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Will solar bring new revolution in mobile world?
By siliconindia
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Kampala / Hong Kong: Ugandan based handyman Jackson Mawa has seen a impressive growth in his business since he has bought a solar powered mobile phone, reports Reuters.
"I am self-employed. Sometimes people call me and they find my cell phone is off. I have been having that problem a lot due to battery charging. So, when Uganda Telecom brought out the solar phones, since I got it, since that very day, I have never had any problem with my phone," said Mawa.
It might not sound like much, but for Mawa and millions of people in Africa and Asia, with no connection to electricity grids or unreliable and expensive power access, these little solar-powered gadgets are proving to be revolutionary. Farmers can check market prices before deciding which crop seeds to sow, speak to buyers from their fields and get weather forecasts. Unlike with standard mobile phones, they don't have to worry about their phone battery losing power.
Solar cell phones could build on the economic advantages that mobile phones have already brought to far-flung regions of Africa and the Indian subcontinent, including price transparency and more accurate and timely information.
Mobile phone penetration in these regions has been held back by a lack of electricity, there is simply no way to charge a cell phone in many rural areas of developing countries. An estimated 1.6 billion people have no access to electricity at all, while another one billion people have no electricity for much of the day, according to estimates by development groups. Most of these people live in sunny climates, and this is where solar mobile phones come in. "If you look at the map of countries with low tele-density, there is plenty of sunshine everywhere," says Rajiv Mehrotra, Chairman of VNL, a company making solar-powered mobile network base stations in India.
Take Uganda as a case in point; Just eight percent of the country's 32 million plus population have electric grid access. Even when the grid is there, like where Mawa lives in Mulago, a poor suburb of Kampala, the power is costly and the service is intermittent. "In our area, electricity is expensive so at six o'clock in the morning, we turn our power off until six in the evening," said Mawa, 29, sitting on a step outside his house.
Until solar cell phones were introduced, charging a phone in remote areas, off the electricity grid, entailed a bone-jarring journey to the nearest town, where the phone battery could be charged at kiosks run on generators for relatively hefty fees.
The journey might take all day and the battery charge fee might cost more than that day's lost wages. There are more than three billion people using mobile phones around the world and most of the next billion users will come from emerging markets, particularly in the countrysides of these markets. "There is a significant opportunity within developing markets where there is limited access to grid electricity," said Windsor Holden, Principal Analyst, Juniper Research.
The makers of solar cell phones such as Nokia, Samsung and ZTE, see the rural poor in these emerging markets as their main customer base rather than carbon-conscious consumers in the West. "People's need to communicate is very high. It's running miles ahead of the power grids expansions," says Anne Larilahti, Head of Environmentally Sustainable Business, Nokia Siemens Networks.
The potential in rural India for cell phone makers and operators is huge. India had nearly 500 million wireless users, and around 10 million new users are signing up each month. That doesn't count the millions in India's remote villages where electricity is rare or non-existent.
Solar phones are not new. Nokia sold a model a dozen years ago, but with technology development their usability and prices are starting to reach masses. About an hour of solar charging offers around 5-10 minutes of talk time. Selling at around $60, Samsung Solar Guru features FM radio, MP3 ring tones, embedded games and a torch light.
If demand for such phones really takes off, it is a risk for Nokia, who likely cannot watch for long from aside as its market share in India and in Africa is 60-70 percent. With proper positioning and pricing, solar-powered cell phones could reach about two billion people across the globe who have no access to electricity. Aside from the commercial opportunities, there are very real economic benefits. "A major appeal of solar-powered cell phones is the growing consumer demand for environmentally sustainable mobile phone devices, and annual sales of greener phones could grow to 105 million handsets by 2014," said Holden.
The world's largest consumer electronics sector by volume, the cell phone industry is keen to tap consumers' increasing interest in more environmentally friendly phones. The sector is closely followed by environmental organizations due to its large scale. More than one billion phones are sold globally each year, which requires the use of sales boxes, add-ons and tonnes of raw materials including rare metals.
Solar phones still have a long way to go in terms of offering sophisticated features already existing in conventional handsets, and some doubt if it's green features help reduce carbon emissions in a significant way.
Sony Ericsson and Nokia are rolling out phones with greener features such as lower energy consumption, use of recycled materials, smaller packages and electronic user manuals. Meanwhile, Samsung and ZTE are pushing ahead with solar phones and Sharp is releasing its own model in Japan this year. It's not clear what Nokia's plans are in the solar phone department as it keeps a tight lid on its future product lines.