Huawei has joined the Smart Africa Alliance as Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) advisor and Platinum member at the Smart Africa Board Meeting. The partnership with the Smart Africa Alliance is one of Huawei’s efforts to drive digital transformation in Africa.

Smart Africa is a bold and innovative commitment from African Heads of State and Government to accelerate sustainable socio-economic development on the continent, ushering Africa into a knowledge economy through affordable access to Broadband and usage of Information and Communications Technologies.

H.E. Paul Kagame, the President of Rwanda, has revealed the Smart Africa Manifesto, the foundation of this initiative, is based on 5 principles: To put ICT at the center of our national socio-economic development agenda; To improve access to ICT especially Broadband; To improve accountability, efficiency and openness through ICT; To put the Private Sector First; To leverage ICT to promote sustainable development.

Dr. Hamadoun Touré, Executive Director of Smart Africa Secretariat extended a warm welcome to Huawei: “One of the key objectives of the Smart Africa initiative is to strengthen the Public-Private collaboration to accelerate the ICT development in Africa. As a global leading ICT solutions provider, Huawei has been continuously making significant contributions to provide telecom connectivity, especially broadband connections to Africa, giving African people access to affordable broadband network.

“We are more than happy that Huawei has joined us to partner with African governments, ITU, GSMA, the World Bank, and all the other Smart Africa members, to transform Africa through ICTs. We believe Huawei’s expertise and experience will promote African countries’ digital economy and improve their global competitiveness.”

Jimmy Pang, Huawei Vice President，discussed the Smart Africa’s vision at the Board Meeting with ICT ministers from various African countries, and said: “The key to accelerate Africa’s digital economy is to improve ICT infrastructure, upgrade the digitalization of every industry, and promote the knowledge-sharing and skill transfer. We will continuously support the Smart Africa initiative, in collaboration with all related stakeholders to increase the connectivity of Africa, and build a smart Africa together.”

Today in the afternoon, Huawei joined the Board Meeting of Smart Africa, and shared its insights on how to leverage ICT to develop Africa’s social-economy with board members of Smart Africa, head of states from African countries, including the host of the 27th African Union Summit, H.E. Paul Kagame, the President of Rwanda, who is also the chairman of the Smart Africa Board.

Huawei entered Africa in 1998, and has been improving connectivity in over 50 African countries through providing advanced telecom network services and affordable smart devices. Huawei will assist Smart Africa to deploy its flagship projects, and push Africa’s digital economy through experience-sharing and ICT talents cultivation.