Energy/Communication Parallels: Straight to Solar?
Katie Fehrenbacher ask today on Earth2Tech whether evolution future energy infrastructure in developing markets might mirror the leapfrogging dynamic we've seen in the past decade with communications in these same markets?
It's an apt question—even with the upfront investment needed in mobile devices and infrastructure, takeup has been increasingly robust, in part because of the perceived return on investment by customers: I pay a little more, I can do a lot more. And operators and device makers have increasingly optimized their products and services for this market. Katie cites several analysts who believe solar may indeed follow the same path, and is perhaps already doing so.
Energy is a critical layer of the emerging BoPNet—the infrastructure ecosystem that is evolving uniquely around the needs of developing markets. It will benefit from the proof of concept this mobile evolution has provided. Over time, successful growth in these cost-sensitive markets should provide innovations in design, service and business model that can be ported back to developed markets, and, like other BoP innovations, can provide needed changes in resilient communications, transport, energy, health care and other critical sectors for the rest of the world.
These are all topics we will be discussing next week at our upcoming workshop. We'll report here on the new ideas and insights that emerge.
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