By Staff Writer
South Africa’s Vox is calling all wireless internet service providers (WISPS) in towns where broadband coverage is limited, or where ADSL is old, over-subscribed and unlikely to be extended, to partner with the integrated ICT and connectivity provider, to drive enhanced connectivity experiences for their customers.
Leveraging its investment in its national long-distance fibre project, which was launched in October 2016, Vox is deploying wireless links via a high capacity backhaul that it anticipates will assist WISPS to convert what were previously best effort basic services to a more inclusive, far-reaching broadband connectivity experience for businesses and residents.
“By improving the backhaul, we will enable local peering and caching; high speed access and drive future investment in the network. We see partnership as the best way to drive a better connectivity experience for businesses and residents outside of major metropolitan centres,” says Jacques du Toit, CEO at Vox.
The company is of the view that the role of the WISP is rapidly changing – moving away from being merely the go-between for businesses (or residents) and connectivity, to being more consultative, delivering customer services management and advisory capabilities.
Vox has prioritised smaller towns along the eastbound N4 route between Johannesburg and Durban and all the towns along the NLD will be considered as drop off points, but we will initially focus our efforts on the larger towns.
“Inclusive, high speed connectivity is becoming an imperative for businesses throughout the country, and we anticipate that this investment will yield greater opportunities for growth and adoption of cloud services beyond the major metros,” says du Toit.
