RIM announced today the launch of their three flagship devices by MTN Ghana. When it comes to maiden national launches, it’s surprisingly rare to see all three (the BlackBerry 8800, 8100 and 8300) all brought together at once, which is too bad, since the three cover the whole range of customer demand really nicely. RIM realizes that Africa is a promising emerging market, and possibly second only to China. Considering the game in China is now entirely in the carrier’s hands and ostensibly slowing, it makes sense that BlackBerry starts setting its sights on the next new market by making aggressive releases like this one.
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Three BlackBerrys come to Ghana
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RIM announced yesterday that Celtel Uganda with the help of Emitac Mobile Solutions is now offering BlackBerry Enterprise Service and the BlackBerry 8800 to corporate customers. Celtel’s also supporting East Africa’s One network, so visitors from the neighbourhood can get their roaming groove on.
“We continue to extend the global availability of the BlackBerry solution and are pleased to be launching today in Uganda with Celtel and EMS. BlackBerry smartphones are a great choice for individuals that strive to be more productive, flexible and ultimately more successful in work and life,” said Charmaine Eggberry, Vice President and Managing Director of EMEA at Research In Motion.
Algerian carrier mobilis has recently announced their inaugural BlackBerry support, kicking things off with the BlackBerry 8100 and BlackBerry 8700. Alcatel-Lucent is lending a hand with the launch and support of the devices – if Alcatel’s work is anything like their network expansion in India, mobilis shouldn’t have too much to worry about. As for the Pearl and 8700, they’re solid choices for getting initial footholds in both consumer and enterprise markets.
It’s possible that Apple might match India’s sale of a million phones in a week, but something tells me they won’t be able to pull off 6 million each month for the next little while. Call me crazy. By 3 years from now, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India is hoping to nail the 500 million mark, after maintaining a steady 6 to 7 million subscriber growth while the country gets hooked up. For those of you not so hot with the math, that’s half of a billion, and about 45% market penetration. China’s great for RIM, and there’s sure to be some opportunities in Africa, but it’s hard to ignore numbers like these. The BlackBerry 8300 is in India, which is a start, but they’re going to have to keep pumping the newer lines out there in order to really cash in on the explosion.
Following the earlier topic of Canadian data rates, Don Morisson continued talking with the Financial Post about the emerging market in Africa. (For anyone who hasn’t entered our weekly contest yet, this is a subtle hint.) While progress in China’s starting to ramp up, RIM is looking to start moving harder into Eastern Europe before significant headway is made in Africa. Despite the economic situation in Africa being vastly different from the usual industrialized markets that RIM usually guns for, Morisson says their enterprise-first approach is going to stick.
“Is there an attractive market that’s beyond the enterprise market? Absolutely.”
As predicted, Celtel announced BES support in Kenya today. Once again, EMS partnered up with Celtel to bring BlackBerry service to a new market. (Celtel Kenya’s parent company, MTC, has done some business recently with Fastlink out in Jordan.) Celtel’s seeing Safaricom’s initial two releases of the Pearl and BlackBerry 8700, and raising them a BlackBerry 8800. We’ll keep you posted on how these two compete in the months to come.
If that sounds like a lot, that’s because it is. The Mobile World has just run a report claiming there will be 3.25 billion mobile users before the end of the year, pushing it over the 50% penetration mark. The Mobile World’s Senior Analyst John Tysoe puts this number into startling perspective.
“The mobile telecommunications industry continues to set new records, driven by huge demand, especially in India, China and Africa. And the growth rate is still accelerating. It took over 20 years to connect the first billion subscribers, but only 40 months to connect the second billion. The three billion milestone will be passed in July 2007, just two years on. By the end of the year, the global mobile base will exceed 3.25bn connections, or over half the world’s population. With handsets and services becoming ever more affordable, the prospect of a fully connected mobile world is becoming ever more real.”
A recent study by Ovum is suggesting that 300 million people across Africa, Asia and Europe could be getting in on wireless broadband by 2012 with some investment in the 900 MHz and 2100 MHz bands. The main pull would be cost effectiveness, but consistent international standards could slow down progress.
“National governments need to coordinate their spectrum policies to enable the widespread rollout of HSPA in the 900MHz band,” said Tom Phillips, Chief Government and Regulatory Affairs Officer of the GSMA. “Such coordination would make HSPA at 900MHz a cost-effective way to provide valuable broadband services to the many people untouched by the high-speed Internet revolution that has swept through the developed world.”
900 MHz is a pretty high-traffic right now, so some heavy restructuring would be necessary in order to make 3G work without interfering with existing GSM signals.
