Greg Wyler - Agenda Setters 2008

Name: Greg Wyler

Title: O3b founder and CEO

Position: 25    Last year: Not ranked

Why? Bringing the internet to the 'other three billion'

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Greg Wyler is the founder of O3b Networks, which aims to make the internet accessible and affordable for billions of people in emerging and developed markets - O3b stands for the 'other three billion'.

O3b will accomplish this by building a global internet backbone which connects the networks of developed countries with people who have limited access in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East.

A serial tech entrepreneur, Wyler previously pioneered the first commercial 3G mobile and fibre-to-the-home networks in Africa.

The Agenda Setters panel said Wyler should be recognised for "providing help to some of the poorest in the world in a contextual manner - not forcing Western thought processes down the throats of people who know what the problem is, what the solution probably is, but just don't have the wherewithal to go about doing it".

Now that Wyler has secured backing for the O3b service from Google, HSBC and Liberty Global, his next challenge is overseeing the expected 2010 launch.