Poa! Internet, an ISP (Internet Service Provider) that develops and delivers affordable internet to low-income communities in Nairobi through WiFi hotspots, has just announced that it is switching its model from data counting, where one is given a certain amount of data to spend based on the bundle they have purchased to offering unlimited data that will be charged hourly, daily, weekly or monthly.
The cream on top of this change is that Poa! Internet will be charging as low as Ksh.10 per hour. This move has placed the company at the peak of the competition such as Express WiFi by Facebook which, according to Poa!, charge around Ksh.27 per hour for WhatsApp usage (with the assumption that WhatsApp will consume around 44MB) compared to their 10 shillings charge.
“We believe the move to such cheap unlimited data will transform the way our customers use the Internet,” said Andy Halsall, Poa!’s Chief Executive Officer. “Our aim is that this move to internet ‘time’ instead of data counting – right down to the smallest unit of one hour – will put our users onto a completely different plane of communication and Internet use,” he added.
The company says that the unlimited bundles will represent an even greater dividend for their customers when using data heavy apps such as YouTube or watching movies. Poa! claims that watching a movie uses around 700MB of data an hour and so the cost of watching for two-hours when counting MB’s would be around Ksh700 but using Poa! Internet time bundles, the cost will be just Ksh20.
Poa! Internet is currently available in Kibera and Kawangware but the company plans to rapidly expand its community internet programme, which sets up its internet points in local schools, clinics and community buildings, giving free internet to these community groups while using the same internet points to offer low-cost access to paying users throughout the rest of the community.
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