Liquid Telecoms Expands Reach to Rural Communities in Malawi

Pan-African telecoms company, Liquid Telecom has announced that it will provide VSAT connectivity services to mbora, a pioneering new social enterprise in Malawi that is providing free connectivity to people living and working in rural areas through community hubs.

Each hub is serviced with broadband speeds of up to 36mbps, which in turn enables mbora and its content partners to digitally deliver their services to mbora users over a free internet connection. Liquid Telecom is using the latest High-Throughput-Satellite of its long-term partner Intelsat and providing an uncapped data service to mbora.

mbora is aiming to build 150 hubs encircling Lake Malawi and to expand across the region and according to the companies, the first community hub is now live in a lakeshore village near Mangochi.

“Malawi is one of the world’s least developed and poorest countries and yet it is blessed with great soils and the third largest body of water on the African continent. Rural communities in Malawi should be living wealthy and resilient livelihoods,” says Adrian Raisbeck, Founder and CEO of mbora.

“Fast and cost-effective connectivity is vital to mbora’s ability to provide Malawi with an alternative effective approach to rural development. We need to work with an operator that we trust and Liquid Telecom’s reputation is second to none. Its VSAT team are an extraordinary group of individuals who bought into our vision of launching rural economies with mbora Hubs acting as connected marketplaces and wealth creation platforms.”