Google and HSBC back cheap Web access for Africa

By Kate Holton and Niclas Mika

LONDON/AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Internet firm Google and Europe's biggest bank HSBC have thrown their weight behind a plan to provide cheap, high-speed Web access via satellite to millions in Africa and other emerging markets.

Google has joined forces with the bank and cable operator Liberty Global to back a group called O3b Networks, which stands for the "other 3 billion" people who do not have access.

It will provide high-speed backhaul for telecoms operators and Internet providers, which can then sell services to businesses and consumers.

South African Finance Minister Trevor Manuel welcomed the project when speaking at a conference in Germany.

"The information gap is very real and clearly whatever we can do to close it must be encouraged," Manuel told a news conference in Berlin on the U.N.-backed Millennium development goals.

"Any initiative that can leapfrog over traditional means of getting information to people must be encouraged. Information is power and it supports democracy and it supports decision-making."

O3b networks said in a statement the satellites would be constructed by Thales Alenia Space and should be operational by the end of 2010.

The company's founder, Greg Wyler, told Reuters coverage would reach from Spain to South Africa, include most of South America, large parts of Asia and all South Pacific Islands.