Elon Musk has a clear plan: become the largest broader service provider in sub-Saharan Africa in this decade. In Nigeria, specifically, I do not expect most of the terrestrial telcos to invest significant amounts since they are logging losses every quarter: “Telecommunication companies expect a decline in investments in their network capabilities due to the negative return on capital recorded”.
But as that is happening. “Elon Musk’s Starlink is advancing a plan to enhance internet connectivity across Nigeria by establishing ground stations, signaling a major shift in the country’s telecommunications market.”
Starlink’s ground stations, also known as gateways, are vital for transmitting data between the company’s Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites and terrestrial internet infrastructures. These stations act as intermediaries, relaying data from the satellites to internet backbones on the ground and vice versa.
Through the establishment of local ground stations in Nigeria, Starlink aims to streamline data transfer, bypassing the need to route traffic through international data centers, which has traditionally been a bottleneck for Nigerian internet users. This would not only reduce latency but also enhance the overall performance and reliability of internet services in the country.
The CDMA companies destroyed the old NITEL cobwebs of wired telephony, the GSM took down the CDMA providers, and right now, satellite, and specifically SpaceX Starlink, is a threat vector to these GSM operators.
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The GSM operators have no grand strategy for rural broadband service, Starlink via its distribution model has an opportunity therein. As Starlink builds these ground stations, expect a massive redesign in the industry.
To Starlink: the Ovim Community League – Diaspora Worldwide will fund 100% of a ground station if you decide to locate one in Ovim, Abia State. It will not cost you a single kobo or cent. We will also pay for all locally associated costs and will offer you FREE land. Recently, we added a 28-room classroom in my alma mater – Secondary Technical School Ovim and I am supposed to be the alternate Physics supporting teacher, but poor networks from the telcos have not allowed me to teach.
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