Orbcomm Global, a low-earth-orbit satellite provider specializing in data communications, signed an agreement with European Datacomm Holding to deliver Orbcomm satellite communications services to 60 countries and territories in and around sub-Saharan Africa, said Orbcomm. Belgium-based EDC will begin operations out of Johannesburg, South Africa, and expects to begin offering service late this year, according to Orbcomm.
Kingston-SCL received a contract to supply its convergent billing, administration and customer care system, Jupiter, to Globalstar S.A. (Southern Africa).
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Nortel Networks and The Acacia Initiative of the International Development Research Centre announced that they will work to provide solutions to the challenges of universal access and rural connectivity in Africa.
Nortel said it intends to be a principal private-sector partner in developing two ITU African Centres of Excellence, to be located in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dakar, Senegal, to focus on human resource development in the information and telecommunications sectors. The centers will serve all of sub-Saharan Africa.
The other partners will include the Canadian International Development Agency, Industry Canada and the Telecommunications Executive Management Institute of Canada. The partners will contribute an estimated US$4 million during a three-year period, said Nortel.
A consortium led by the Pan African Telecommunications Union, an intergovernmental association based in Nairobi, Kenya, received a US$250,000 grant from the World Bank’s infoDev program to help African countries bring global mobile personal communications by satellite (GMPCS) to their communities.
The consortium also includes African Connections, an initiative by African governments to build Africa’s communications infrastructure; the Global Information Infrastructure Commission, a U.S.-based non-governmental organization; and ICO Global Communications, which plans to launch GMPCS service in 2000.
