In April, AFRINIC partnered with the International Exhibition on Information Technology and Innovation (OSIANE 2017) in Brazzaville, Congo. AFRINIC staff attended the event as part of its outreach and knowledge-share activities. Radha Ramphul, AFRINIC's Customer Service Manager, gives an overview of AFRINIC's activities during the event.

About OSIANE

The International Exhibition on Information Technology and Innovation (OSIANE 2017) took place from 11 - 14 April in Brazzaville, Congo, at the “Palais Des Congres”. The event was an initiative of the association PRATIC with the support of the local regulator L’Agence de régulation des postes et des communications électroniques (ARPCE).

The name OSIANE was derived from the different objectives that the event set out to address:

• Opportunities (B2B meeting, product exhibitions and exchanges with economic and political decision-makers).
• Services (presentation of platforms and application development environment).
• Innovation (understand its key role and strengthen the competitiveness of companies).
• Accessibility (put in place favorable conditions to provide quality internet to users).
• Numeric (making visible the contribution of ICTs in a diversified and inclusive economy).
• Entrepreneurship (setting up a favorable environment for the development of digital tools, conquering niches and accompanying Congolese startups).

AFRINIC's Activities

During the events, AFRINIC led or participated in the following activities:

Panel Session

AFRINIC’s CEO, Alan Barrett, participated in a panel discussion on the challenges of the digital transformation and innovation in the African region. The theme was "“Quels sont les enjeux de la transformation numérique et de l'innovation dans les économies africaines?"

During the discussion he identified three aspects of digital transformation: technology, capacity building, and regulation. Under technology, he talked about the need to deploy IPv6, set up Internet exchange points (IXPs), and cross-border links. In regard to capacity building, he talked about AFRINIC's training and certification programmes, and the FIRE Africa awards and grants programme. For regulation, Alan noted that the cities of Brazzaville and Kinshasa are separated by only a few kilometres, and each city has an IXP, but no ISPs have connections to both exchange points: he urged regulators to make it easy for ISPs to connect across the border. 

CEO Interview

Alan was also interviewed by SocialNetLink and you can read more about it here.

AFRINIC INRM and IPV6 Training courses

From 11 -14 April, 34 network engineers took part in AFRINIC's world-class free training courses, learning how to manage their Internet number resources and to deploy IPv6. One participant deployed IPv6 in his office network by end of the training - congratulations!

AFRINIC Members Session

AFRINIC has 14 members in the Republic of Congo, including ISPs and mobile operators, governments and regulators and private business sector companies. A meeting was held on 11 April for AFRINIC’s Members to meet with Radha Ramphul, AFRINIC’s Customer Services Manager, to discuss their membership, IP address allocations an any other issues of importance to the AFRINIC community. Targeted meetings enable us to get direct feedback about the unique issues that affect our members in a particular country. Several topics were discussed, and many focused heavily on IPv4 exhaustion, AFRINIC community policies and policy proposals under discussion, the critical need to deploy IPv6, and AFRINIC services and initiatives. We met several enthusiastic members that would like to engage more with AFRINIC in regards to policy discussions, RPKI, FIRE AFRICA, RIPE ATLAS and requesting their additional resources. AFRINIC/RIPE Atlas probes were also handed out and existing probes holders were encouraged to continue supporting this initiative.

AFRINIC Booth

From 11-14 April, AFRINIC’s on-site booth was busy. AFRINIC staff held several face-to-face meetings with AFRINIC members and informed interested potential members on the benefits of membership, how they can become a member how and how they can get IPv4, IPv6 and Autonomous System Numbers (ASNs) from us.

Many students from the different universities were excited to learn how the Internet works, the role AFRINIC plays within the AFRICAN region and why IPv6 should be deployed.  A few Computer Science students expressed their interest in attending IPv6 Training in future.

The FIRE Africa small Grants & Awards program run by AFRINIC also attracted interested software developers at our booth: they work on community network projects and thanked AFRINIC for such an initiative.

Meeting the Minister of Posts and Telecommunications

On 14 April, Alan attended a courtesy meeting with Minister of Posts and Telecommunications of the Republic of Congo, Hon. Mr Tbombo, together with Pierre Dandjinou (ICANN) and Emmanuel Adjovi (OIF), to reiterate AFRINIC's support for developing the African Internet.

Partnership

AFRINIC supports local and regional initiatives that promote capacity building in the African region and was proud to have partnered with OSIANE 2017.

We would like to seize the opportunity to thank the event organisation committee and local hosts for all the assistance. Last but not least, our congratulations for the event's resounding success.