AfriConnect’s 4G service is a low cost service for mass market which is aimed at giving more Zambians access to a resilient, high speed internet connection.
This fourth generation WiMAX network is the very latest technology, designed to bring high-speed reliable internet connectivity to clients at a new low price.
The launch of the 4G service marks another milestone, in the company’s vision to increase its presence on the Zambian market and provide the best and fastest internet connectivity.
AfriConnect Managing Director Mark Bennett announced the launch of the 4G service at a launch officiated by Minister of Communications, Transport, Works and Supply, Yamfwa Mukanga in Lusaka today.
Speaking at the launch of the service, the Communications Minister commended AfriConnect for providing cost effective internet service to the people of Zambia.
He said the Ministry of Communications was happy with the effort that AfriConnect had put into its expansion programme, adding that the provision of quality access to the internet was critical to Zambia’s social and economic growth.
“We believe as government that provision of quality internet service to the Zambian people will play a cardinal role in our effort as government to bring development to all parts of the country.”
The Minister said the AfriConnect’s 4G service will offer the best and fastest connectivity to the internet for Zambians.
And Mr. Bennett said “The new service, marketed under the iConnect brand, is designed to allow thousands more Zambians to have affordable internet access, getting connected to the internet for the first time and allowing them to ‘take their place’ in the new connected world.”
He said with rapidly increasing amounts of international internet connectivity coming into the country via fibre optic cables, new ways have to be found of getting that link to users at high speeds and at affordable prices.
Since the acquisition of AfriConnect by Vodacom Business Africa, the company has undertaken major expansion of its operations through upgrading of its network, increasing resilience and capacity and reaching new towns and locations countrywide
Meanwhile, Vodacom representative Geoff Hardwick said Zambia has become the best performing operation under the Vodacom group.
Mr. Geoff pledged that the Vodacom group will continue to invest in people with further Investments of millions into the network, infrastructure and operational support.
He said “the launch of the 4G service in Zambia will change the internet service provision landscape in Zambia as the new 4G service is a real economic driver and will make all businesses more efficient and bring down the cost of doing business.
good news! am tired of using the air fail internet which is expensive and unreliable
that’s great, i wish ZAMTEL cud emulate that,
Isn’t 4G LTE based and not WiMax?!!!!!
I’m a tad jealous :) Proud to know that as I type there is a 3G symbol on my phone which Zed has just rendered obsolete! Great news Zed! Many little steps will move us forward.
good news!! fellow bloggers, will anyone please tell me how much internet costs in terms of Zambian kwacha.thanks
The more companies offering these services the better. airtels service varies too much and their back up if anything goes wrong is just awful.
Chisokone, chisokone, chisokone. One Zambia! One Zambia!!!
Well all this is rubbish!. They amy work on the access end of the network but the pipe out to the internet remains either satelite or the our own ineffeciencty fibre. All these is marketing language for f*****
The fact that we have fibre optics is good enough itself.
Vodacom does not have a mobile operating license in Zambia. Does this mean Vodacom business the parent company of Iconnect has one? If not then I am confused as to how the 4g network operates as I thought it was based on mobile technology. Some please enlighten me.
@MARY
Here on the copperbelt and Chingola in particular its K5000 per 15 minutes
@wapya baisa thanx so much.that makes it very expensive.Here in Russia i pay something like US $12 or 63600 kwacha every month.now i understand why most of my friends who went to Zambia don’t appear anymore on facebook.
Did anyone bother to ask how much this costs?
These hypes are rather self humiliating because 4G Wimax suffers many challenges in terms of speed and coverage without mentioning its shortcoming. It is inferior to Long Term Evolution which we expected. This is why the US, China, Singapore, Japan and the Netherlands including many EU countries are rapidly migrating or upgrading into 4G LTE. Can’t Zambians see LTE networks than seeing this hype of substandard Wimax many developing nations in information evolution are moving away from?
As exposed Zambians we challenge Africonnect to detail the upload and download speed their Wimax will deliver then compare to the Long Term Evolution. This culture of always dumping on Zambia old technologies being discarded in the developed world must be stopped.
The real reason why “Vodacom representative Geoff Hardwick said Zambia has become the best performing operation under the Vodacom group” is because these operators are fleecing Zambians with a poor service. iConnect should own up that their services are only available in the middle of Lusaka City and not the outskirts (Makeni, Lusaka West, Chalala, Lusaka East etc). Rip offs!!!!
Lack of Quality
The Wimax network has lack of quality service because there are hundreds of people trying to get access at the same tower so due to heavy traffic it is very hard to maintain high quality.
Wimax range
The other disadvantage of Wimax network is range. As Wimax offer 70Mbps in range with moving station but in practice it is quite different because it is possible only in specify or ideal circumstances. If a user staying away from the specified environment then speed can drop considerably.
Wimax Bandwidth
Like other network Bandwidth is collective amongst clients in a specified zone. But if there are a lot of users in one area the speed decreases which may be 2 to 10 Mbps of shared bandwidth.
Expensive network
The most disadvantage of Wimax is its installation and operational cost. Due to heavy structure, tower, antennas etc makes the Wimax network collectively high cost network.
Bad Weather
The quality of services decreases in rainy season because the weather condition could interrupt the signal which may cause of bad signal and broadcasting may be stop or interrupted.
Wireless equipments
If you are trying to use much wireless equipment at a time within Wimax network then these equipments may cause of interference and could interfere your broadcasting data or face some compromised speed.
WiMax Technology is facing many hurdles in market. Its about time we started opening up our market to state o the art technology. Wimax is a decadent technology with too many shortcomings which Africonnect with traditional challenges may just become worse for the money they get from our people.
This comment, along with those of ‘nSATA nYOKO’ and similar above show why the devlopmental challenge is an uphill battel in Zambia.
Too many poorly-educated and ill-informed cut cut-and-paste theorists holding themselves up as experts dominating the discourse, despite offering no real PRACTICAL solutions or an understanding of how to arrive at them.
Indeed, there are alternatives, but how do they stand up to the African reality, and our own means? How about you lay a fiber network yourselves?
Better, and more simply, yet: How about you read the freely-available RFC and related documents on the 802.16e standard yourselves and argue from a position of knowledge rather than revel in your ignorance like a pig in its muck?
why is internet access still an issue in Zambia?
Let it be that way, as guys we might watch porn on the net; so the slower access to the net reaches Zambia the better. That way we can pray, get technocrats and put Server blockers up in the next five years. Yes am Christian and telling you the truth from my heart. Repent and pray on family :).
Very Good News!
With just about 6.4% Internet penetration in Zambia of the economically active population, we need more users to be connected. On an even much brighter side, the cellphone has become the most deeply penetrated medium in Zambian household with WAP (Mobile Internet) usage on a constant and steady rise!
Miss Daisy lady beautiful mulipo Kansi. My other Girl Impali Olympia Extension Chick, Ali Mbanda! anagena sanga lol.
Zamtel were are you?
Too many poorly-educated and ill-informed cut-and-paste theorists holding themselves up as experts are dominating this discourse, despite offering no real PRACTICAL solutions or an understanding of how to arrive at them.
Indeed, there are alternatives, but how do they stand up to the African reality, and our own means? How about you lay a fiber network yourselves?
Better, and more simply, yet: How about you read the freely-available RFC and related documents on the 802.16e standard yourselves and argue from a position of knowledge rather than revel in your ignorance like a pig in its muck
Too much marketing froth in the poorly written article…..for starters WiMAX, the Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access, is a telecommunications technology aimed at providing wireless data over long distances in a variety of ways, from point-to-point links to full mobile cellular type access.WiMAX is a wireless alternative to Cable and DSL and Modem manufacturers like Seimens have brought to the market modems capable of achieving broadband speeds of 70Mbp across multiple devices.
Subscription and tariffs fees are lower when compared to Cable or DSL but initial equipment purchase and operational costs are very very costly. As for security It’s only a matter of time before someone starts sniffing out WiMAX networks and breaking their encryption.
Iconnnect? pwahahahahaha the only think these jokers are good at is painting cars and marketing. Their service is so bad its amazing. Even Airfail is better.
Isn’t Wimax one of the most expensive forms of internet? :-?
@ Chembe now you have annouced your challenge to us, now call them and challenge them fam.
#8 bb you are correct Vodacom does not have a mobile license and the ownership of the vodacom internet is Mauritius while the ownership of vodacom mobile is Kavindele. Before the MMD left power the mentioned that they were accepting vodacom Mauritius in as long as it had no connection to the existing one in Zambia of which they didn’t have (Apart from them having a franchise of Vodacom SA). You can check it in LT archives if not then it was the Post, i remember reading it.
@ 8 bb
has posted something very interesting that needs to be investigated.
The problem with our politicians in power is that they are very quick to take these photo opps. when they see anything shiny without considering the cost on the consumer.Mark Bennett doesn’t state how much his company has invested & who is going to foot the bill since these are new installations….these costs will be passed to you the consumer.
The gov’t should stick to fiber optic & be in the forefront in laying fibre optic cables then sub contract distribution to the private sector, with an objective of creating “super connected” cites. This is only way we can truly benefit from cheap broadband tariffs.The economic benefits are huge and are wide ranging ie. businesses are able to reach out to new markets cheaply in innovative mediums & potential for job creation is limitless.
lies why don’t they post there actually speeds , the parent company hasn’t even setup 4g /lt connections in there main country of south africa
@chembe…true what you have stated…4G wimax is an obsolete service. Even here in south africa we have discontinued the offering of product and services based on this standard (@jay jay – wimax is a standard not a technology). Real 4G is based on LTE..most CSPs the world over are still perfomring trials on this with the exception of one or two(KPN in Holland and nippon in Japan) if am not mistaken that already have 4G services & products..even Verizon wireless in the US claims of 4G are essentially HSPA+ which effectively is 3.5G in this evolution path.
Don’t worry. LTE is on its way guys. You’ll hear about it very soon.
@ Moono
Thank you very much for that correction…apparently in the U.S. Sprint Network had deployed Mobile WiMAX networks since 2008 & MetroPCS was the first operator to offer LTE service in 2010. Some of these 4G cellular mobile communications standards are not yet available smartphones for the European Market.(Stand to be corrected) South Korea is the only nation I’ve come across that can truly boast of a 4G Network, they claim its fastest in the world, SK Telecom rolled out Korea’s first LTE service in July 2011.
Here is another reason why I’m truly against PF administration for trivialising the Communication Department by merging it instead of creating a full stand alone ministry with a P.S from with a telecomms background. What the gov’t claims to save in wages for ministers is peanuts compared to what the ministry can create if its fully focused. This is 2012 we need it… why can’t we attract the best firms in the country from South Korea, States or Europe instead of these guys in the article who are clearly not being generous with the truth.
Mr Jay Jay a lot of people read these things and just try not to show ignorance. You re lucky no can see you face and real name. What are we as Zambians doing to improve communication? Should it always be a foreign firm South Corea? Only 3% of bloggers on this topic understand what they are talking about. Most and talking from without googling, copying and pasting. Technologies deployed to an area depends on a number of reasons. Capital, Market, weather conditions, already existing infrastructure, Vegetation etc. If you do not believe me try go deploy LTE in Shyangombo. I cannot go fishing in the desert. That why people think having tall buildings is development. Try comparing Findeco and Manda Hill today.
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