Middle East and Africa Experience Positive Connectivity Growth, According to Akamai’s ‘Second Quarter, 2016 State of the Internet Report’

Monday 03 October 2016

Dubai - MENA Herald: Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKAM), the global leader in content delivery network (CDN) services, today released its Second Quarter, 2016 State of the Internet Report, showcasing positive growth in connectivity across the Middle East. Based on data gathered from the Akamai Intelligent Platform™, the report provides insight into key regional and global statistics such as connection speeds, broadband adoption metrics, notable Internet disruptions, and IPv4 exhaustion and IPv6 implementation – all of which can be used for planning and development purposes, such as new market expansion or additional infrastructure investment.

Data and graphics from the Second Quarter, 2016 State of the Internet Report can be found on the Akamai State of the Internet site and through the Akamai State of the Internet app for iOS and Android devices. State of the Internet Report-related discussions are also taking place on the Akamai Community.

About half of the MEA countries surveyed posted quarterly gains in the second quarter, with average Internet speeds growing anywhere from 2.0% in Saudi Arabia to a robust 64% in Egypt. According to the World Bank, enhanced connectivity has been linked to increases in national productivity, competitiveness, and the ability to attract foreign direct investment.

“The continued increase in average connection speeds is a reassuring trend and we have seen a number of announcements in the region that bode well for further improving Internet connectivity between the MEA region and the rest of the world, including the landing of new high-capacity submarine cables in the region. However, recent Internet disruptions caused by everything from government-ordered blackouts to a lone monkey sparking a widespread outage are reminders of the many factors that can affect access to and use of the Internet that is so often taken for granted,” said David Belson, editor of Akamai’s State of the Internet Report.

Highlights from Akamai’s Second Quarter, 2016 State of the Internet Report:

Global Average Connection Speeds and Global Broadband Connectivity
Global average connection speed decreased 2.3% from the first quarter of 2016 to 6.1 Mbps, a 14% increase year over year.
All countries surveyed in MEA saw positive year-over-year changes in average connection speeds, with Kenya having again the largest jump (297%). Egypt and Qatar both more than doubled their average speeds compared with one year prior, while eight countries in the MEA region posted double-digit yearly gains.

Global average peak connection speed increased 3.7% to 36.0 Mbps in the second quarter, rising 2.5% year over year.
Qatar led the Middle East in average peak connection speeds, and was ranked fifth globally, with a 9.6% quarterly increase to 97.8 Mbps, while the UAE ranked 25th on the global scale with 9.1% quarterly increase to 66.1 Mbps.
Nine of the surveyed MEA countries saw higher average peak connection speeds in the second quarter compared with the first.

IPv4 and IPv6
The number of unique IPv4 addresses connecting to the Akamai Intelligent Platform was just over 800 million, which is 1% less than the first quarter of 2016.
Belgium remained the clear global leader in IPv6 adoption with 38% of its connections to Akamai occurring over IPv6, up 5.1% from the previous quarter.
Among the MEA countries, Saudi Arabia ranked 34th globally with a 1,2% adoption rate.

Mobile
Average mobile connection speeds ranged from a high of 23.1 Mbps in the United Kingdom to a low of 2.2 Mbps in Venezuela. Among the Middle Eastern countries, the United Arab Emirates recorded the highest average mobile connection speed (8.4 Mbps).

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