21 September 2010, 06:00 a.m.

As Africa becomes more connected by new, undersea cables, bringing faster Internet connection speeds, African businesses are expecting an online revolution, states the latest survey released this week.

According to the Telecoms Trends in Africa 2010 report, more than 90% of business decision-makers across Africa are expecting Internet prices to come down and competition to increase significantly. Previously African countries had to rely on slow and expensive forms internet connection like dial-up and satellite.

The survey, released by World Wide Worx and Database 360, was conducted on around 1100 African businesses of varying sizes in 20 countries. The survey also revealed that most African countries remained heavily reliant on slow or expensive forms of connectivity, such as dial-up and satellite. However, most are beginning the move to broadband.

“Our interviewers encountered tremendous enthusiasm for the Internet in all countries we surveyed,” the Managing Director of Database 360, Louise Robinson, told MyBroadband.co.za. “There is little doubt that, in this new connectivity era, the very nature of most businesses is changing.”

More than 40% of businesses surveyed were using ADSL-lines to connect, but satellite connectivity still remained a vital part of the Internet in Africa due to lapses in infrastructure in certain countries.

The survey highlighted Kenya and Uganda as the biggest African users of social networking for business while countries like Botswana and Zambia, whose fibre networks were recently updated, are quickly catching up.

In addition, the survey revealed that countries like Mauritius, Côte d'Ivoire and Namibia were already showing strong growth in ADSL usage by business.