Google 'reaches out' to Africa

Google has just signed an agreement to provide software for students and government officials of two East African countries: Kenya and Rwandan to promote the IT sector in this region.

On March 19, Google said it had agreed to establish a partnership with the Rwandan Ministry of Infrastructure and Kenya Education Network (KENET) - including students and teachers of 32 Kenyan universities.

According to the above agreement, in addition to using the Google Apps software package, students in the two countries together with Rwanda government officials will have access to free communication tools, including e-mail and calendar. share, instant messages and Google word processor.

Since last year, Google has begun to penetrate the enterprise software market with a set of free Web-based basic tools. Last month, Google also began offering registration services to businesses in need, which will pay to receive technical support and new features in Google applications.

Because Google Apps is distributed through a Web browser and requires little maintenance like traditional software, Google hopes it will reach millions of users in emerging markets to dominate the market share of the new business. this.

Three Rwandan universities include: National University, Kigali Institute of Education and Kigali Institute of Science and Technology and government departments will be able to use the Google Apps application package.

Meanwhile, nearly 50,000 University of Nairobi students will be the first to use Google Apps in Kenya. Subsequently, 150,000 students at other universities in Kenya will have access to this application package.

In December 2006, Google also signed an agreement with the Egyptian government to provide Google Apps to 3 million college students and 8 million secondary students in the country.