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If you want to get rich, move to Africa. This could be the slogan of an imminent revolution of the forgotten continent. Internet’s explosion, social media and e-commerce that so many new millionaires have created in the West hasn’t but only been the seedbed compared to what’s about to go down in Africa. A giant world full of possibilities opens up for digital entrepreneurs.
Everything is already set: the submarine cable that connects the continent with the rest of the world, the optical fiber on all the east coast and an entire generation of young adults holding back their desire to burst in the web. You’re the only one missing.
Revolution Dates
Just some eye opening numbers. In the year 2000, internet users from the Democratic Republic of Congo formed a small community a little bit bigger than Bielsa (a small unpopulated town from the province of Huesca in Spain). They had to be careful when publishing personal data or criticizing a business online. The alias they used was pretty much worthless if they pretended on hiding their true identity. The 500 advanced web surfers from the Congolese cyberspace were well located. In 2012 the picture is very different: 915.400 users surf the bits of the mid-African country.
The percentage growth of users is so impressive that its rate is almost unintelligible: a whopping 183.080%. With everything added, this number doesn’t represent more than 1,2% of its population (73.599.190). This pattern repeats itself from north to south and from east to west in this enormous continent. In total, Africa already has 167.355.676 users online and an infiltration of 15,6% according to data handled by Éxito Exportador, but the growth expectations, as you can deduce from the calculations, are overwhelming.
So much so that the British prime minister, David Cameron, sent a delegation of advisers to Nigeria and South Africa on a recon mission, according to revista Wired.
How did all this affect e-commerce?
According to a survey done by MasterCard Worldwide in 2011, 51% of the web surfers in South Africa use the internet for online shopping. Another example: in Kenia, according to studies done by the TNS Research International and the Kenia ICT Board, between 18% and 24% of the web surfers go online to buy music, movies and e-books. And Nigeria, the most populated country of the continent has, according to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) has an internet penetration of 28%.
Connections are slow and internet access is expensive
But e-commerce has arrived to Africa almost before the internet has. There’s no need for a laptop, and let’s not forget to mention a smart phone, for online shopping. The startup American company SlimTrader launched their MoBiashara service, that allows you to purchase from a second generation mobile phone (as in, those two or three generations back).
Challenges and Threats
Shagaya Sim is an entrepeneur, worthy representation of a striving generation of youthful ciber revolutionaries – and founder of DealDey, an online group shopping site like Groupon, that runs from Lagos, Nigeria. Slim already plans to expand to Abuja: in his first 7 months on the market (he launched the platform in March of 2011) he was able to sign – up more than 50.000 members and has a daily increment of 1.000 users.
His strategy: in third world countries, a strong physical infrastructure is necessary to support electronic business. He tells CNN México:
If you begin an online business in Nigeria it’s not about a web browser. You have to be capable of having a physical presence to the client’s eyes to make them keep thinking that you’re real and that you’re here for the long run.
The lack of a convenient payment service is one of the barriers for a safe business
It’s one of the many challenges imposed by electronic commerce in the new culture that is digital material. Connections are slow and internet access is expensive. But not even those who manage to get online have it all figured out. The lack of a convenient payment service is one of the barriers for a safe business (the insertion of debit cards and credit cards is still too low). Besides, users are still hesitant to give their personal information through the web, because it has gained a bad reputation thanks to some online fraud. According to CyberSource data, in 2008 “76% of American and Canadian businesses stopped accepting online orders from Nigeria and 58% of that commerce froze in Ghana, due to the high levels of fraud”.
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The telecommunications companies have extended already more than 248.000 kilometers of submarine cables around Africa. TeleGeography.
With everything said and done, more than 248.676 kilometers of submarine telecommunications cables communicate the different regions of Africa and the continent to the rest of the world, according to facts that Telegeography has to offer on their website, a company that specializes on studying the telecommunications market. The door is open.
What web services or e-commerce stores would you take of advantage of in Africa? Would you move in search of an entrepreneurial adventure?