Transformation of a Community
Samal Island is located in the southern Philippines, off the largest island in the archipelago, Mindanao, and is about the size of Singapore. Samal lies across Davao Bay from the largest city in Mindanao, Davao City, and is largely dependent on tourism. However, like much of the Philippines outside Manilla, Internet connectivity is patchy to non-existent. This means that critical medical and other services are hard to reach for the roughly 120,000 inhabitants. Power is also not linked to the Mindanao grid (the power cables were damaged by ship anchors, and were never repaired), and depends on diesel generators on the island. Outages occur frequently, disrupting life and services.
In many ways Samal is a microcosm representing the larger nation of 105 million, representing around 0.1% of both land mass and population.
In 2018, we joined hands with TierOne Communications, in the formation of a multi-disciplinary consortium to tackle the problems, starting with telecommunications infrastructure. Energywise, an Australian company specializing in solar micro-grids and battery technology, brought much-needed distributed generation know-how to the consortium.
On June 12th we switched on the first Ammbr mesh routers on the island. Over the next 12 months, Samal Island will begin a period of rapid transformation as a result of the telecommunications and power upgrades, as well as the improved health and emergency services.
This island-wide deployment is an important step in understanding and measuring the impact of the various initiatives. Understanding the economics, user acceptance, technical challenges, and practical deployment difficulties will contribute to better execution in the grater Mindanao, as well as in other parts of the world. Achieving scale is massively dependent on not turning small mistakes into big mistakes. For this reason Samal Island will contribute disproportionately to our mission, in the Philippines and beyond.
To understand the relative complexity of this island deployment, consider that the topology and environment. Samal Island is mountainous, covered in dense tropical shrubbery, and the population is spread over a large area. A fairly dense blanket of Wi-Fi coverage is required to provide service across the island. However, no fiber optic network makes it to the island, and long-range wireless links must be established, from Davao City to the west to the island, in order to pipe in broadband. At a later date, with usage data to substantiate the investment, fiber optic cables will be laid to increase capacity.
To provide line-of-sight fast backbone to the island, TierOne is building six large telecom towers and many smaller towers to clear the tree canopy for efficient radio links.
To the east of Samal Island, Mindanao wraps around the Bay of Davao, and there are significant settlements and mining towns facing the island. The town of Banaybanay houses over 40,000 people. Several other settlements dotted along the coast add to this number .These towns have no Internet access. TierOne is planning to establish wireless links across to these communities from Samal, giving them Internet for the first time.
The economics of this deployment must be finely balanced, keeping in mind the financial capability of the population. This is where the Ammbr mesh router equipment shines. These versatile and cost-effective devices will be used across the range of requirements, service long-distance links, wireless backhaul in point-to-point-to-point setups, mesh topology, and for access points.
The use of blockchain technology to reduce friction in financial transactions across a diverse set of stakeholders is the ultimate strength of the Ammbr system. As other networks are deployed around the world, the Ammbr network will feature true seamless roaming. Any user from any Ammbr network will be able to receive service on any Ammbr network, anywhere in the world. There will also be no breakage (the value you lose when your telecom package “expires”).
Decentralized telecom, combined with decentralized power generation, offers people a first glimpse of self-sufficiency. It also illustrates the power of decentralized systems to safeguard critical capacity, addressing concerns such as power/food/telecommunications security and sovereignty.
Other Ammbr deployments will be publicized in the coming weeks and months, but we will always remember Samal Island for where the first commercial activities began.