Internet users in the Country: Registered Dialup accounts: 40,000 Population: 23 million

Is it really the number of Internet users that's going to decide the future of web design in Nepal? And what are web designers up to these days? Let's go interview some.

Mr. Deepesh Pradhan, Chief Operations Officer of Yomari, Inc, a web designing company in Kathmandu says, "Today customers are more serious about building better websites and using it effectively to sell their products. So today web designing companies must work from outside in, thinking from customer's prospective and building sites to solve customer's problems. I think it will take another 2 to 3 years for our banks and financial institutions to go online with their e-commerce website. As for Internet users to increase, the telephone line per house must increase. Today telephone is only in 5% of Nepali homes. This leaves us with ample prospects for future web business in Nepal"

Unofficial records provide the following registered dial-up accounts in Nepal

About 90% of these accounts are shared. The maximum sharing of an account is obviously done by Internet café, whose average score is found to be a thousand users per account per year, while private companies have upto 25 users per account per year. On family basis on average, sharing of an Internet account is 7 users per account, this includes the account being used by the account owner's friends or relatives. These all small numbers of dial-up internet accounts and users add up to only a tiny fraction of the Internet reach in a country of population of 22 million! Perhaps the numbers are so tiny and so discouraging enough that there are still no official data on the Internet usage in the country. Many web developers claim that Nepali portal, e-commerce websites of banks, schools, shopping centers, films, entertainment and a complete web based online public services from government will mushroom as the number of Internet users grows.

Mr. Rajat Kayastha, a marketing cooridnator of Mercantile Communications, says, "Data-bank of the overall Information Technology resource and utilization in the country including computers, software, hardware, web design, and hosting services, rates and standards would enable many IT companies in Nepal to use those data to create and develop better solutions for customers. Right now we do not have any data. We need a thorough census to collect and review Data and use that data towards the development IT in Nepal."  Next.. >