Starlink offers free internet to 5,000 SA schools

Elon Musk’s Starlink will connect 5,000 rural schools if it is allowed to operate in South Africa, it says.

Starlink Market Access senior director Ryan Goodnight made the offer in a letter to Trade, Industry & Competition Minister Parks Tau on Saturday, which emerged on Wednesday.

Instead of having to give a 30% shareholding to previously disadvantaged people, Starlink will be able to invest in so-called equity equivalent investment programmes (EEIPs).

“Today, millions of children are being denied access to education resources because SA broadband networks do not extend to the most rural parts of the country. This is a problem we want to help solve,” wrote Goodnight.

“As per our referent submission to your office, if EEIPs are recognised for individual licence holders, Starlink proposes to provide more than 5,000 rural schools with fully funded Starlink kits and service in addition to facilitating the installation/maintenance support alongside local SA companies.

“Not only will this help the SA government achieve its objectives under SA Connect, but our EEIP will support local businesses and will positively impact the lives of an estimated 2.4-million schoolchildren each year by providing access to world-class digital education.”

Reaching for the Starlink

Last month, Communications minister Solly Malatsi gazetted a new policy directive that allowed the Independent Communications Authority of SA, the regulator, to use BEE regulations designed for the broader information and communication technology (ICT) sector that allow for equity equivalent investment programmes – instead of the strict 30% equity requirement that has previously been required for a telecommunications licence.

Malatsi quite rightly describes this as “a mechanism to accelerate broadband access”.

Millions of South Africans living in rural parts of the country have been left behind by the broadband revolution. It’s expensive to maintain cellular infrastructure, especially with unreliable electricity.

Starlink can change this divide between the broadband haves and have-nots, albeit about $50 (R900) a month based on the P688 fee in neighbouring Botswana. The standard base station costs $370 (P5,000/R6,700) and the mini $177. (P2,400/R3,200). There’s a cheaper data package that costs $30 (P400/R530) a month.

Goodnight said Starlink operates in 150 countries.

“The problem lies in that Icasa’s licensing regulations are not appropriately aligned with the BBBEE ICT sector code. Said another way, the law already supports what Icasa’s regulations do not,” he wrote.