Can ‘SuperTowers’ bring Mobile Broadband to Rural Africa?

Worldwide, Over 4 billion people lack reliable Internet service and about 1.6 billion lack mobile voice services. Africa is especially at a disadvantage. Recently, a study by cable.co.uk was carried out to find the internet speeds of countries as required “to take part in a truly digital society”. The testing benchmark was 10Mbs. Out of the 190 countries, 140 did not meet this target and out of the bottom 10, 6 are African countries

Source

One company has developed a solution. It has developed a tethered aerial platform that can be used for a range of applications in energy, telecom, and agriculture. The name of the Company is Altaeros. A typical Altaeros Super Tower provides telephone coverage equivalent to 30 conventional cell towers and saves significant cost of energy. The Super Tower is launched automatically from a rotating ground station. Three support tethers keep it aloft, one of which delivers its operational power and data. A computer program gathers real-time weather forecasts and information from sensors on the aerostat to make decisions about how to operate the system, at which altitude to fly, in which direction to point, and when to land.

Source
Some of the features of this tech include:
• It provides mobile voice and high speed data service to rural or remote areas for up to 65% less than than conventional cell towers
• Deployment consequently reduces site acquisition and approval delays
• infrastructure costs are brought to a minimum
• Dramatic reduction of energy costs by up to 50%
• Reduction of operations and general maintenance overhead

With only a handful of these towers a country can cover most of its rural areas successfully.
Thanks for reading