Author: Akin Naphtal

Japanese automaker, Honda Motor Company, has announced its intent to enter a joint venture with General Motors (GM) and the latter’s self-driving robotaxi unit, Cruise, to begin a driverless ride service in Japan in early 2026. In a statement, Honda said that the three companies were looking to establish the joint venture in the first half of 2024 pending regulatory approval. Honda said in 2018 it would invest $2 billion in Cruise, which currently offers limited ride services in San Francisco, over 12 years. Cruise’s chief executive, Kyle Vogt, said with the joint venture, the companies hope to commercialise autonomous…

SpaceX CEO and owner of X (formerly Twitter), Elon Musk, says the social media platform will soon launch two new tiers of premium subscriptions.”One is lower cost with all features, but no reduction in ads, and the other is more expensive, but has no ads,” Musk posted on X. He, however, did not provide more details on the subscription plans.X has rolled out “Not A Bot”, a test case subscription on 17th October, aiming to “bolster our already significant efforts to reduce spam, manipulation of our platform and bot activity reduce spam, manipulation of the platform and bot activity.”The test…

Finnish telecommunications company, Nokia, is planning to cut 14,000 jobs to reduce costs, after suffering a 20% drop in third-quarter sales due to weaker demand for 5G equipment. Nokia has experienced a slowdown in the United States, which is among its more profitable markets. Rivals like Ericsson had forced them to seek growth in other regions such as India, however India is also expected to normalize after a stellar 2022. “The market situation is really challenging and it is witnessed by the fact that in our most important market, which is the North American market, our net sales are down…

Ghanaian fintech company, Hubtel has for the past years introduced disruptive innovation in the industry making it a market leader in the West African country. In the first ten months of 2023, Hubtel again showed its innovation prowess by introducing two new services- the Event Tickets Service and the Instant Car Insurance Service. In April 2023 Hubtel launched the Event Ticket Service to make life simpler for their customers, the new service feature provides a way to simplify and speed up the process of finding and paying for events in Ghana. With this new feature on the Hubtel mobile app,…

Keeping the tradition of making slim models of its PlayStation (PS) consoles, Sony has announced a slim variant of its much sought after PS5 console. Like the PS2, PS3 and PS4 Slim variants, which were thinner than the original “fat” consoles, the PS5 Slim is a smaller, lighter, and cheaper version of the PS5, with some notable changes and improvements. Sony says the PS5 Slim has received a volume reduction of more than 30%, and weight reduction of 18% and 24% compared to the previous models. The console has four separate cover panels, with the top sporting a glossy look,…

Qatar Airways is set to offer Starlink’s high-speed Wi-fi service on specified aircraft and routes, with access being free for all passengers with ‘One-Click-Access’ onboard. Starlink says it will offer Qatar Airways passengers Wi-fi speeds of up to 350 megabits per second for gaming, VPN access, sports streaming and other online functions. Group Chief Executive of Qatar Airways, Akbar Al Baker, said, “Qatar Airways is proud to announce its agreement with Starlink to provide seamless and complimentary Wi-Fi to its global passengers.” The Musk-owned satellite internet constellation is set to support the entire Qatar Airways fleet. Passengers travelling to over…

Amid South Africa’s power crisis, online food ordering and delivery platform, Uber Eats, has partnered mobile rental network, Adoozy Power to enable South Africans rent power banks and have them delivered to their doorstep. The partnership was facilitated by Uber Direct, the last-mile white-label delivery solution for Uber Eats. The power bank-renting process is a stopgap solution the company believes will make the power issues a bit more bearable for SA citizens. The “Adoozy Collect” in-app feature, allows consumers who need to charge their smartphones, and other devices, to place an order. The company says once an order is made,…

Chairperson of the African Union Commission (AUC), Moussa Faki, was recently the target of impersonation by cyber fraudsters who used deepfakes of him to place video calls to European capitals, seeking to arrange meetings with foreign leaders. The AUC has since revealed that the cyber criminals also pretended to be the organisation’s deputy chief of staff, faking email addresses, in their bid to arrange calls between foreign leaders and the chairperson. The motive behind the impersonations is still unclear, but the AU has described their fake emails as “phishing,” indicating that they might have intended to steal digital identities to…

Botswana Telecommunications Corporation (BTC) has informed its customers that, starting from 1st December, it will no longer accept payments via cheques. This decision comes on the back of the announcement made by Bank of Botswana and Bankers Association of Botswana on the discontinuation of cheques as mode of payment in Botswana on the January 1st, 2023. Following this announcement, BTC has availed various alternative digital payment channels to allow for ease of payment directly into customer’s accounts. According to the Corporation customers are now able to pay their BTC invoices from the following platforms; 1. BTC Website 2. BTC Mobile…

The Acting Director for Capacity Building and Awareness Creation at the Cyber Security Authority (CSA), Alex Oppong has urged Ghanaians to strengthen their technical skills to meet the worldwide surge in demand for cybersecurity experts. Addressing attendees during the concluding session of a three-day cybersecurity workshop in Accra, Oppong highlighted the vast opportunities in the cybersecurity sector. “Currently, there’s a gap of four million cyber security professionals globally. With our enhanced skills, Ghanaians can tap into these vast opportunities,” he remarked. The seminar, themed “Building a Secure Digital Future,” trained 200 participants and was a collaboration between Slamm Foundation and…