For quite some time, VoIP telephony and Unified Communications tools (voice, instant messaging, video calls, audio conference, and presence combined into a single communication stream) have proliferated on many markets, and now it appears as though Africa too is on the brink of this communications revolution. With technology evolving so fast, businesses in developing areas of the world are catching on to the need to deploy robust communications tools.

By taking advantage of both VoIP and UC, companies benefit from cost savings and increased functionality which, in turn, improve business processes and boost productivity.

As the number of reliable Internet connections increases, so does the number of businesses that can leverage IP telephony. With that in mind, let’s take a look at two countries in particular—South Africa and Nigeria—and how VoIP and UC are making an impact there.

South Africa Eager to Embrace Mobility and BYOD

When it comes to deploying modern communications solutions on the African content, South Africa is a trailblazer. With a 41% penetration rate among users, the Internet is definitely on the rise.

According to Ovum, as far as adopting VoIP telephony goes, South African enterprises are even ahead of their global counterparts. 87 percent of them have already adopted IP PBX solutions, that is 7 percent above the global average. What’s more, 91 percent of large South African enterprises already set up a plan to use UC and collaboration applications in their processes in the coming years.

Breaking the research down a little more, we can observe the following:

• 58 percent of businesses use instant messaging and presence, while 26 percent of them plan to use the tools within the next two years.

• 38 percent have standard UC tools—like unified messaging, presence and softphone—while 26 percent of them plan to deploy them within the next two years.

• 64 percent use audio or Web conferencing, while 18 percent plan to deploy the technology within the next two years.

In addition to those figures, South Africa seems to be embracing mobility and the BYOD movement at a fast pace. 53 percent of businesses offer support for company-approved, employee-owned smartphones, while 33 percent offer support for any employee-owned smartphone.

For service providers, things are looking good on the horizon. South African businesses seem to be more open to public and private cloud delivery options than their neighbors. In this respect, they resemble more North America and Europe.

Nigeria Has Ambitious Plans for Business Communication

Nigeria may not have been so fast at developing Internet infrastructure, but it definitely has the most ambitious plans. At the end of 2013, Communication Technology Minister Omobola Johnson stated that Nigeria plans to reach 30% broadband Internet penetration by 2017.  For more details, here’s a link to Nigeria’s National Broadband Plan 2013 – 2018.

According to a recent report, for the time being only 25 percent of Nigerian businesses’ outgoing voice traffic is routed over Internet connections. Still, since more infrastructure is being built, the rate is expected to increase in the near future. “With Unified Communications gaining traction in Nigeria, VoIP adoption by businesses is expected to grow because it offers an even cheaper platform for making voice calls,” explains Oluwole Babatope, telecommunications analyst at IDC West Africa.

Poor quality of service—which was a problem even in the United States in VoIP’s early days—is a major reason IP telephony adoption hasn’t taken off in the country, as reported by IDC. As technology continues to improve and companies can safely rely on providers to deliver a high quality of service, one can expect to see Nigerian enterprises adopt the modern communications tools with more frequency.