Intelsat Wins Contract with the African Virtual University to Provide Internet Bandwidth Services

Business Wire, Sept 23, 2005

PEMBROKE, Bermuda -- Intelsat has been selected by the African Virtual University (AVU) as its strategic communications partner in an initiative to establish a higher education bandwidth consortium which will make Internet bandwidth more widely accessible to African universities. Using Intelsat's GlobalConnex(SM) Internet Trunking Service, this initiative will deliver cost-effective, reliable bandwidth to students, academics, and other users at 11 universities and two consortia in six African countries, initially.

The Partnership for Higher Education in Africa (PHEA), a body consisting of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, The Ford Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, have pooled their resources to fund universities in Africa. By leveraging economies of scale to achieve cost efficiencies and satisfy demand for Internet bandwidth services, the PHEA funding is channeled through the AVU, which selected Intelsat to provide the needed bandwidth.

Intelsat's network for the service consists of its teleport in Germany and the IS-903 and IS-904 satellites, both of which provide strong coverage of the region. The AVU, an international university based in Nairobi, Kenya affiliated with 56 learning centers and institutions in 27 countries in Africa, will provide some of its own content and source additional educational content from universities in the U.S., Australia and Europe. The partnership between the AVU, PHEA and Intelsat is geared toward achieving the AVU vision and mission of increasing access to tertiary education across the continent.

The AVU was established in 1997 as a World Bank project to assist sub-Saharan African countries in enhancing capacity availability to African universities through technical and administrative support and channeling brokered content. The AVU recognizes that lack of connectivity is a serious drawback for most of its partner institutions, which hampers the delivery of Open Distance and e-Learning programs, as well as access to digital resources. The AVU was identified by the PHEA as the ideal institution to manage the complex project based on its proven skills in purchasing and managing satellite-based distance education across its own centers in Africa.

Mamman Aminu Ibrahim, convener of the Nigeria Information and Communications Technology Forum of Partnership Institutions, said, "When African universities have the capacity to connect with the Internet at speeds approaching those available to others around the world, we will have taken one of the most important steps possible in our efforts to become a full member of the world's academic community. This is technology that is central to the transformation of higher education in Africa."

The Rector of the AVU, Kuzvinetsa Peter Dzvimbo, stated, "Most of the universities in Africa do not have access to reliable and affordable bandwidth, with some making do with less than one megabit per second. We are now in the process of publicizing this partnership so that more African universities can join the consortium or even form regional consortia for bandwidth and connectivity."

Derek Pierson, CFO, African Virtual University, added, "Intelsat is a strong, reliable partner that has a proven track record of successfully designing, implementing and operating long distance networks for education, telemedicine and disaster recovery in many countries around the world. Relying on Intelsat for this service gives African university students access to reliable, fast and continuous Internet connections, thereby opening doors for them personally, and providing long-lived value to the countries in which they live and work."

"One of the main reasons Intelsat was created over 40 years ago was to ensure that people around the world would have access to communications technology that would foster the spread of knowledge and encourage development," said Dave McGlade, CEO, Intelsat, Ltd. "It is fitting that Intelsat provides this service to African students, since making communications accessible is still a large part of our corporate mission. We are proud that GlobalConnex(SM), the latest in our efforts to make communications services reliable and affordable, will be used to deliver educational information that will build and shape the lives of the thousands of students who access it."

About Intelsat

Intelsat is a global communications provider offering flexible and secure services to customers in over 220 countries and territories. Intelsat has maintained a leadership position for over 40 years by distributing video, voice, and data for television and content providers, government and military entities, major corporations, telecommunications carriers, and Internet service providers. Intelsat's reach, power and expanding solutions portfolio deliver information reliably and quickly to every corner of the globe. For more information, visit www.intelsat.com.