Nigeria Listed Among Top 3 Countries in Emerging Broadband Market

Nigeria is among the top three countries in the emerging broadband market, according to the first Global Connectivity Index, GCI, on West Africa released during the weekend by Huawei Technologies as reported by Vanguard Newspaper. According to the report, the 2015 GCI covered 50 countries including Nigeria and  highlighted the growing opportunities. The index, among other things benchmarks 50 economies in terms of connectivity, ICT usage, and digital transformation. The President of Huawei Western Africa Region, Mr. Peng Song who released the GCI at the just concluded Huawei Cloud Congress (HCC) West Africa 2015 –  which held in Lagos – told the gathering that  Nigeria has a small fixed base but huge potential in the uptake of mobile products. He stated that Nigeria is one of the world’s largest mobile subscriber markets offering impressive opportunities primarily in the mobile broadband space where rapid M-commerce uptake is driving market growth. According to him, the GCI report showed that 20% growth in ICT investment will increase the country’s GDP by 1%. “The Global Connectivity Index is not merely a ranking of countries. We see it as a platform to partner with policy makers and enterprise leaders to identify, harness, and create new digital economy opportunities with the aim of building a better connected West Africa,” he said. He said by 2025,  according to Huawei forecast, as many as 100 billion connections will be generated globally, 90 percent of which will come from intelligent sensors. This increase will be attributed to enterprises becoming enabled by the internet. By leveraging connectivity to streamline business processes, reduce costs and improve efficiency, enterprises will drive innovation and move the focus from a consumer driven internet to an industrial one. “It is an amazing era with rapid growth and data explosion. In this dynamic environment, Huawei will continue to invest in IT industry, emphasizing on the concept of being integrated, customer-centric and providing customers with innovative, differentiated, leading-edge products and solutions,” he added.