Digital Solutions for a Better
African Living Experience

Who is the “smart citizen”, the intelligent citizen? Is he or she the one who lives in a smart city? Yes, in some respect — and we are happy to be involved in some of these new connected urban projects in Africa.

However, we primarily regard the “smart citizen” as the man or woman who has the means to transform his or her daily life thanks to new technologies in a smart environment. Supporting a new generation of connected and creative Africans: this is what we do when we offer them basic digital skills but also application solutions that meet their expectations:

• optimized mobility
• distance education
• telemedicine

Africa Digital Solutions has a specific focus on improving administrative governance in Africa.

From a citizen perspective: it is about having an easy, secured and affordable access to public services.

From a government perspective:

• better authenticating citizens for an optimal management of public personnel (recruitment, payroll, skills and careers)
• facilitating communication and information-sharing between administrations
• collecting useful data for better management of public policies
• having revenue assurance for all sums collected as part of administrative procedures

Let's move towards a new generation of infrastructure — the smart infrastructure! In practice, it is now possible to combine sensors and monitoring tools within telecommunications infrastructures.

These sensors enable real-time data collection and analysis, to support infrastructure providers in their decision-making process as well as in maintaining and optimising equipment. While Africa Digital Solutions primarily focuses on intelligent telecommunications infrastructures, the long-term objective is to develop smart infrastructures in other industries — transport, access to energy and water.

What are the benefits resulting from such an approach?

• continuous improvement of the infrastructures
• real-time management aligned with the needs of end-users
• optimised maintenance activities, and therefore their cost
• better operational efficiency and overall performance

Offering a better African living experience: this is the rationale behind the creation of Africa Digital Solutions. Our practical objective is to address the increasing needs across the continent in the telecommunications industry and new technologies.

New technologies are a way for Africa not only to catch up economically speaking, but also to become a leading continent in the digital innovation sector.

African creativity in ICTs is well established: some strategic applications, especially Fintech, are African and are now being exported; major innovations in data aggregation are now being tested to support emergence plans; and new technologies are revolutionizing some traditional sectors, such as finance, trade, health and education.

Africa Digital Solutions brings in a new offer to design and supervise integrated projects — from connectivity infrastructure to application solutions.

We can work across the entire value chain from strategy design to implementation — or only on specific aspects of a project, for example when it comes to setting up connectivity infrastructures or designing and operationalising smart government systems. In other words, our fully integrated approach is what makes us different.

Public authorities or companies that call on us in Africa are looking for “turnkey” solutions enabling them to leverage new technologies for their development — which often requires more than connectivity, but also public service centres, distance learning systems, or the development of telemedicine.

An integrated approach is also a guarantee of greater quality: that is our conviction. The infrastructure is sized according to needs, for an even greater impact and quality of both the connectivity network and associated services.

We want to actively contribute to restructuring the African economy through strategic growth pillars, leveraging new approaches to industrialisation as well as the best technologies to date.

We are convinced of Africa's potential. Indeed, if the African continent is capable of rapidly appropriating foreign innovations, it is also a unique laboratory where new digital activities, new expertise and skills can be created.

We want to support this movement and eventually export African technical know-how throughout the world.

Under the aegis of the Smart Africa Alliance, Africa Digital Solutions has partnered with Tata Communications Transformation Services to launch a major project out of the Republic of Guinea. This digital interconnectivity pool will bring together a total of seven African countries of all sizes, starting with the Republic of Guinea, Mali and Sierra Leone.

The proposed architecture and approach are directly inspired by the Report on Interconnectivity in Africa presented at the Mobile World Congress 2019. The proposed solutions (traditional optical fibre, aerial fibre optic cables, and open space fibre optic cable systems) were chosen according to three criteria: speed of deployment, compatibility with the needs of rural areas and the cost-benefit ratio.

One year later, in February 2020, work was completed on the first fibre-optic interconnection of the networks linking the Republic of Guinea to the Republic of Mali. Strategic projects — rural connectivity, e-health, tech clusters — can now be implemented, based on a reliable, high-speed internet connection.