The promise of mobile web services, including WAP-based banking in developing countries is well established. Mobile banking, simply put, is transactions over a mobile network (via text message or connection to a data service) with a cash-in/cash-out agent (such as a local merchant or post office). This is a core piece of CGAP’s work. We share the belief that increased access to the online world can help transform the offline world (what some inelegantly call Meatspace). That has been true in wealthier nations and it is proving true in emerging markets. The need and the demand seem clear. Last month, Google and HSBC backed a plan to bring broadband backbone connectivity to telecoms and internet service providers in poor places. The venture is called O3b (”Other Three Billion”) and is easier said than done (remember Iridium, the failed satellite phone project?). As the Christian Science Monitor trimly puts it: “Are 16 satellites the answer to reaching 3 billion people?”

But…what if the entire way we get connected will be different in a few years time? Today’s telecom headlines include details of an effort to transmit wireless communications over visible light:

­Boston University’s College of Engineering is launching a program, under a National Science Foundation grant, to develop the next generation of wireless communications technology based on visible light instead of radio waves. Researchers expect to piggyback data communications capabilities on low-power light emitting diodes, or LEDs, to create “Smart Lighting” that would be faster and more secure than current network technology. (via Cellular News)

When it comes to getting connected, there is no shortage of mobile phones on this planet. The part of the UN that deals with telecom issues tells us that by the end of this year there will be some four billion mobile phone connections. Many of the handsets being sold around the world are still the basic, cheap models that do voice and text messaging. One of the more popular models in India even features a flashlight, which makes me think there’s a sales slogan in there somewhere (mobile phones can go where electricity cannot) or something silly like that.

The connectivity story in rural, poor places is changing fast. An increasing share of handset sales in Africa and Asia are capable of fast data speeds, enabling more robust services that are web-based. If O3b gets off the ground, it will enable millions of people to leapfrog copper wires and rudimentary mobile handsets, right to broadband web. If Boston University’s program succeeds, then that’s one more way to close that digital divide.