New role for Tristan Thompson
Tristan Thompson took a new job at World Mobile, where he will serve as Chief Digital Equity Officer, a C level role that the company and outside reports say will focus on getting more people online, especially in places with weak service.
What World Mobile does
World Mobile runs a network that uses small community devices called AirNodes to give last mile coverage for voice and data, and the company sells devices and plans to let local people host and run parts of the network as a way to reach remote areas without big towers. The firm posts details about AirNodes and how people can earn rewards on its site.
Funding and pilot programs
Reports say Thompson will lead a Community Connectivity Fund, a fund worth millions that will back pilot projects and local builds, and this fits with World Mobile work on grants and programs it already runs, including a $25 million program it announced with Tenity to support projects in the same space. The firm has used grants and pilots to test tech in parts of Africa and elsewhere. TMZ
Why this matters now
A large gap in access still exists around the world, with about 2.6 billion people offline in 2024, which equals roughly a third of the global population, and that gap affects schooling, jobs, small business work and access to basic services, so private projects that lower the cost of local service will have real payoff if they reach people in hard to serve places. ITU
How this links to tech and money
World Mobile builds a hybrid network that mixes local AirNodes and partner networks and it has been working on a chain and testnet to power payments and staking for node operators, which lets people run parts of the network and get paid in token or cash for the coverage they provide, and those design choices have driven both interest and some criticism from local groups and regulators in markets the firm enters.
My analysis
This hire makes sense as a public move. A known athlete who also speaks about crypto and tech gives the company a bigger stage, while the firm gets a name that can open doors to partners and to public interest. The real test will be local launches and clear numbers that show people get stable service at a low cost, and not only a short lived pilot that ends when the money runs out.
If World Mobile can move from pilot to steady revenue in several countries, then the model could scale. If not, the work will still help the debate on new ways to fund local networks, but it will not fix the core problem, which is the high cost of getting signal into thinly populated places. I see the hire as a step that raises public focus fast, but it will mean little without solid results on the ground.
Sources: TMZ.com
