TIER has developed.
In addition to making sure semi-literate people earning around $100 a month who have little prior contact with tech can afford and use what TIER built, the researchers have to be attuned to challenges around deployment and operation. They make sure that hydro, solar, generator or grid power can be used to power their solutions, which lets villagers use whatever is available to them.
TIER’s work on healthcare, wireless connectivity and cellular access has already spawned three startups — Endaga, Tarana Wireless and Captricity. The group is currently still working on cellular access and is also working on rural electrification and analytics for the developing world.
More than a billion people do not have access to cellular networks, three billion people live without phones and five billion people do without Internet access.
To create a cell network with the power to bring phone networks to the unconnected billions, the Endaga team re-designed the base station, the link in a telecom network that connects phones with the broader network. Base stations usually cost around $250,000 and require extensive support, but Endaga has developed an alternative, the CCN1, which costs $6,000. Instead of needing to build a cell tower, bring in a generator and set-up a complex to support and protect a station, local entrepreneurs who purchase the CCN1 are able to mount it high on a roof or a tree and use whatever power is available to get the network up and running.
Range Networks is also working on the challenge of creating cellular networks in underdeveloped areas. Range has developed OpenBTS, software that replaces the traditional base station network and brings it online through Wi-Fi, VSAT or BGAN, different types of Internet networks. By unbundling the software needed to create and operate a cellular network from the expensive hardware needed for a traditional cell network, and by relying on Internet protocols to support the network, Range offers a low-cost alternative to create cell networks in villages and rural areas.
While U.S.-based startups are working on infratech for the developing world, Nairobi’s startup scene has had recent success with homegrown solutions. BRCK, a connectivity device built to work with spotty electricity in Africa’s harsh environment, and Kili, a cloud infrastructure startup that is working to improve cloud hosting in Africa, were developed within Kenya and are gaining traction across East Africa. By building in the developing world, these startups are acutely aware of the needs and restrictions of their users, which forces them to stay simple, direct and affordable.
While these startups are building for the developing world, the technology they create can be brought to the developed world as everyone could use a better designed, cheaper solution to getting online or placing a phone call. Captricity, a startup spun out from TIER, initially focused on helping doctors in Uganda accurately and quickly collect data on patient health.
After having success with AIDS clinics in East Africa and continuing to improve its core technology, Captricity’s founders recognized that, while they had been focused on improving paper processes and data collection in the developing world, their tools also solved problems in the U.S. Now, New York Life, Humana and the FDA use Captricity’s data-capture platform to analyze paper documents, the kind of transition these infratech companies could eventually make.
Almost every person should have reliable and affordable access to phone and Internet networks within the next decade.
While startups like Endaga, Range, EveryLayer, BRCK and Tarana are focused on the link between people and Internet and phone connections at the local level, Facebook, Google, SpaceX and OneWeb are pursuing projects to redefine how Internet service providers operate. These corporations are developing alternatives to traditional ground-based networks that struggle with hilly terrain, low-density populations and limited infrastructure. Facebook’s Aquila program of solar-powered drones should