Real lessons learned to connect the unconnected at scale
The future of connectivity has arrived. Now, we must make it evenly distributed, says Previsions CEO and analytics expert Henrik P?lsson .
Every night, I fall asleep with my Philippine village's internet lab server humming away on the floor below me.?
It is a reality two decades in the making, with eye-opening experiences I believe can guide the broader telecom industry’s historically elusive efforts to achieve a major stated goal: connect the unconnected.?
In my work not just serving but becoming part of the community I’ve helped connect, I’ve learned that technology isn’t the answer. Affordability isn’t even the most important factor. Rather, understanding what a community needs and serving it as a whole versus attempting to cater to the individual could be key to finally unlocking ubiquitous connectivity for all.?
In this article, I share my experiences standing up $2 per month unlimited internet and how we came to the realization that loyalty paid internet is a better and more profitable model.?
I also offer my takeaways for the global telecom community, including the principals we are following that could be implemented at scale to make substantial progress in bringing more communities like mine rapidly into the connected world.?
As we collectively begin to eye 6G architectures and priorities, now is the time to have this conversation and make important decisions.?
My long journey from the African desert to delivering critical connectivity to a rural community
Two significant books that capture pivotal moments in telecom’s history are:
Mobile technology has undoubtedly brought a profound transformation.
Five generations of telecom advancements have revolutionized the world, taking people on a remarkable journey to the third place Kruse describes. This progress is now driven by spectral division as we currently separate channels by frequency (FDD) versus time (TDMA), representing yet another “switch in time.”?
Predicting lower-order impacts is straight forward. It’s the higher-order impacts, which are more profound, that remain elusive. A prime example is our belief in an information society, which evolved into something far greater than mere information management.?
As Ericsson’s ConsumerLab founder, I have had a lifetime opportunity to work and interact with many great telecom futurists around the world, including visionaries like Muerling and Kruse. I have also been in the same Xerox labs that inspired Steve Jobs and had the privilege of early close encounters with the internet in Silicon Valley and Seattle. Although Bill Gates was not the first to realize the power of the internet, he eventually understood its significance. His 1995 internal memo accurately stated: "The Internet is a tidal wave. It changes the rules. It is an incredible opportunity as well as [an] incredible challenge.”?
These perspectives have inspired me on my 20-year adventure of extensive close encounters with marginalized communities. The foundation for this article began in an African dessert, on a quest for water under a four-wheel drive pickup, wearing an initially white shirt with my back on the equator, changing a drive belt.
Back then, I had no idea that this marked the start of a journey that would lead us to where we are today—providing critical connectivity to an entire community.?
Everything changed on March 14, 2020. Until that point, I had a life as a thought leader conducting advanced predictive market analytics to advise others about the future.?
At the time, my hometown was Manila. Its bustling physical and online casinos attracted large numbers of mainland Chinese, with approximately 600,000 casino-related Chinese residing in the city.?
Unsurprisingly, COVID-19 reached Manila early. In the week leading up to March 14, we realized the city would shut down. We decided it was better to be in the province during the pandemic. Thanks to quick thinking and good information, we managed to fly out just hours before the city closed.?
On a remote tropical island with no plan—or connectivity
We found ourselves on a remote tropical island with no clear plans. Sitting still was never an option. We brought the experience of seeing how industry and early adopters had driven the world into a state of extreme instant gratification. It was ultimately evident that this was a shift with limited lasting benefits for marginalized communities.?
While life in rural areas had somewhat improved, it still lagged in connectivity, which we know is just about as essential as clean water. The telecom industry’s focus on urban markets had resulted in a missed opportunity to fully harness the potential for national GDP growth. Trends in data consumption and telecom revenues indicated that 5G would not meet anticipated market realities or expected use cases and mobility patterns.?
We also noticed the first signals of direct satellite-to-smartphone technology emerging. This highlighted a huge opportunity for lasting connectivity benefits in rural areas and the need for new telecom business models.?
We aimed to serve the market of marginalized people and micro businesses, which had the time, motive and need to become more digital. Our goal was to create a commercial foundation for fair and empowering connectivity opportunities, ensuring lasting community benefits balanced individual instant gratifications.??
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The next seven Robinson Crusoe months were a mix of interesting, innovative and sometimes frustrating experiences.?
We introduced the M-Sari village market concept—essentially a physical representation of an Amazon-style digital flywheel business platform that cuts out middlemen to increase efficiency and improve customer experiences. It seamlessly blends the digital and physical worlds, contributing to a vibrant and healthy local village economy. (In the Philippines, a “sari-sari store” refers to a small neighborhood convenience store. “M” in our M-Sari village market concept has multiple connotations, with “meeting” being a dominant one.)??
To prepare for proofs-of-concept, we expanded our new home plans to include a 300-square-meter M-Sari prototype space on the ground floor for market experiments. Adding this floor also gave us even better sea views from our private terraces on the top floors. Today, we essentially live above our rural community internet lab, dedicated to creating lasting community benefits.?
Initially, we aimed to provide unlimited internet at $2 per month, but soon learned that loyalty paid internet was both possible and a better, more profitable model. Our extensive experience and existing predictive machine learning algorithms gave us confidence in the analytics side. However, we were less certain about other technologies, which we have now prototyped and feel ready to scale. The biggest challenge has been to gain insights in how to change, guide and motivate human behavior at both individual and community levels to empower, vitalize and enrich grassroots life.?
This has been our focus and area of proof-of-concept learnings. So far, every step has exceeded our expectations. We are now preparing for a fourth, larger and more digitally advanced phase of proof-of-concepts.?
Our focus today is on a digital flywheel business support system to be franchised to local or regional micro MVNOs with a strong physical presence in communities. This approach invites connectivity partners, particularly those interested in enhancing Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) into Community Wireless Access (CWA).?
The dual nature of changes in the mobile industry presents, as Gates framed it, with the tidal wave internet, both threats and opportunities. The commoditization of connectivity and the introduction of direct-to-mobile satellites may initially be perceived as threats by the industry. However, they also offer a significant opportunity for the evolution of fixed wireless into Community Wireless Access (CWA). This transition presents a compelling chance for growth and to extend connectivity to an underserved half of the global population, thus unlocking substantial growth potential in the connectivity market and driving national GDPs.?
Rather than focusing solely on individual households, Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) has the potential to serve as a cornerstone for remote village community hotspots. By integrating FWA with a novel Community Flywheel Business Support System (F-BSS), which fosters community empowerment, vitality and enlightenment through loyalty bonding, this service can be offered as a service enabling a community micro mobile virtual network operator.?
Following are key aspects that we recognize should be present to successfully serve communities.
Features:
Infrastructure Design:
Community Benefits:
The above FWA opportunity is being addressed through our ongoing CWA proof-of-concept, which is part of a market innovation test being conducted in the Philippines within a simplified connectivity environment.?
The project aims to explore promising CWA use cases within the context of a mobile network setting. It is being executed by British Previsions Software, a dynamic startup specializing in mission-critical software and predictive machine learning consumer analytics in cooperation with Philippine Lux Solana, a green power and potable water provider. The pioneering aspect of this project lies in the development of a community loyalty Flywheel-BSS. Leveraging strong relationships with MNOs, our goal is to flywheel enhance fluidity, loyalty and growth in micro-economies, while significantly improving connectivity volumes and MNO return on investment. The innovative open-source flywheel M-Sari platform being developed can seamlessly integrate with legacy mobile systems through APIs.?
One approach, which shines a light on a range of new opportunities?
By embracing community-centric FWA solutions and integrating them with an innovative Micro F-BSS, mobile service providers can expand market reach and profits while driving positive social impact, economic development in remote villages and National GDP growth.?
This is just one innovative approach that not only bridges the digital divide but strengthens the social fabric of rural communities, ushering in a new era of connectivity and collaboration.?
The ongoing proof-of-concept presents a strategic opportunity for interested parties to add further value. The timing to explore new Community Wireless Access revenues in MNO and MVNO environments couldn't be more opportune.
Looking ahead, we recognize opportunities for 5G and 6G from a classic spectrum and mmWave perspective. Classic spectrum for FWA will connect the remote village M-Sari to the world and mmWave will serve local opportunities within the village market space.?
This is merely one proven approach that we have pioneered while demonstrating potential for global applicability.
Mention me, Henrik P?lsson in the comments to share your perspective and let’s discuss additional strategies for connecting the unconnected, once and for all.
M-Sari is up running with very happy customers, a great service and solid financials. https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/henrik-p%C3%A5lsson-278659_internet-mvno-connectivity-activity-7239806103486676993-3iQw?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_ios
Can you please describe what the "loyalty paid internet" mentioned in the article is ? Isn't the "Community Wireless Access" concept essentially similar to providing internet to a single family through a Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) or a home router? In this scenario, the community acts as a single subscriber to the operator who owns the spectrum rights, and the owner of the CWA would function as another MVNO or middleman.
To live as a startup entrepreneur 24/7 in close encounter with your market reality has indeed been an interesting and very valuable deep learning experience! It was not my idea initially, but I’m very thankful we took this approach.