Comments for Coming Soon to Africa: XLBrowser, a Mobile Browser Powered by SMS

Coming Soon to Africa: XLBrowser, a Mobile Browser Powered by SMS

2009-02-16T13:34:43Z

Mobile-XL, a mobile technology company, have just announced a partnership with Nokia, one of the world's top mobile handset manufacturers, to embed their company's XLBrowser into some handsets that will ship to parts of Africa beginning in March. The XLBrowser, designed for use in emerging markets, lets users search for information like news, currency conversion, finance information, weather, and more from their mobile phones. But don't be fooled - this is no ordinary web browser - it's powered entirely by SMS.

]]> For most of us in the developed world, browsing the mobile web means whipping out our new favorite smartphone and launching a web browser that nearly mimics the one we have on our home computer. Unfortunately, other parts of the world aren't so lucky. In emerging markets, you're more likely to see SMS used for information retrieval - not mobile browsers - for reasons that include everything from lack of infrastructure to the high costs of mobile internet data plans.

In parts of Africa, there simply is no mobile internet access available...but there is the ability to send SMS. Enter Mobile-XL. With their browser's graphical, easy-to-use interface, people with limited or no internet access finally have an entry point to vast resources of the web. The application, which works on Java-based phones with either GPRS or Bluetooth functionality, provides access to news, weather, flight status, package tracking, dictionary, thesaurus, translations, local 411, games, music, access to email, and more.

The XLBrowser doesn't have to be pre-installed on handsets in order for people to use it. If customers have a GPRS-enabled phone, they can text "XLB" to 3663 (for Kenya) or 7197 (for Uganda) or 3112 (for Tanzania). However, they will need a Bluetooth-activated PC or laptop to store the file that's downloaded from the link. The file then needs to be transferred to the handset using Bluetooth. For obvious reasons, having phones which are already equipped with the browser will give more people access to the mobile web, especially in places where PCs and laptops are hard to come by.

Says Guy Kamgaing-Kouam, CEO of Mobile-XL, "we're taking a gigantic step toward realizing our mission of bridging the digital divide." His company has been working since 2005 to develop a simple and affordable technology that could bring internet services to the underserved markets of the world.

The new partnership agreement between Nokia and Mobile-XL will deliver the XLBrowser in phones initially shipped to Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania as early as March 2009.

Comment from Alex Trup on 2009-02-16

2009-02-16T14:24:20Z

This seems like a really good idea, although the fact you still need a GPRS connection once you've actually acquired the browser to do the surfing is still a barrier (both in terms of technology and concept) to a lot of people in these target countries. I gave the online demo a try and it works quite well.

When I lived in Shanghai, China there were a few interactive SMS services which worked quite well for looking up restaurants and other listings. Those were of course limited to a certain extent but I think if someone could build the equivalent of (or even simply parse) the Google search experience into SMS (i.e. text your search term, receive an SMS with the top 5-10 results [usually enough to find what you need], you text back the option number of the search result you want and are then sent multiple SMSs containing the text content), that could really be the solution for these markets. Of course with this solution you couldn't really get music or images unless it also handled MMS, but I think that's really not what the majority of people need.

Anyway, an interesting project I'll definitely be following.

Comment from Dana Mech on 2009-02-16

2009-02-17T03:41:51Z

Actually - you don't need GPRS at all. The XLBrowser works on mobile phones using only SMS! You CAN download the application via GPRS - or purchase the application pre-installed on your Nokia phone or download the application onto your phone from a computer. Once its on your phone - its all run by SMS - but works just like a browser.

Comment from Q dub on 2009-02-18

2009-02-19T03:50:16Z

I'm a HUGE fan of the concept around "bringing back the command line" via SMS in developing countries. SMS-query driven surfing is not sexy, but is good enough to give people access to critical information where infrastructure is thin (thus low capacity) and devices are low-end.

Comment from Daniel Kuria on 2009-04-27

2009-04-28T02:09:15Z

Guys this is the next big thing as far bas communication is concerned.
Bringing information and infortainment down to the grassroots.