As we move ever closer to a hyper-connected world, WAN optimization experts are set to have their work cut out as more and more devices join the online universe. And as the interconnected globe of tomorrow continues to spawn spinoff, connection-dependent technologies (from smart watches that monitor your health vitals, to sensors that detect and report on natural disasters before they happen, to smart fridges) WAN optimization methodologies that facilitate increased urgency in the access of information coming from billions of devices will be a central player in making the digital world of tomorrow possible.

Juliana Rotich is one of Kenya’s leading thinkers in the the information technology landscape. As member of the founding team of BRCK Inc, a hardware company that developed, designed and engineered self-powered, mobile Wi-Fi devices which connects people to the internet in areas with poor infrastructure, Rotich is passionate about making new networking technologies help people in need. She is also the founder of Ushahidi, an Open Source application developed to help displaced communities during the Kenyan post-election upheavals in 2008.

In her insightful TedTalk, this innovator addresses a few key challenges around Africa within the context of an increasingly digital world, a subject many WAN optimization experts on the continent can relate to as they grapple with the unique challenges of delivering business technology to enterprise organizations that typically operate across multiple borders within the continent.

The talk discusses technological challenges facing Africans, including:

• Unreliable power supply systems/grids and their effects on building an “online” continent
  
• The connectivity cost factors intrinsic to African countries
  
• The impacts of loss of connectivity on productivity, communications, etc.