News
Seven Questions: Wiring the World’s Poor 
Foreign Policy, March 9, 2007
As head of the United Nations’ Global Alliance for Information and Communication Technologies and Development, Intel’s Barrett has been at the center of efforts to bring the Internet to the developing world.
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UN warning to Silicon Valley over digital rift
By Richard Waters, Financial Times, March 2, 2007
Silicon Valley has been slow to develop technology and business approaches specifically suited to customers in the emerging world, according to representatives at a UN-sponsored gathering in the US technology heartland this week.
As a result, it risks missing out on one of the next big potential markets for its products, while also leaving a widening “digital divide” that is seeing the growing ranks of broadband users in the developed world leap even further ahead.
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Ignore Cheaper Phones At Your Peril, Says Motorola
Information Week, February 14, 2007
Consumers in emerging markets may be buying cheap phones with low margins at the moment, but a Motorola executive said Tuesday that phone makers who ignored those markets would miss out on major global trends.
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It’s super-phone! 
By TN Ninan, Financial Times, January 23, 2007
It is simplistic, and often delusional, to seek quick technological fixes for complex social, economic and organisational challenges.
Still, the prospects held out for making life easier for millions because of the rapid spread of mobile phones (150m, at last count) are exciting - especially when you compare that figure with some other numbers. India’s largest bank has about 10,000 branches. The post office network has over 100,000 offices. And the country has some 15m people who own and use credit cards. In short, there is no network of any kind that can count up to 150m, or anything remotely approaching that number.
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One of Four Handsets Shipped in 2011 Will Cost Less Than $20, Says ABI Research
ABI Research, January 22, 2007
LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The global market for sub-$20 ultra low cost handsets (UCLH) will be over 330 million units in 2011. A new study from ABI Research finds that over 50% of these handsets will be shipped in the emerging markets of Asia Pacific and the remainder in markets of Africa, Middle East, Latin America, and Eastern Europe.
According to research analyst Shailendra Pandey, “The growing demand for ultra low cost handsets has provided mobile operators and handset vendors with a quick route to a greater share of the emerging markets. The downside is that they are manufacturing and shipping a greater proportion of low-cost handsets, which can adversely affect their profits.”
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$100 laptop could sell to public
By Darren Waters , BBC News, January 10, 2007
The backers of the One Laptop Per Child project are looking at the possibility of selling the machine to the public. One idea would be for customers to have to buy two laptops at once - with the second going to the developing world.
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India's Huge Market for Cheap Phones
By Nandini Lakshman, Business Week, January 8, 2007
It's one of the world's hottest mobile phone markets, but Nokia, Motorola, and Samsung must deliver cool handsets at very thin profit margins.
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From Matatu to the Masai via mobile
By Paul Mason , BBC News, January 8, 2007
Newsnight correspondent Paul Mason travels through Kenya using a map of the country's mobile phone networks as his guide.
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Motorola's gloomy outlook casts shadow on mobile phone market
By Katie Allen, The Guardian, January 6, 2007
The need for lower-cost models for large parts of these markets, along with intensifying competition between manufacturers, has eaten away at margins.
Shaun Collins, an analyst at the telecoms consultants CCS Insight, said competitive intensity was at an all-time high. "This is a marketplace that is making a lot more phones but it's gaining less profit from making a lot more phones," he said. Some of the targeted marketplaces were "ultra-low price", he pointed out, citing Motorola's recent launch of the Motofone handset in India for less than £20.
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Kenya's 'Lord of the Ringtones' carves empire in African cell phone
WBCSD, October 22, 2006
In a warehouse on the outskirts of Nairobi, the "Lord of the Ringtones" holds sway over a growing cell phone service empire amid an African explosion in mobile technology. With 14 employees and a clever Middle Earth-inspired slogan, Ken Njoroge's two-year-old Cellulant firm has seized on the phenomenal surge in cell phone use and a ballooning desire for people to customize their handsets with distinctive rings.
"Mobile phones are getting more and more sophisticated," says the 31-year-old "lord," as Cellulant employees in oversized headphones, upship song snippets and ditties to customers for 82 cents (65 euro cents) a ringtone. "We've just found an untapped niche," Njoroge told AFP.
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Mobiles 'to help track diseases'
BBC News, October 17, 2006
Mobile phone technology is being developed to help manage the spread of diseases such as HIV and bird flu.
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For India's Traditional Fishermen, Cellphones Deliver a Sea Change
By Kevin Sullivan, Washington Post, October 15, 2006
Babu Rajan pointed off the starboard bow and shouted: "There! There!" In choppy, gray seas four miles from shore near India's tropical southern tip, Rajan spotted the tinselly sparkle of a school of sardines. He ordered his three dozen crewmen to quickly drop their five-ton net overboard.
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Africa closes tech gap with flashy phones
News.com, September 26, 2006
Rickety minibus taxis weave between corrugated iron shacks, dodging street hawkers and the odd scrawny child with trousers gaping at the knee.
Alexandra is one of South Africa's roughest townships, and yet you can switch on your laptop there, slide in a data card and access your e-mail in seconds using the world's most advanced commercial wireless technology. About a decade after mobile phones started to spread across the poorest continent, trailing Europe by several years, wireless technology in major cities is catching up with that in the West.
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Linux v. Microsoft: Third World Showdown
By David Wolf , Yahoo News, September 13, 2006
So, in the brewing battle of Windows vs. Ubuntu, Mark Shuttleworth's stated belief that "software should be available free of charge, that software tools should be usable by people in their local languages and despite any disabilities, and that people should have the freedom to customize and alter their software in whatever way they see fit."
If you think that's all standard Linux/Open Source talk, you're right. The difference is that instead of trying to convert school systems, governments, and enterprises in the developed world, Ubuntu is attacking Windows in it's soft underbelly - Africa, Asia, Latin America, and those places around the world where the money for a software license is more urgently needed to feed a kid a hot breakfast every day for six months.
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Negroponte: $100 laptop trials to kick off
By Andrew Donoghue , CNet News, August 22, 2006
Reports that trials of the $100 laptop project will kick off in Thailand alone have been quashed by Nicholas Negroponte.
Negroponte, the chairman of the One Laptop per Child group, said Monday that field trials of its low-cost PC for children in the developing world will start everywhere the laptop is required at roughly the same time.
In an e-mail sent to CNET News.com's sister site ZDNet UK, Negroponte said reports that trials would initially be limited to Thailand were inaccurate. "Visual models and developer board demos" will be sent to Nigeria in September, and to Thailand in October, for field trials, he said.
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Entrepreneur has quixotic goal of wiring Rwanda
By Christopher Rhoads, The Wall Street Journal, August 17, 2006
MOUNT KARISIMBI, Rwanda -- Greg Wyler, an American tech entrepreneur, dreams of bringing the Internet to this troubled country. There are a few hurdles. One is a battered communications tower atop this 14,787-foot volcanic peak. The air is too thin for helicopters to transport the several tons of equipment needed for repairs. Instead, it has to go by hand.
One recent morning, as mist covered the mountain, a group of 20 Rwandans lugged a 1,300-pound transformer with ropes and pulleys through deep mud. Rains had turned part of the trail into swamp. Mr. Wyler, 36 years old, was checking on their progress. He had recently hired a South African mountain-rescue company to advise on navigating the steeper sections.
"We are pushing the boundaries of technology here," Mr. Wyler said, as the muck oozed up around his knees.
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Thai kids to get low-cost laptops
The Associated Press, August 16, 2006
The ambitious project to provide low-cost laptop computers to poor children around the world is about to take a small step forward. More than 500 children in Thailand are expected to receive the machines in October and November for quality testing and debugging.
The One Laptop Per Child program, which began at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab and now is a separate nonprofit organization, hopes to deploy 5 million to 7 million machines in Thailand, Nigeria, Brazil and Argentina in 2007.
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A revolution in a laptop
By Greg Norman , Aljazeera.net, August 13, 2006
After an inauspicious birth 25 years ago when Ronnie Reagan and Maggie Thatcher were in their prime, the IBM 5150, retailing at $1,565, ushered in the age of the modern PC.
While software applications and the companies that develop them have become the main drivers in today's information society, the CM1, more commonly known as the $100 laptop, could take over where the venerable 5150 left off - becoming one of the enduring pieces of techno hardware in the next 25 years.
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New Move to Bridge Digital Divide
WBCSD, August 4, 2006
IPS, 4 August 2006 - The Commonwealth has launched a new initiative to take information technology to underdeveloped countries that need it most.
The initiative 'Commonwealth Connects' aims to bridge the digital divide that leaves large numbers of people in many vulnerable Commonwealth countries cut off from the information flow.
The 'Commonwealth Connects' programme will seek primarily to ensure that "all developing countries have good ICT (information and communication technologies) policies," Devindra Ramnarine, head of the programme told IPS Friday. "It will seek to make sure that these policies are in line with national development goals, and can be implemented."
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ICT Access Centers to be introduced in rural areas
News from Bangladesh, August 3, 2006
The government for the first time is going to introduce ICT Access Centers for the rural people to attach the underprivileged section to the technology-based knowledge society, reports UNB.
The rural ICT Access Centers, to be equipped with modern computers and Internet facilities, will provide ICT-enabled services to the rural people to bring them into the mainstream of development.
“Within next two months, we’ll be able to introduce such knowledge centers,” Science and ICT Minister Dr Moyeen Khan told a workshop here Wednesday.
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India's great leap forward?
By Brian Bremner, Business Week, August 2, 2006
The world second fastest-growing mobile phone market offers challenges for telecoms and implications for Indian society.
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Poverty-stricken Rwanda puts its faith and future into the wide wired world
By Xan Rice, The Guardian, August 1, 2006
Office workers talking over Skype. Fibre-optic cable snaking hundreds of miles underground and to the top of a 4,500-metre volcano. Paperless cabinet meetings with every minister using a laptop. This may sound like an advanced western country rather than a tiny, poor African state. Yet this is Rwanda, now in the midst of an extraordinary development plan to leap into the 21st century.
More "mobile in every pocket" than "chicken in every pot", the Vision 2020 project aims to rapidly transform a depressed agricultural economy into one driven by information communications and technology (ICT). If it works, the percentage of Rwanda's workforce involved in farming will drop from 90% to 50% in 15 years. By then the country should be the regional ICT hub - a kind of Singapore of the Great Lakes.
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PCs for the poor: as good as their hype?
By Waleed al-Shobakky, SciDev.Net, July 31, 2006
Technologists are at odds over how to bridge the digital divide. What one group calls the ultimate solution, another dismisses as "the scam of the century", reports Waleed al-Shobakky.
At the 2005 World Economic Forum in Switzerland a soft-spoken academic made an announcement that sent seismic waves across the computer industry. Nicholas Negroponte, then director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab, spoke of making laptops available at US$100 for schoolchildren in developing nations.
The price was not the only big news. Negroponte named companies that had agreed to collaborate on what would become the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project.
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Nanotech debate 'must involve poor communities'
By Tawanda Majoni, SciDev.Net, July 24, 2006
[HARARE] Poor communities must be involved in debates about whether nanotechnologies can contribute to social and economic development, said delegates at a series of meetings in Zimbabwe this month.
The last of the three 'nano-dialogues' — attended by Zimbabwean scientists and representatives of local communities — took place on 22 July in Harare.
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India’s farmers switch faith to mobile phones
By Ashling O’Connor, The Times online, July 24, 2006
FOR centuries, Indian farmers have relied on ancient rituals, the study of wind direction and local gossip to ascertain the annual onset of the unpredictable monsoon rains. Deciding when to sow their crops and when to take their produce to market is based on experience and instinct.
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Going Mobile in India
By Nandini Lakshman, Business Week, July 24, 2006
Service providers and handset manufacturers look forward to explosive growth as India skips the copper wire and heads straight for wireless networks.
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Namibia: Cellphones Can Reverse Poverty
By Prof. Monish Gunawardana, allAfrica, July 14, 2006
Recently, Warren Buffet, the world's second richest businessperson, adding US$31 billion to Bill Gate's Foundation, did not forget to say: "A market system has not worked in terms of poor people." It is true. The third world nations are struggling in a highly volatile global market system that was promoted by the first world. It focuses on profits but not the welfare of the poor. As China and India did it, let us use this system for our benefit. Let us arm our people with the best technological tools to reverse the poverty and retain the global competitiveness. Today, our topic is "cellphone", which is a status symbol for the rich, but an anti-poverty weapon for the poor.
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UN and Microsoft for small business in Africa
Bloomberg, July 12, 2006
Cape Town and Seattle - Microsoft, the world's biggest software company, and the UN are forming a partnership to supply information technology (IT) and other support to small businesses in Africa.
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Motorola May See Gains In Emerging Markets
By R.M. Schneiderman, Forbes, July 11, 2006
Motorola, the number two manufacturer of wireless headsets, could see market share gains in both developed and emerging markets in the second quarter, according to a Monday report by Morgan Stanley.
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Rwanda: Rural Areas to Access Solar Energy
By Grace Mugabe, allAfrica.com, July 10, 2006
The president of Solar Energy Africa, John Ssemanda, has said that the organization has an ambitious project of accessing solar energy to rural areas to boost economic development.
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In War-Torn Congo, Going Wireless to Reach Home
By Kevin Sullivan, Washington Post, July 9, 2006
KINSHASA, Congo -- Until not long ago, if Zadhe Iyombe wanted to talk to his mother, he had to make the eight-day boat trip up the Congo River to the jungle town where he was raised. In a country with almost no roads, mail or telephone system and a grisly guerrilla war raging, making that exhausting and dangerous trip was about the only way he could find out if his 59-year-old mother was still alive.
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Uganda: USAID Pushes for Rural Mobile Banks
By D. Livingstone Ssempijja, allAfrica.com, June 28, 2006
BANKING institutions have been urged to start rural mobile banking services to attract more people into the banking industry and help the country instil a savings culture; much lacking in Uganda.
The service that involves making banking transactions through a combination of banking technologies such as Point of Sales Services, Automated Teller Machines, Mini-ATMs (Movable ATMs) and mobile phones does not necessarily require bankers to visit banks.
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Wireless: From zero to 3G: A cellphone utopia?
By Eric Sylvers, International Herald Tribune, June 26, 2006
Executives in the cellphone and computer industries are fond of speaking about bridging the digital divide, the gap between people with access to technology and those without. But translating the talk into action is not easy. In addition, the benefits of high-tech gadgetry for the poor often are not evident
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The Village Phone Comes to Rwanda
By Geoffrey Kamali, allAfrica.com, June 26, 2006
The Grameen Foundation of USA, in collaboration with MTN Rwanda, is re-energising its Village Phone scheme to bring mobile telephony to rural communities where no telecom services have existed before.
After resounding success in Bangladesh and recently in Uganda, the scheme was last week launched in Gashora, Bugesera in Rwanda on a pilot basis.
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MTN takes internet to poor
INet-Bridge, June 21, 2006
An initiative to provide convenient internet connectivity as well as access to a wealth of education information via a bespoke online portal to some of the country's poorest communities was launched on Wednesday by mobile services operator MTN.
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Globe Talk: Mobile banking as aid tool
By Shihoko Goto, Middle East Times, June 19, 2006
Mobile phones are becoming commonplace enough in some of the remotest parts of the world, much to the delight of both private companies and public policymakers. For phone manufacturers and service providers, some of the globe's poorest people have turned out to be one of their most profitable demographic groups, while for international development agencies, the proliferation of mobile handsets is one key means to bridge the ever-increasing technological divide between rich and poor.
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PCs for Third World, by design
Electronic Engineering Times, June 16, 2006
Intel Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) are taking their fierce rivalry to the Third World. At stake is an untapped emerging market of 3.8 billion people, whose purchasing power, according to World Bank figures, is less than $4,000 per household.
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New Mobile Phone Program to Bring Economic Lifeline to Rural Rwanda
CSRWire, June 14, 2006
Washington, DC, June 14, 2006 – With the nearest telephone sometimes six miles away, a mobile phone is more than just a means of communication for rural communities in Rwanda; it is an economic lifeline. To help spur greater telecommunications access for villagers, Grameen Foundation, a global non-profit organization that combines microfinance with new technologies to empower the world’s poorest people, and mobile network operator, MTN Rwanda, are launching an innovative new venture: Village Phone Rwanda. Through its signature product, Tel’imbere, Village Phone Rwanda will provide affordable telephone access in places where there is no access to public communications and where power supplies are either unreliable or nonexistent.
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Ghana: Mobile Phone Prospects Attract More Investments to Ghana
By Amos Safo, allAfrica.com, June 12, 2006
After two previous attempts to set up mobile phone business in Ghana, MTN, Africa's biggest telecommunications provider has finally entered the Ghanaian market through a merger with Investcom, the parent company of Scancom Ghana Ltd. owners of Areeba, Ghana's biggest mobile phone provider.
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South Africa: Conference to Explore Potential of Research, Technology in Poverty Alleviation
By Thapelo Sakoana, allAfrica.com, June 5, 2006
More than 200 delegates will converge in Johannesburg next week, to explore how research and technology can be used to stimulate economic growth and alleviate poverty in rural communities.
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Microsoft Testing Pay-as-You-Go PC System in Brazil
By Mary Jo Foley, Fox News, May 22, 2006
Microsoft (MSFT) unveiled a new financing program designed to make PCs more affordable to emerging-market customers on May 22, the day before the kick-off of its annual Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in Seattle.
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Official: Africans pay $1,800 for 1GB of data
CNN.com, May 19, 2006
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) -- African Internet users pay on average 90 times what Americans pay, crippling efforts by the world's poorest continent to become competitive, a senior Kenyan official said.
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How the mobile phone has given hope to a new generation of African people
By Diane Coyle , The Independent, May 18, 2006
The spread of mobile phones in Africa has been dramatic and is having dramatic effects, social and economic. The continent has seen the world's fastest growth in numbers of mobile subscribers since the late 1990s. Although it still lags other regions, an average of nine people out of 100 have a mobile subscription, up from close to zero less than a decade ago. In some countries this "penetration rate" is much higher: latest industry figures show it at 62 per cent in South Africa and 38 per cent in Botswana.
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Nokia rates South Africa high
Mobile Africa, May 16, 2006
Africa has one of the most highly developed mobile workforces in the world, even in the poorer and least developed countries on the continent, says Eric Anderbjork, Nokia enterprise solutions head for Middle East and Africa.
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Free outgoing call creates a new price threshold
By Satish John , DNAIndia, May 16, 2006
MUMBAI: The bugle was sounded for a fresh battle on Thursday in the booming Indian telecom market.
‘Don’t stop Mobile’, a new scheme unveiled by Tata Indicom across 20 circles that allows customers to make free outgoing calls for a period of 2 years to any Tata Indicom Mobile or Tata Indicom fixed phone. It allows a maximum outgoing talktime of 3,600 minutes (60 hours) to another Tata Indicom phone.
It was only in October last year that Tata Indicom had coined a new free incoming scheme called “non-stop mobile” which forced its competitors to follow suit quickly as new subscribers emerged to enlist for the Tata scheme.
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Mobile phone boom spurs economic growth in Bangladesh
Yahoo News, May 10, 2006
DHAKA (AFP) - Bangladesh's booming mobile phone industry has emerged as a key driver of the cash-strapped nation's economy, creating nearly 240,000 jobs and adding 650 million dollars to gross domestic product.
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The digital sector can make poor nations prosper
By Michael Dell , The Financial Express, May 10, 2006
Approximately two in every three people in the US have direct access to a computer. In sub-Saharan Africa, fewer than two in every 100 do. Narrowing this digital divide, by giving more people access to information technology, is one of the great challenges facing governments and the private sector.
Information technology (IT) is fundamental in driving productivity and economic growth. A McKinsey study found that IT-producing sectors of the US economy generated 36 per cent of its productivity growth in 1993-2000, in spite of accounting for just 8.0 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP). A similar study, by the United Nations International Telecommunications Union, recently found that 27 per cent of GDP growth in the Group of Seven (G-7) leading industrial nations in 1995-2003 was a function of investments in IT. These dry numbers translate to real economic opportunity and the kind of well-paying jobs that are greatly needed in all parts of the world.
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Computers with a cause
By By Aman Batheja, Star-Telegram, May 6, 2006
Here’s a safe goal: saving the world.
Bridging the digital divide is the best solution for many problems plaguing the developing world - healthcare, education, debilitating poverty - according to a group of 2,000 business and world leaders who met in Austin last week. But the question of which ways best connect the world’s poor was vigorously debated at the World Congress on Information Technology, which meets every two years to discuss how technology can address needs.
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Intel CEO: Need To Speed Gains For ‘Next Billion People
Intel Press Release, May 3, 2006
The multiplying effects of computers, the Internet and education can double the reach of technology’s benefits worldwide in the next 5 years, Intel Corporation President and Chief Executive Officer Paul Otellini said today in a speech at the World Congress on Information Technology.
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Tech rivals target the world's poor: Intel, Amd push world wide web access with cheap pcs
By Dean Takahashi, Mercury News, May 2, 2006
Two of Silicon Valley's biggest technology rivals will promote initiatives this week to grow their global business by providing low-cost computers to developing countries.
Intel is announcing it will spend $1 billion to speed up the marketing of inexpensive computers to such emerging markets as such as India, China and Mexico. Its rival, Advanced Micro Devices, is already making bare-bones computers that cost $250 or less.
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Uganda: Bwindi Telecentre Brings MDGs Fulfillment in Focus
By Edris Kisambira, allAfrica, May 1, 2006
Located at the Congo-Uganda border 500 kilometres south west of Kampala, the Conservation Through Public Health (CTPH) Bwindi Impenetrable National Park telecentre - a combination of conservation and technology, is making a whole lot of a difference to the endangered mountain gorillas, eco-tourists, tourist stakeholders and locals who live in and around the park.
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Connecting the unconnected
By Rajat Dhawan, Chris Dorian, Rajat Gupta, and Sasi K. Sunkara, The McKinsey Quarterly, April 28, 2006
Mobile networks in emerging markets are too expensive to build and run at a price low-income people can afford. But they could be developed much more cheaply if network operators in these countries collaborated with the other stakeholders—governments, mobile-data-service providers, and local entrepreneurs—that have an interest in extending their reach.
This article presents business models for building low-cost mobile networks that would yield substantial economic and social benefits not only for their developers but also for low-income consumers in emerging markets.
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Connecting developing nations
By Eric Sylvers, International Herald Tribune, April 26, 2006
A pregnant woman at home alone in her remote village in Sierra Leone unexpectedly went into a difficult labor and, with no access to a doctor or medical facilities, a minor medical emergency could have taken a tragic turn. But the woman, Emma Sesay, managed to use one of the few cellphones in the village of Port Loko.
Celtel is the name of the cellphone company that provides services in her village and many others across 14 African countries, including Burkina Faso, Kenya, Uganda and Madagascar.
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Rural Students Benefit from the World of Computers
Development Gateway, April 11, 2006
The PiL Program( China), which began in 2003 and ends in 2008, Microsoft will contribute over US$10 million in investment, donations and other forms of support to help furnish computer education and computer-aided teaching programs in primary, junior middle and teachers' schools, especially those in rural and remote areas.
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Six Trends Will Drive Sustainable Development, According to PricewaterhouseCoopers
PricewaterhouseCoopers, April 10, 2006
Sustainable development will steadily advance over the next 10 years, with six major trends influencing industry world-wide, according to a new PricewaterhouseCoopers' report, "Corporate Responsibility: Strategy, Management and Value." The challenge of creating strategies that meet immediate needs without sacrificing the needs of future generations will be driven by the growing influence of: global market forces; revisions in corporate governance; high speed innovation; large scale globalisation; evolving societal requirements and communication, the report says.
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Making the market work for the poor
By Ann Bernstein & Paul Zille , Business Day, April 6, 2006
AS a new development approach, making markets work for the poor (MMW4P) can have a big impact in SA because it is about changing the circumstances that prevent the poor from participating more effectively and extensively in the market economy.
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HK explores new ways to help poor people
China View, April 6, 2006
More than 300 participants from various sectors on Thursday attended the Conference on Social Enterprise to discuss new approach to helping the poor.
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Intel Kicks Off Low-Cost PC Effort
By Jeremy Kirk, PCWorld.com, April 1, 2006
Intel has partnered with a Mexican telecoms company to sell an affordable PC designed for first-time computer users in developing countries. It's the latest effort by technology vendors to develop products for emerging markets.
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Tech a Key to Easing Poverty, Microsoft official adapts software for Third World uses
By Sara Israelsen, Deseret News, March 11, 2006
The connection between a computer and the economic stability of an African villager may seem like a stretch, but to Kevin Johnson, it's a connection he works on every day. Johnson, co-president of the Platforms and Services Division of Microsoft, spends his weeks traveling the world, trying to adapt Windows technology to the various developing countries and citizens.
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Give Africans the Blackberry -- and they will do the Job
By Dan Latendre, The Record, March 11, 2006
What do computers, cellphones and BlackBerrys have to do with eradicating extreme poverty in Africa? Quite a bit as it turns out.
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Power to the people
Economist, March 11, 2006
AS A young boy in rural Bangladesh in 1971, Iqbal Quadir walked ten miles to collect some medicine for a sibling who was unwell. But when he arrived at his destination, the medicine man was not there, so he had to walk home empty-handed, having wasted an entire day. Many years later, having moved to America and become an investment banker, Mr Quadir was reminded of this episode when the network at his New York office stopped working.Mr Quadir was seized by the idea that "a telephone is a weapon against poverty". He decided to dedicate himself to making telephones more widely available to the poor in his homeland.
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New infoDev Report on m-Commerce
By InfoDev, February 24, 2006
The proliferation of mobile communications in developing countries has the potential to bring a wide range of financial services to an entirely new customer base. This report explores the use of mobile phones to expand financial services in the Philippines.
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The Birth of Philanthrocapitalism
By The Economist, February 23, 2006
RELATIVE to the corporate environment, we are in the 1870s. But philanthropy will increasingly come to resemble the capitalist economy, predicts Uday Khemka, a young Indian philanthropist and a director of the SUN Group investment company owned by his family.
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The Business of Giving
By The Economist, February 23, 2006
Philanthropy is flourishing as the number of super-rich people keeps growing. But the new donors are becoming much more businesslike about the way their money is used, says Matthew Bishop.
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Fancy Phones to Clash with Low Cost PCs
By Pragya Singh , Financial Express, February 20, 2006
Here is something the bottom of India’s mobile user pyramid can cheer about. If 2005 was the year of the cheap PC, 2006 will see the dawn of entry-level smart phones in rural parts.
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Mobile technology - a catalyst for social and economic growth in developing economies
By Arun Sarin, World Business Council for Sustainable Development, February 20, 2006
In this speech, Vodafone's Chief Executive Arun Sarin announces a commitment of £5 million to the company's Social Investment Fund. The fund facilitates the development of commercially viable products and services with high social value, particularly those that increase accessibility.
>> More Details | created on: 05/31/2006
MTN's CSR Initiative Wins GSM Association Award
Africa News, February 17, 2006
>> More Details | created on: 02/17/2006
Grameen and Segway team up to produce micro-entrepreneurial "Slingshot"
By Erick Schonfeld, CNNmoney.com, February 16, 2006
Dean Kamen, the engineer who invented the Segway, is puzzling over a new equation these days. An estimated 1.1 billion people in the world don't have access to clean drinking water, and an estimated 1.6 billion don't have electricity.
>> More Details | created on: 02/23/2006
Intel's Hiring Spree
By Michael Fitzgerald, Technology Review, February 14, 2006
Why is Intel, the giant chip maker, in the process of hiring more than 100 anthropologists and other social scientists to work side by side with its engineers? While the success of this strategy will become clearer over the next 12 to 18 months, it's obvious Intel is betting that sales will rise and new markets will emerge because of this nonintuitive pairing.
>> More Details | created on: 02/23/2006
Google's Big BOP Bet? Bringing Wi-Fi to Africa
By John Paul, World Resources Institute, February 9, 2006
Google
announced this week that it has selected Abuja, Nigeria as one of about seven African cities the company will fully connect with a wireless network.
>> More Details | created on: 02/17/2006
Q&A: C.K. Prahalad
Red Herring, February 6, 2006
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Business Prophet
By CK Prahalad, Business Week, January 23, 2006
This article discusses how strategy guru C.K. Prahalad is changing the way CEOs think.
>> More Details | created on: 01/27/2006
India's mobile giants battle it out in the villages
By Shailendra Bhatnagar , Yahoo News, January 21, 2006
Mobile phone companies are taking cheap handsets and life-time prepaid services to India's hundreds of millions of low-income earners in a bid to expand market share and maintain their break-neck rates of growth.
>> More Details | created on: 01/24/2006
Putting Paid to Poverty
By Al Hammond & Bill Kramer, January 17, 2006
"Putting Paid to Poverty" provides a hopeful scenario for the development of the 'base of the pyramid' over the next ten years.
>> More Details | created on: 02/17/2006
OSS CEO Announces Global Campaign to Deliver Intelligence to the Poor, Lifting the Bottom of the Pyramid - the Poor - With Information
Yahoo Finance, December 14, 2005
>> More Details | created on: 01/04/2006
Can Africa Join the Investment Revolution
By Africa Business, November 29, 2005
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India's phone-to-farmers operator
Financial Express, October 19, 2005
The idea was to connect India's farms with the world by modernising a clapped-out supply chain that allows most produce to rot long before it gets to market.
>> More Details | created on: 11/23/2005
AMD to jointly sell cheap personal computers in India
Agence French Presse, October 14, 2005
US-based semiconductor maker AMD said it would enter a joint venture with an Indian firm to sell personal computers for the same cost as cellphones.
>> More Details | created on: 11/23/2005
Radioactive: The next billion mobile users
silicon.com, August 3, 2005
Forget the latest feature-rich smart phones - the real action is happening at the other end of the mobile phone market, says Futurity Media's Stewart Baines. All players are piling headlong into low cost mobiles in the hope that the three billion people who currently could but do not use a mobile phone will soon be able to embrace the 21st century.
>> More Details | created on: 07/05/2006
Calling an End to Poverty: Mobile Phones and Development
By The Economist, July 7, 2005
Discusses how mobile phone firms have found a way to help the poor help themselves.
>> More Details | created on: 11/23/2005
Pennies from the poor add up to fortune
By David Ignatius, The Korea Herald, July 1, 2005
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A Richer Future for India
McKinsey Quarterly, July 1, 2005
Analyzes Indias growth potential beyond IT and outsourcing services.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Trickle-Up Economics
By David Armstrong & Naazneen Karmali, Forbes.com, June 20, 2005
How low-tech, low-cost designs are helping the poorest farmers on Earth grow their way out of poverty.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Selling to the Poor: There is a Surprisingly Lucrative Market in Targeting Low-Income Consumers
By Kay Johnson & Xa Nhon, Time Magazine, April 25, 2005
Identifies the lucrative market in targeting low income consumers.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
MIT Team Seeks to Seed Developing World with $100 Laptops
By Mark Jewell, The Detroit News, April 4, 2005
Addresses MIT's efforts to bridge the digital divide by bringing laptops to children in the developing world.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Selling to the Poor: Mobile Firms Plan Cheap Handset
BBC News, February 1, 2005
An alliance of mobile phone firms has launched an ultra-cheap handset in the hope of connecting millions more customers in developing countries.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Senegalese Villagers are Learning to Use their Natural & Cultural Heritage to Make a Living
World Business Council for Sustainable Development, January 1, 2005
It is in partnership with the Nicolas Hulot Foundation (NHF), and the Ademe, the French agency for the environment and energy efficiency, that EDF has begun to engage in projects where local communities in developing countries take responsibility for the protection of their natural and cultural heritage, and turn it into an opportunity for growth.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
The Akassa Community Development Project in Nigeria: Statoil and BP
World Business Council for Sustainable Development, January 1, 2005
Reviews how corporate social responsibility programs are helping to build and sustain livelihoods in the Niger Delta.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
PEOPLink and CatGen: Empowering a Global Network of Artisans
By Nia Ujamaa, Digital Divide Network, December 1, 2004
Discusses the success of PEOPLink and CatGen in empowering a global network of local artisans.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
China and India: The Race for Growth
McKinsey Quarterly, September 1, 2004
Analyzes the different economic growth patterns of India and China.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
The Global Compact: A Business Perspective
International Chamber of Commerce, July 1, 2004
A look at the Global Compact as businesses begins to take more of a role in International Development.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Local Entrepreneurial Skills & Sustainability in Rwanda's Community Internet Centers
DOT-COMments e-newsletter, 2004
Addresses how local entrepreneurial skills are leading to sustainable growth in Rwanda’s Community Internet Centers.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
eBusiness and Sustainable Development
Digital Europe, 2003
This article investigates the changing nature of business, society, and information technology.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
The Corporate Key: Using Big Business to Fight Global Poverty
By George C. Lodge, Foreign Affairs, July 1, 2002
The authors analyze a new approach to global development addressing a global corporate alliance that brings business know-how and profit motive into play.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
The Global Information Technology Report 2001-2002: Readiness for the Networked World
Center for International Development, 2002
A report on the current and future state of information and communication technology.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Let's Focus on the Digital Dividend
By C.K. Prahalad, European Business Forum, 2002
Disucusses the idea that in the new economy, where access to knowledge is critical for economic success, the increasing importance of the internet will further accentuate the differences between the rich and the poor.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Information Communications Technology for Development
UNDP Evaluation Office, September 1, 2001
Addresses Information Communication technology as a key player in development.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Information and Communication Technologies and Poverty
By Charles Kenny, World Bank, July 1, 2001
This article address the importance of "Digitally enabled Development" as one of the keys to third world development.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Strategic Innovation: Hindustan Lever Ltd
By Rekha Balu, Fast Company, June 1, 2001
Highlights Hindustan Lever's success through soap marketing and distribution at the BOP.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Bottom Up, Digitally Enabled Development, A Vision
By Allen Hammond & Elizabeth Jenkins, iMP Magazine, February 1, 2001
The authors address the importance of "Digitally enabled Development" as one of the keys to third world development.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Improving Health, Fighting Poverty: The Role of Information and Communication Technology (ICT)
The Exchange, 2001
Addresses the power of technology in alleviating poverty but the risk of marginalizing the poor through this process.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
India's Growth Chase: High Aspiration, Low Aspiration
By Narendra Jhaveri, Economic and Political Weekly, 2001
Discusses the governanace of India and its implications for further growth.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Alleviating Poverty Through Technology
By Muhammad Yunus, Science Magazine, October 1, 1998
This article discusses ways of alleviating poverty through the spread of technology to the developing worlds.
>> View Article | created on: 11/18/2005
Academic Research
International Technology Diffusion and the Growth of TFP in the Manufacturing Sector of Developing Economies
By Andreas Sawides & Marios Zachariadis, November, 2005 (Review of Development Economics, Vol. 9, No. 4)
This paper evaluates various channels through which foreign technology diffuses to the manufacturing sector of developing economies. These economies undertake virtually no own R&D, so they rely on foreign technology to a much larger extent than developed economies. We investigate the direct effect of foreign R&D, as well as technology embodied in imports of intermediate and capital goods and foreign direct investment, on the growth of total factor productivity and value added in the manufacturing sector of 32 economies during 1965-92. We find that foreign R&D typically has the biggest positive impact on domestic productivity and value-added growth. Imports of capital goods and foreign direct investment also play a similar role, but their effect is of smaller magnitude and is not always significant.
>> More Details | created on: 01/20/2006
Credit Constraints as a Barrier to Technology Adoption by the Poor: Lessons from South-Indian Small Scale Fishery
By Gine, Xavier, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper, June, 2005 (No. 3665)
The paper studies the diffusion of plastic reinforced fiber boats in a fishing village in Tamil Nadu and the dynamics of income inequality during this process
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Premium Marketing to the Masses: An Interview with LG Electronics India's Managing Director
By Pramath Raj Sinha, McKinsey Quarterly, 2005 (Subscription Required)
In this interview, Kwang-Ro Kim shows how LG Electronics India has built a dominant position in India's consumer electronics and white-goods markets.
The company has overcome India's notorious distribution challenge, in the process pushing deeper into rural territories than have most competitors. Indian consumers, LG has found, will pay a premium for quality and service.
>> More Details | created on: 03/20/2006
India's Economic Agenda: An Interview with Manmohan Singh
By Rajat K. Gupta, McKinsey Quarterly, 2005 (Subscription Required)
In an interview, India's prime minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, discusses his country’s prospects and challenges, saying that the ultimate goal is to wipe out poverty, ignorance, and disease.
To him this can be accomplished by increasing foreign direct investment, particularly in infrastructure and by opening up the retail sector.
>> More Details | created on: 03/20/2006
Fulfilling India's Promise
By Rajat K. Gupta, McKinsey Quarterly, 2005 (Subscription Required)
The article discusses how India must take steps to boost its economic prospects, lift its living standards, and improve opportunities for the multinational companies that do business there.
>> More Details | created on: 03/20/2006
Lessons from the Field: An Overview of the Current Uses of Information and Communication Technologies for Development
By John Paul & Robert Katz, WRI Paper, November, 2004
An overview of the digital divide that effects many in the developing world and highlights many of the projects that are attempting to use information and communication technologies (ICT) to bridge this divide
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Cracking China's Chip Market
By Derek Dean & James Hexter, McKinsey Quarterly, 2003 (Subscription Required)
The country’s semiconductor market represents a lucrative opportunity for foreign companies, but to exploit it they must adapt to the needs and expectations of Chinese customers.
>> More Details | created on: 03/20/2006
Electronic Architectures for Bridging the Global Digital Divide: A Comparative Assessment of E-Business Systems Designed to Reach teh Global Poor
By Nik Dholakia & Nir Kshetri, ARCHITECTURAL ISSUES OF WEB-ENABLED ELECTRONIC BUSINESS, 2003
We discuss some examples of electronic architectures for Bridging the Global Digital Divide. We provide a comparative assessment of four e-business systems designed to reach the global poor.
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The Great Leap: Driving Innovation from the Base of the Pyramid
By Hart, Stu & Christensen, Clayton, MIT Sloan Management Review, September, 2002 (Fall 2002)
The authors illustrate their point of how and when BOP can be successful with examples of companies that are already profitably disrupting such industries as telecommunications, consumer electronics and energy production.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid
By C.K. Prahalad & Stuart L. Hart, Strategy+Business, January, 2002 (Issue 26, First Quarter 2002)
Dispells some of the assumptions regarding selling to the poor and discusses how companies can both maximize their profits and help the poor
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
India as a Source of Innovations
By C.K. Prahalad, 2000
Analyzes and the old mindset of the poor as an intractable problem and shows how currently there has been a shift in this mindset to one of the poor as an active market and the Bottom of the Pyramid as a source of innovation for this market.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Innovation and Growth with Rich and Poor Consumers
By Zweimuller, Josef & Brunner, Johann K., CEPR Discussion Paper Series, April, 1998 (No. 1855)
This paper studies the impact of income inequality on the level of innovative activity in a model where innovations result in quality improvements.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Developing Customers Before Products
By Robert J. Davis & Shinichi Ueyama, McKinsey Quarterly, 1996 (Subscription Required )
To increase their sales growth and profitability, some companies are beginning to develop customers before products. Adept at identifying and meeting unmet as well as latent demand, these companies can almost guarantee a profitable market prior to making substantial investments in a new product.
>> More Details | created on: 03/20/2006
Cases
What works: Grameen Telecom's Village Phones
By NEVIN COHEN, World Resource Institute, December 7, 2006
The high revenues generated by Grameen Telecom’s shared-access business model suggest how powerful such approaches can be. With local entrepreneurs providing one phone per village, the whole community is the customer. The phones generate revenues averaging $90 per month in rural Bangladesh, one of the world’s poorest countries. Social and economic benefits to the entrepreneurs, and to the village, from phone access have
proved to be high as well.
>> More Details | created on: 12/07/2006
The Case of Vodafone
By UK Department of International Development , May 2, 2006
Vodafone has successfully bid for grant funding from the Financial Deepening Challenge Fund (FDCF) to develop a Mobile Micro-finance “platform” in Kenya and Tanzania. This initiative has already resulted in important new developments within Vodafone that are likely to have significant commercial and social impact. However, it was not developed without overcoming a number of significant challenges.
This Case Study examines the process through which Vodafone recognised and took advantage of the opportunity presented by the FDCF, and captures important lessons that have relevance to the process of engaging the private sector in development activities.
>> More Details | created on: 05/02/2006
Narayana Murthy and Compassionate Capitalism
By Bill George, Shailendra J. Singh & Andrew N. McLean, Harvard Business School, July 22, 2005
Narayana Murthy's roles at Infosys Technologies--as a co-founder, longtime CEO, and nonexecutive chairman and chief mentor--has been marked by explosive growth, demanding management challenges, and widely lauded company leadership. His personal leadership philosophy has been articulated through and driven by his philosophy of "compassionate capitalism." Profiles Murthy's philosophy and leadership principles. Traces the development of Murthy as a child, scholar, businessman, and political and social activist. Traces the links between Murthy's principles and the business practices that repeatedly brought Infosys Technologies recognition as one of India's most admired and best managed companies. Raises questions in his mind about the place of philanthropic principles in the management of a business enterprise.
>> More Details | created on: 04/03/2006
The Mogalakwena HP i-community: Hewlett-Packard
WBCSD, July 5, 2005
Despite the enormous worldwide impact of the Internet, more than 90% of the world’s population has never used the technology and the “digital divide” between the developed and developing nations is growing. Hewlett-Packard's Mogalakwena i-community in South Africa seeks to bridge that divide.
Through public-private partnerships, the HP Mogalakwena i-community aims to turn the region into a thriving, self-sustaining economy where access to technology permanently improves the livelihoods of the population by raising literacy rates, creating income, providing access to government services, education and health care, and opening new markets.
>> More Details | created on: 07/13/2006
The Mogalakwena HP i-community: Hewlett-Packard
World Business Council for Sustainable Development, July 5, 2005
Despite the enormous worldwide impact of the Internet, more than 90% of the world’s population has never used the technology and the “digital divide” between the developed and developing nations is growing. Hewlett-Packard's Mogalakwena i-community in South Africa seeks to bridge that divide.
>> More Details | created on: 11/23/2005
Electrifying rural Moroccan households: Electricité de France (EDF), Tenesol, Total
World Business Council for Sustainable Development, June 2, 2005
Through a unique program developed by Morocco’s National Electricity Office (ONE), EDF, Total and Tenesol (previously Total Energie) are helping remote Moroccan villages access electricity through solar power installations.
>> More Details | created on: 11/23/2005
The Kuppam HP i-community: Hewlett-Packard
World Business Council for Sustainable Development, May 2, 2005
Hewlett-Packard's Kuppam i-community aims to provide people with access to greater social and economic opportunities by closing the gap between technology-empowered and technology-excluded communities.
>> More Details | created on: 11/23/2005
Access to Electricity program eases poverty: ABB
World Business Council for Sustainable Development, March 1, 2005
ABB’s Access to Electricity program is designed to promote sustainable economic, environmental and social development in poor communities and is yielding its first concrete results in a remote village in southern Tanzania.
>> More Details | created on: 11/23/2005
Empowering supply chains: Anglo American’s Mondi Recycling
World Business Council for Sustainable Development, February 25, 2005
Mondi Recycling, the biggest paper recycler in South Africa, feels it has the ability to create employment and sustain livelihoods in its operational areas.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Serving the Poor: Do Embedded Ties Matter?
By Pablo Sánchez, Miguel Ángel Rodríguez & Joan Enric Ricart , IESE Business School, January 1, 2005
In the past, the 4.6 billion people living in poverty were considered anything but a market. Recently, however, several authors have suggested that by stimulating commerce and development in low-income segments, multinationals could radically improve the lives of billions of people and help create a more stable and inclusive world. In order to succeed at this challenging goal, companies need not only to innovate strategies, business models and products, but also to better understand the market and local customer needs.
>> More Details | created on: 04/18/2006
Solar Energy in Rural South Africa
By Patricia H. Werhane & Michael E. Gorman, Darden Case No. UVA-E-0145-SSRN, 2005
This case describes Solar Electric Light Fund's pilot project to deliver solar-energy units to a rural, nonelectrified village in the Maphephethe region of South Africa. What appears to be an innocuous project with positive social dimensions ends up causing social stratification in the village's poorer class. The case presents students with some interesting ethical dilemmas as traditional community values of equity and social class are challenged by an attempt to improve living standards. It may also be taught as an environmental-ethics case concerning alternative-energy options (see also "SELF (A)" [UVA-E-0112] and "SELF (B)" [UVA-E-0113]).
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Eskom and the South African Electrification Program A
By Patricia H. Werhane & Michael E. Gorman, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0162-SSRN , 2005
Eskom, a South African electric-utility company, is currently spending $400 million annually (roughly 30 percent of its annual profits) to implement a national social-initiative project. This project is a countrywide infrastructure-development program to provide electricity to the citizens of South Africa, who were often denied access to basic services under apartheid; thus, the company is hoping to fulfill its goal of becoming a "model corporate citizen."
>> More Details | created on: 02/02/2006
Eskom and the South African Electrification Program B
By Patricia H. Werhane & Michael E. Gorman, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0163-SSRN , 2005
After Eskom implemented a viable plan for providing electricity to more than 1.75 million South African households, many of its customers failed to pay for service, which resulted in a debt of approximately $400 million by 1997. This negative consumer behavior, however, was not necessarily unjustified, as South Africa's black citizens had historically used consumer boycotts as a means of protest against the apartheid state. Consequently, the country's consumer base had evolved in an environment where nonpayment was often seen as a social norm rather than negative behavior. Recognizing that consumers' behavior was the result of living under an oppressive regime, Eskom needed to address this seemingly intractable situation. See also the A, C, D, and E cases (E-0162, E-0164, E-0165, and E-0166).
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Eskom and the South African Electrification Program C
By Patricia H. Werhane & Michael E. Gorman, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0164-SSRN , 2005
Eskom had committed to spending approximately $400 million annually to provide 1.75 million South African households with electricity by 2000. The company had to forfeit an additional $300 million because of consumers' nonpayment for service. Moreover, the company also faced rising operational costs as a result of consumers' illegally tampering with their electrical connections. In fact, these costs had increased to such an extent that annual costs were higher than annual sales in many of the areas Eskom served. This illegal behavior, however, had evolved under an oppressive regime that forced many consumers to steal from the existing infrastructure in order to access basic services. Following the end of apartheid, Eskom hoped to receive an adequate return on its investments in the electrification program. See also the A, B, D, and E cases (E-0162, E-0163, E-0165, and E-0166).
>> More Details | created on: 02/02/2006
Eskom and the South African Electrification Program D
By Patricia H. Werhane & Michael E. Gorman, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0165-SSRN , 2005
The D case concerns Eskom's commitment to provide employment in rural areas by training residents to work on local electrification projects. The company discovers, however, that its employees, for a small fee, often help customers make illegal connections to power lines, thus avoiding payment for service. In some communities, as much as 80 percent of the electricity is illegally obtained. How should Eskom deal with this problem? See also the A, B, C, and E cases (E-0162, E-0163, E-0164, and E-0166).
>> More Details | created on: 02/02/2006
Eskom and the South African Electrification Program E
By Patricia H. Werhane & Michael E. Gorman, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0166-SSRN , 2005
Eskom produces the world's cheapest electricity by using coal-fired plants, most of which have not been retrofitted to meet World Bank standards. Moreover, most South Africans without electricity burn wood, which creates even more air pollution than coal. Should Eskom retrofit its coal-fired facilities and raise the price of electricity or continue to expand its inexpensive electrification program? See also the A, B, C, and D cases (E-0162, E-0163, E-0164, and E-0165).
>> More Details | created on: 02/02/2006
The Volta River Project
By Patricia H. Werhane & Michael E. Gorman, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0161-SSRN, 2005
In 1998, Ghana was considering new ways to generate electricity to solve the recurring problem of power shortages due to droughts. This case discusses the Volta River Project, which was conceived by Kwame Nkrumah, the founder of Ghana. Built in 1963, the Volta River Dam was a joint project between Ghana and Valco, a multinational aluminum company that was to be the largest consumer of the dam's electricity. Various difficulties, including repeated droughts and a long-term low negotiated price for Valco's electricity, have created a shortage of electricity in Ghana. The case poses the following question for students: What is the best long-term solution - should Ghana build another dam or develop other solutions to this recurring problem?
>> More Details | created on: 01/20/2006
SELF A
By Patricia H. Werhane & Scott B. Sonenshein, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0112-SSRN, 2005
This series of cases (see also the B case, UVA-E-0113) describes the choices facing Neville Williams, founder and president of SELF, in his attempt to provide environmentally friendly electricity to rural China. SELF is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to improve the standard of living in developing countries. The A case encourages students to choose among three alternative-energy sources - hydropower, photovoltaics, and clean coal - that are technologically sufficient and environmentally sustainable. Students are not told what the acronym SELF stands for until the end of the A case.
>> More Details | created on: 01/20/2006
SELF B
By Patricia H. Werhane & Scott B. Sonenshein, Darden Case No.: UVA-E-0113-SSRN. , 2005
The main purpose of the B case is to demonstrate that corporate and managerial ideologies play a role in determining how to finance projects. Williams must decide how to fund rural-electrification projects in such developing countries as China. Given SELF's ideology, students must evaluate the alternatives of government subsidies for energy development, partial subsidies, and individual payment plans for energy. See also the A case (UVA-E-0112).
>> More Details | created on: 02/02/2006
Partnering for mutual success: DaimlerChrysler – POEMAtec Alliance
By Yerina Mugica, World Business Council for Sustainable Development, November 10, 2004
DaimlerChrysler formed an alliance with the Poverty and Environment in Amazonia Research and Development project (POEMA) to reforest previously cleared land to produce continuous yields year-round and process these harvests within the region.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Enabling Rural India with Information and Communication Technology Initiatives
By Ashok Jhunjhunwala & Sudhalakshmi Narasimhan, Anuradha Ramachandran, International Telecommunications Union, Korea Agency for Digital Opportunity and Promotion, October 1, 2004
Discusses the impact of digital capabilities throughout rural villages in India.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Smart Communications, Inc. , Philippines
By Sharon Smith, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, September 1, 2004
Discusses how Smart Communications is providing telecommunication services to low-income markets in the Phillipines.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Simputer: Bridging the digital divide
WBCSD, February 27, 2004
Digital technologies have the potential to tackle social and environmental problems, but for half the world’s population the learning curve will be steep. The Simputer Trust is helping to bridge the "digital divide" with a new computer aimed at people previously excluded from modern communications.
India has approximately 20 million telephones and 500,000 Internet connections for a population of over one billion people. The challenge is to introduce technology for large numbers of people at a low enough cost and at a level suitable for users with little or no formal education.
>> More Details | created on: 07/14/2006
Vodacom: Extending telecom services to South Africa’s poor
World Business Council on Sustainble Development, February 2, 2004
Vodacom has confronted the enormous challenge of providing subsidized public cellular telephones in under-serviced and rural areas by seting up stationary phone shops or kiosks with multiple lines, all connected to Vodacom's existing infrastructure through a wireless link.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Solar Energy Distribution in Brazil
By Yerina Mugica, UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School, 2004
Approximately 25 million people in Brazil do not have access to electricity. Fabio Rosa, a local social entrepreneur, is aiming to fill this need through innovative distributed solar energy systems.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Businesses Are Helping to Overcome Global Poverty
By Stern N, Richard Ivey Business School, January 1, 2004
The facts today point to a decline in global poverty and to the reality that global economic development is working. These positive developments are due to policies pursued by both public organizations and the international business community. But as the Chief Economist of the World Banks says, business can do even more to help the world's poorest countries.
>> More Details | created on: 04/18/2006
Aravind Eye Care System, India
By C.K Prahalad, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, January 1, 2004
Discusses how a world class clinic in India has brought relatively free eye care treatment to the poor in India.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Casas Bahia , Brazil
By Sami Foguel & Andrew Wilson, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, December 12, 2003
Through a unique business model, Casas Bahia has developed an innovative way to bring consumer products to the poor in Brazil.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
eGovernance - Andhra Pradesh, India
By Praveen Suthrum & Jeffrey Phillips, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, December 12, 2003
An e-governance experiment in Andhara Pradesh is using business to deliver government services electronically and is fundamentally altering the relationship between the government and its citizens.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Voxiva
By Cynthia Casas & William LaJoie, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, December 12, 2003
Voxiva is bringing critical healthcare information to rural villages by using the already in place telecommunications systems.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Jaipur Foot , India
By Scott Macke, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, December 12, 2003
Jaipur Foot has been able to create a low cost highly durable prosthetic foot that has enabled many of the poor in India to sustain their livlihoods inspite of a handicap.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Hindustan Lever Limited , India
By Mindy Murch & Kate Reeder, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, December 12, 2003
Discusses how Hindustan Lever Limited created a unique public private partnership while simultaneously making a public helath issue an integral part of their business.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
E+Co's , Nicaragua
By Scott Baron & George Weinmann, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, December 12, 2003
Discusses the success of Technosol in providing clean and affordable energy to the poor in Nicaragua.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
e-Choupal , India
By Kuttayan Annamalai & Sachin Rao, University of Michigan Ross School of Business, August, 2003
Highlights the success of e-Chopals at connecting subsistence farmers with large firms and the global market through internet information centers.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
HealthNet Uganda , Uganda
By Keisha Phipps & Genevieve Sangudi, Steven Woolway, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, August 1, 2003
Analyzes Healthnet Uganda's evolution from NGO to sustainable enterprise but bringing portable healthcare service to Uganda's rural areas.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Vodacom's Community Cell Phones , South Africa
By Jennifer Reck & Brad Wood, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, August 1, 2003
Discusses how Vodacom is providing telecommunications to poor communities in South Africa.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Afrique Initiatives, Senegal
By Luis Castro & Sharon Smith, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, August 1, 2003
Analyzes the success two social development organizations in Senegal.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
AKASHGANDA, India
By Ajay Sharma & Akhilesh Yadav, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, August 1, 2003
This case dicussess the work SKELPL, a small bussiness in India, which has used innovative solutions to automize the milk collection process at local dairy cooperatives.
>> More Details | created on: 04/13/2006
Vodafone , Poland
By James Goodman, Digital Europe, April 1, 2003
Addresses the use of mobile phones to create social capital in Poland.
>> More Details | created on: 07/10/2006
TARAhaat , India
By Dr. Andrew Lawlor & Vivek Sandell, Caitlin Peterson, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, July 1, 2001
Discusses TARAhatt how internet portal is providing information and services to many of the rural poor in India.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Infocentros , El Salvador
By Yacine Khelladi, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, July 1, 2001
Discusses the El Salvador based Infocentros's model that empowers the poor by giving them access to telecenters in order to gain access to a variety of information and services.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
ViaSebrae , Brazil
By Jason P. Hekel & Carlos Waack, World Resources Institute Digital Dividend, June 1, 2001
ViaSebrae e-commerce model subsidizes the business to consumer segment with the profits from the businesses to business segment providing the business to consumer segment with e-commerce they could not otherwise afford.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Corpomedina: Social and Economic Development, Venezuela
By Luis Sanz & Lawrence Pratt, World Resources Institute, 2000
As part of its strategy to develop tourism in an economically depressed zone of Venezuela, Corpomedina formed an independent foundation aimed at improving the quality of life for the local population through health, cultural, and educational programs, and through the creation of micro-enterprises.
>> View Article | created on: 11/22/2005
Books
The India Mobile Development Report
The Center for Knowledge Societies, February 9, 2007
Mobile communication is revolutionizing economic and social life in rural India, spawning a wave of local entrepreneurs and creating greater access to social services according to a new study by The Center for Knowledge Societies (CKS) commissioned by Nokia. The research identifies seven major service sectors including transport, finance and healthcare that could be radically transformed through mobile technologies.
>> More Details | created on: 02/09/2007
Economic Empowerment through Mobile
Vodafone, November 10, 2006
The new report by Vodafone includes three case studies: "Mobile phone banking and low-income customers: Evidence from South Africa", "A sense of balance: A socio-economic analysis of airtime transfer services in Egypt" and "Mobile-enabled transactions for the base of the economic pyramid: A brief review of the 2006 ‘state-of-play".
>> More Details | created on: 11/10/2006
Improving health, connecting people: the role of ICTs in the health sector of developing countries
By Edited by Andrew Chetley; with contributions by Jackie Davies, Bernard Trude, Harry McConnell, Roberto Ramirez, T Shields, Peter Drury, J Kumekawa, J Louw, G Fereday, Caroline Nyamai-Kisia, BiD Network, May 31, 2006
This framework paper is aimed at policy makers who are involved in the development or management of programmes in the health sector in developing countries. It provides a ‘snapshot’ of the type of information and communication technology (ICT) interventions that are being used in the health sector, and the policy debates around ICTs and health. It draws from the experience of use in both the North and South, but with a focus on applicability in the South to identify the most effective and relevant uses of ICTs.
>> More Details | created on: 11/02/2006
Taxation and Mobile Communications in Bangladesh
By GSM Association, May 12, 2006
Bangladesh's booming mobile phone industry has emerged as a key driver of the cash-strapped nation's economy, creating nearly 240,000 jobs and adding 650 million dollars to gross domestic product.
"The mobile phone industry in Bangladesh employs 237,900 people directly and indirectly. These are well-paid jobs with salaries many times the national average," said the study by the international consultancy firm Ovum.
The study commissioned by the GSM Association (GSMA), a global industry body of 690 operators, found that the mobile services industry contributed 650 million dollars to Bangladesh's GDP annually.
>> More Details | created on: 05/12/2006
Information and Communications for Development 2006: Global Trends and Policies
World Bank, March 9, 2006
Information and Communications for Development 2006: Global Trends and Policies is a World Bank flagship publication addressing the critical role being played by information and communication technologies (ICT) in economic development. It provides a global overview of ICT trends and policies in developing countries, covering issues such as financing infrastructure, the importance of public-private partnerships and effective competition to extending access, using ICT in doing business and formulating national e-strategies. The ICT At-a-Glance tables for 144 economies show the most recent national data on key indicators of ICT development. The data enable assessment and comparison both over time and across economies to assess ICT capacity, performance, progress and opportunities.
>> More Details | created on: 02/23/2007
Inequality and Poverty in Africa in an Era of Globalization: Looking Beyond Income to Health and Education
By David E. Sahn & Stephen D. Younger, Cornell Food and Nutrition Policy Program Working Paper No. 194 , November 25, 2005
This paper describes changes over the past 15-20 years in non-income measures of wellbeing - education and health - in Africa.
>> More Details | created on: 03/20/2006
The Economic Impact of Telecommunications on Rural Livelihoods and Poverty Reduction: A study of rural communities in India (Gujarat), Mozambique and Tanzania
By Prof. David Souter, Dr Nigel Scott, Prof. Christopher Garforth, Prof. Rekha Jain, Prof. Ophelia Mascarenhas & Dr. Kevin McKemey, DFID - UK Department for International Development, October, 2005
Aimed at a policy audience this paper looks at the use of various communications technologies in villages in Gujarat, Mozambique and Tanzania.
>> More Details | created on: 06/06/2006
Capitalism at the Crossroads
By Stuart L. Hart, Wharton School Publishing, March 30, 2005
Global capitalism stands at a crossroads—facing international terrorism, worldwide environmental change, and an accelerating backlash against globalization. Today's global companies are at a crossroads, too: finding new strategies for profitable growth has never been more challenging. Both sets of problems are intimately linked, says Stuart L. Hart—and so are the solutions.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
Agricultural Investment Sourcebook: Agriculture and Rural Development (Trade and Development)
World Bank, January 1, 2005
Investing to promote agricultural growth and poverty reduction is a central pillar of the World Bank’s current rural strategy, Reaching the Rural Poor (2003). One major thrust of the strategy outlines the priorities and the approaches that the public sector, private sector, and civil society can employ to enhance productivity and competitiveness of the agricultural sector in ways that reduce rural poverty and sustain the natural resource base. These actions involve a rich mixture of science, technology, people, communication, management, learning, research, capacity building, institutional development, and grassroots participation.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
Technology, Globalization and the Poor: Summary of the Global Knowledge for Development Virtual Conference
By John Paul, World Resources Institute, December 1, 2004
Can technology help make globalization work for the poor? Can the private sector use ICT to create, as CK Prahalad argues, "sustainable win-win scenarios where the poor are actively engaged and, at the same time, the companies providing products and services to them are profitable"? During four weeks in November and December 2004, GKD’s Technology, Globalization and the Poor online conference attempted to explore these questions. This PDF document is a searchable compilation of the discussion.
>> View Article | created on: 11/30/2005
Profits with Principles: Seven Strategies for Delivering Value with Values
By Ira Jackson & Jane Nelson, Currency, June 29, 2004
At a time when unethical business practices continue to dominate the business press, PROFITS WITH PRINCIPLES offers persuasive proof that when businesses combine profit making with a concern for values and the greater good, they do better in the marketplace than those that concentrate only on the bottom line.
>> More Details | created on: 02/14/2008
Privatizing Poland: Baby Food, Big Business, and the Remaking of Labor
By Elizabeth Dunn, Cornell University Press, June 1, 2004
The transition from socialism in Eastern Europe is not an isolated event, but part of a larger shift in world capitalism: the transition from Fordism to flexible (or neoliberal) capitalism. Using a blend of ethnography and economic geography, Elizabeth C. Dunn shows how management technologies like niche marketing, accounting, audit, and standardization make up flexible capitalismâs unique form of labor discipline. This new form of management constitutes some workers as self-auditing, self-regulating actors who are disembedded from a social context while defining others as too entwined in social relations and unable to self-manage.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
ICT for Poverty Alleviation
By Roger Harris, UNDP, 2004
This e-primer provides case studies and lessons learned on the use of information and communication technologies in poverty alleviation programmes and projects. A poverty alleviation framework is presented as a guide to analyze the impact of the case...
>> More Details | created on: 09/26/2006
Raising the Bar: Creating Value with the United Nations Global Compact
By Claude Fussler (editor) & Aron Cramer, et al, Greenleaf Publishing, 2004
Raising the Bar, produced by a unique team of business experts and UN agencies, is designed to fill a critical vide - poches the support of more than 1,000 organisations for the globally recognised Principles of the United Nations Global Compact and the need for this support to be translated into the day-to-day running of business to create value and improve performance.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
How to Change the World: Social Enrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas
By David Bornstein, Oxford University Press, December 1, 2003
What business entrepreneurs are to the economy, social entrepreneurs are to social change. They are, writes David Bornstein, the driven, creative individuals who question the status quo, exploit new opportunities, refuse to give up--and remake the world for the better.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
Education Sector Study: Pro-Poor Economic Growth Effects of Policies and Activities
By Jere R. Behrman, USAID Bur. for Economic Growth, Agriculture, and Trade, April, 2003
The paper reviews what is known and what is not known about the pro-poor economic growth effects of policies and activities in the educational sector, drawing on substantial literature in this area.
>> More Details | created on: 02/13/2006
Development as Freedom
By Amartya Sen, Anchor Books, August 15, 2000
Development as Freedom is a general exposition of the economic ideas and analyses of Amartya Sen, winner of the 1998 Nobel Prize in Economic Science. This brilliant and indispensable treatise compellingly analyzes the nature of contemporary economic development from the perspective of human freedom. Freedom, Sen persuasively argues, is at once the ultimate goal of economic life and the most efficient means of realizing general welfare. It is a good to be enjoyed by the world's entire population. Drawing on moral and political philosophy and technical economic analysis, this work gives the nonspecialist reader powerful access to Sen's paradigm-altering vision and vividly shows how he, in the words of the Nobel Prize committee, has both "restored an ethical dimension to the discussion of economic problems" and "opened up new fields of study for subsequent generations of researchers."
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution
By Paul Hawken & Amory Lovins, et al, Rocky Mountain Institute, 1999
For decades, environmentalists have been warning that human economic activity is exceeding the planet's limits. Of course we keep pushing those limits back with clever new technologies; yet living systems are undeniably in decline. These trends need not be in conflict—in fact, there are fortunes to be made in reconciling them. Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution, by Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, and L. Hunter Lovins, is the first book to explore the lucrative opportunities for businesses in an era of approaching environmental limits.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
Which World?: Scenarios for the 21st Century
By Allen Hammond, Island Press, June 1, 1998
Looking 50 years into the future, Which World? analyzes persistent, long-term trends -- demographic, economic, social, environmental, and security trends -- that are likely to shape and constrain the future. It develops three scenarios -- scenarios that reflect very different mindsets or world views -- to explore alternative possibilities for how the future may unfold. And it analyzes both trends and scenarios for each of 7 major world regions, combining information on each region’s political and cultural patterns, natural resource endowments, and social problems.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
Whose Reality Counts?: Putting the First Last
By Robert Chambers, ITDG Publishing, 1997
In this sequel to Rural Development: Putting the Last First Robert Chambers argues that central issues in development have been overlooked, and that many past errors have flowed from domination by those with power. Development professionals now need new approaches and methods for interacting, learning and knowing. Through analyzing experience – of past mistakes and myths, and of the continuing methodological revolution of PRA (participatory rural appraisal) – the author points towards solutions.In many countries, urban and rural people alike have shown an astonishing ability to express and analyze their local, complex and diverse realities that are often at odds with the top-down realities imposed by professionals.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
2025: Scenarios of Us and Global Society Reshaped by Science and Technology
By Joseph Coates & John Mahaffie, et al, Oakhill Press, September 1, 1996
Tapping the worlds of science and technology, this penetrating look at the years ahead paints a fascinating picture you're sure to enjoy. Looking backward from the year 2025, fifteen scenarios reflect a well-focused view of what life will be like in the United States as well as other societies (both affluent and less prosperous).
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005
Business as Partners in Development: Creating Wealth for Countries, Companies, and Communities
The International Business Leaders Forum, 1996
Published in collaboration with the World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme, this publication is aimed at every level of an organisation, and seeks to stimulate consideration of the new way of doing business. In the context of three billion people rapidly taking their place in market economies, the private sector has become the principal motor of development and a growth-test of economic strength.
>> More Details | created on: 11/30/2005