Exponential drop in handset costs
• Pre-paid (98%)
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Business Impact• Incremental benefits:
– Productivity gains– Makes markets work better– Orders can be taken
anytime anywhere.
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Business Impact -• Transformational
Benefits:
Offers new ways to access services: Banking, Money transfer, Knowledge Transfer
• Grameen phone Bangladesh
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Social Impact• Mobiles have improved social communication,
household logistics, provided families with a sense of security, provided friends and loved ones with a continual sense of being in contact.
• Many conservative tribal leaders fear mobile phones have led to rise in extra marital affairs. This has increased tensions within families.
• Owning and using a mobile phone elevates your social class especially in rural areas (increased mobile penetration is diluting this effect)
• The item most targeted by thieves, after cash, is the mobile phone
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Innovative consumer behaviour
• Beeping - Cameroon or flashing-Nigeria or bleeping-Uganda is a popular way of saving on call cost. Sophisticated codes are being developed
• Unfulfilled demand for mobile services is significant
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Results• 73% of micro-entrepreneurs save as many as 3 hrs of
business time in a single day thanks to mobiles.• 72% of the 108 micro-entrepreneurs we surveyed in
Cameroon, Uganda & Nigeria reported that the mobile had increased the profitability of the business (still quantifying the precise impact)
• 86% think it will be very difficult to continue doing business without mobile phones.
• Main reasons for 8% of surveyed small traders not to own phones: poor or no coverage, Can’t afford, not necessary, unable to use (illiteracy)
• Many small businesses (99% rural, 85 % urban) rely solely on mobile telephony to achieve their information needs.
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The future• Increase access & QoS
– Taxation– Increased competition– Spectrum
• Mobile phones as principal access platform to Internet in developing countries?
• Convergence with radio-based broadband services?
Source: GSMA
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Conclusion• The real impact of access to mobile communications is
far more complex especially in developing economies where financial data are rare, patchy and in many cases non-existent. Also, mobile services contribute to multiple social, economic, and livelihood dimensions that are interrelated in complicated ways (Hillier, 2000).
• Mobile telephony is an important enabler of small businesses and a catalyst to economic growth.
• More research is needed to establish the concrete impact of mobiles
• Government must partner with industry to increase access in order to reap the benefits of mobile network externalities
• Mobiles have done the most to reduce costs, increase income and reduce uncertainty and risk
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The End
Thank you