Glo 1, Ready for the Big Bang

The Nigeria telecom industry has been a compelling tale of a sector which rose from an economy long hobbled by political instability, corruption, and poor macroeconomic management.
To put it with a swagger, the Nigeria's telecom industry has experienced exceptional growth rates and has now surpassed South Africa as the largest mobile telecom market in Africa.
Regrettable however, the growth is not even. 
The country’s Internet sector has been hindered by the underdeveloped and unreliable fixed-line infrastructure as well as the epileptic nature of Sat-3, touted as technology and commercial breakthrough of unparalleled significance for Africa.
As a result of this, bandwidth or rather the lack of it, affects the ability for Nigeria to communicate with the world at large.
A hope of cheap bandwidth was however bolstered last week as Glo submarine cable system named Glo 1, made a historic landing in Alfa Beach, Lagos.
Though, the continent will soon be inebriated with submarine fibre optic cables as at least seven other  networks with an aggregate of 10.94 terabytes capacity, land in almost all the coastal countries of Africa; Glo 1 promises a more profound big bang.
Mike Adenuga, chief promoter of Globacom, owners of Glo 1 said that the submarine cable system will translate into many possibilities in the Information and Communications sector of the Nigerian economy including telemedicine, eCommerce and eGovernance among other practices that transform economies.
The 9800km cable is come from Bude in UK and connected Nigeria to the rest of West Africa and the UK.
Apart from Nigeria it also has landing points in London and Lisbon in Portugal and is deploying 16 branching units to connect countries in West Africa.
It is another first from Globacom as the first single telecommunication company in the world to own its submarine cable and a bold step to giving Nigeria the lead in the magical broadband revolution in Africa.
It will boost economic activities in the region, create job opportunities and serve companies in Europe and Africa.
Glo 1 will drive further convergence of voice, data and video/TV, enabling the provision of triple-play services that will ultimately also involve the country’s broadcasting sector.
For the ordinary man on the street, Glo 1 brings speed and affordability of electronic communication. This means internet access and data transmission will be cheaper and voice communication on the internet could be free.
These are necessary to enable Nigeria  to catch up with the rest of the world at a faster rate.