Africa-Press – Eswatini. The Eswatini Communications Commission (ESCCOM) has granted Elon Musk’s Starlink a licence to operate in the country.
ESCOOM has granted Starlink a general licence for electronic communications services (internet services provider and will operate as Starlink Eswatini (PTY) LTD.
The licence is valid for five years as of July 26. ESCCOM Chief Executive Officer, Mvilawemphi Dlamini, said the decision was in light of the foregoing and acting under the provisions of Regulation 10 of the Electronic Communications (Licencing) Regulations, 2016.
This comes after the commission invited interested parties, licensees, stakeholders and the general public to make comments on the application by Starlink, which comments were received.
According to Dlamini, they evaluated the application, taking into consideration the impact on the market, the comments received and determined that the applicant met the requirements for the grant of such licence for different reasons.
One of the reasons was that the service to be availed shall provide fast and reliable internet access to the general public and business, even in locations that are difficult to reach by traditional land-based networks.
Giving another reason, Dlamini said the services to be rolled out by Starlink would stimulate competition in the market and in turn reduce the cost of communication in the country.
“The technology to be deployed guarantees around-the-clock service availability and the introduction and adoption of cutting-edge technology and innovation in the country will contribute to social and economic growth,” Dlamini stated.
He further explained that as part of the application, the applicant provided an outline of how the services would be rendered.
“The applicant submitted that its network infrastructure layout consisted of a low-Earth orbit small satellite constellation to provide low bitrate internet and internet of things services and enable machine to machine devices anywhere on earth utilising a store and forward design,” explained the executive officer.
Dlamini further stated that the system used small satellites that transmit over the very high frequency (VHF) frequency band in ITU defined mobile satellite service spectrum.
Eswatini becomes the sixth African country to grant a licence to Starlink, the satellite broadband service launched by California-based SpaceX, the spacecraft company founded by Elon Musk.
The country joins Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Mozambique, Rwanda, and Mauritius as African nations connected to Starlink.
Granting the giant licence to operate in the country would put Eswatini on the map in the digital sector as the Starlink is known to be the world’s largest ISP.
Eswatini now has 22 internet service providers currently registered with ESCCOM.
Starlink has already sent around 2 000 satellites into orbit and aims to have as many as 42 000 offering strong coverage globally (at present, Starlink’s fastest connections are restricted to certain latitudes).
The LEO satellites move across the sky during their orbit (unlike many traditional communication satellites, which orbit at a fixed-point above the Earth).
A satellite might cross a sparsely-populated area of Africa, then fly over a higher-income region where more customers are available.
Whereas it is often uneconomical to lay cables or build telecom towers in remote parts of Africa, satellite internet providers are able to cover these areas at no extra cost after serving their main customer base.
In fact, companies that build larger constellations would ultimately be able to offer faster connections and incentivise subscribers to sign up.
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