Ericsson has announced plans to set up an Innovation Center in sub-Saharan Africa to develop mobile applications to meet the needs of poor and rural populations.

The center -- with hubs in Kenya, South Africa and Nigeria -- will provide mobile product in health, education, agriculture, small business development, finance, government services and the overall improvement of communication capabilities.

Mobile communication significantly improves quality of life, providing the tools to deliver enormous socioeconomic benefits to people in developing countries, said Jan Embro, president of Ericsson in the sub-Saharan region.

"The center is an important step in Ericsson's ongoing commitment to support the achievement of the U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals," Embro said. "Connectivity helps to offset a lack of resources, particularly in rural areas."

Initially, the Ericsson Innovation Center will concentrate on mobile applications that can enable health workers to gather, monitor and share data on births, deaths and epidemics, and to use smart mobile decision support tools in their daily work.

The Innovation Center will also develop business cases that enable network operators to introduce and expand mobile broadband services in Africa and other emerging markets, with an emphasis on developing affordable, sustainable applications and services for rural communities.

"The Innovation Center will employ local expertise, and encourage the creation of sustainable business models and applications relevant to Africa," Embro said.

The decision to establish the center is backed by a report by the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization, which revealed that the demand for mobile services in developing countries is not being met.

The report also states that, in the future, healthcare and job-related services will top the list of in-demand services, while Internet over mobile, remittances and mobile banking may also be in demand.

This initiative is expected to extend Ericsson's ongoing international projects, such as the Millennium Villages. The initiative reaches over half a million people across 10 countries and aims to lift rural African communities out of extreme poverty. Ericsson has committed to providing Internet connectivity to each of the Millennium Villages sites.

The IDG News Service is a Network World affiliate.