A powerful, reoccuring theme for me recently recently has been the growing importance of mobile technology. This is as profound a shift in many parts of the developing world as it is in the richer nations. Mobile adoption in Sub-Saharan Africa is ocurring at staggering rates. The International Telecommunications Union puts out a report each year chock-filled with information about mobile usage. Erik Hersman does a great job of pulling some salient points out in this post, so I’ll leave it to him. But I think this graph says a lot:
(From ICU, via White African. Click to enlarge.)
We did an analisis of the Nigerian mobile market at Oxford recently. Underneath (and encouraging) the growth in subscriber numbers are systematic market changes, increasing competition between providers and promoting the spread of mobile technology further into hard to reach rural areas. (Contrast this with Ethiopia, where government lock down on mobile technology has left quality far behind. I heard a Somali SIM card worked better along the Ethiopia-Somalia border than an Ethiopian one did. Not encouraging.) Some governments really do get it. The impact of phones on development is well documented. It’s set to continuing accelerating through 2010, changing lives as it happens. A good thing.
On the other side of the world smartphones continue to gain market share. This is supported with more handset makers, new operating systems and thousands of supporting apps. Smartphones are becomming ever intertwined in people’s lives, acquiring uses and personalization. Withing a few years they will be the norm. I’ll be investing in a new smartphone in the next few days, and am excited about the possibility.
Finally, the Economist put out a fascinating article last week on the way we use all of this new technology. I’ve been interested in this for some time (and reading this guy’s posts regularly): the intersection between technology and culturally-influenced usage methods. They explore it nicely.
This space is wide open right now. It’s making billions of people’s lives better, and providing opportunities for motivated entrepreneurs. This post isn’t meant to be a coherent analysis of the emerging mobile space. Just my wonderment as I watch it happen, and look for the right points to dive in. Exciting times.
B
[UPDATE: Duncan Green of Oxfam has a good piece today on mobile applications in development today: check it out here. And if you're at all interested in development, Duncan's blog is a great read, week in, week out.]
(Shot from Ethiopia last year)
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{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
Really true, especially for a country like Uganda. Their high excise tax on mobiles hurts the ability of phones to penetrate the market. I’m looking at the effect of mobile ownership (using household surveys) on a bunch of indicators in Uganda and education seems to be a place where huge gains can be seen. I just wonder what could happen if they could get ownership up to the level it should be given the other (largely positive) factors they have for ownership.
[Reply]
Brendan Reply:
January 5th, 2010 at 12:43 am
Matt, Uganda would make a fascinating case study. What are some of the other aspects that influenced mobile adoption, in your opinion?
B
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