Author: Akin Naphtal

In the 21st century, the refrigerator was promoted to the rank of one of the most important, and for many people even the most important, home appliances. With the development of modern technologies, our expectations for all household appliances have changed, but it is refrigerator-freezers that are the segment that reacts most strongly to the needs of consumers. What to look for when choosing a new refrigerator and are there appliances that fit perfectly in each of these areas? We will try to answer this question in this article. Manufacturers almost compete in retrofitting their devices with various amenities and…

Telecom giant, MTN, is in talks to buy South Africa’s incumbent operator, Telkom. As South Africa’s second- and third-largest mobile operators, if approved the deal would alter the competitive dynamics of the market substantially and would effectively create a duopoly in a market that currently benefits from a healthy level of rivalry between operators. In the mobile segment, MTN’s position would improve dramatically. Using the latest data (quarter 1, 2022) available from the operators, Fitch Solutions estimate that MTN’s market share would increase to 48.4% with the acquisition of Telkom’s 16.94 million subscribers it reported for the year ending March…

ETAP, an insurance technology (InsurTech) company has announced a partnership with CFAO Motors, the sole distributor of Suzuki cars in Nigeria to provide easy access to insurance to drivers of the brand. As a result of the partnership, drivers will be able to purchase insurance for their Suzuki vehicles in 90 seconds, complete claims in 3 minutes or less, and get rewarded for good driving and avoiding accidents. ETAP creates solutions and incentives to improve the automotive experience across Africa. It inspires behavioural change on Africa’s roads and has gamified the driving experience, using advanced telematics to monitor driving behaviour…

The Minister for Communications and Digitalisation (MoCD), Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, has affirmed Ghana’s commitment to the strategic plans of the Africa Telecommunications Union (ATU) which had invited member states to effectively participate in the Union’s programmes to project Africa’s voice in the field of Information and Communication Technology (ICT). It was therefore against this background that Ghana hosted the Africa preparatory meetings for the World Telecommunications Standardization Assembly in 2020 (WTSA-20) and attended Africa Telecommunications Union (ATU) preparatory meetings for WTDC-21 as well as the International Telecommunications Satellite Organisation’s (ITSO) General Assembly of Parties in 2022. She said the country sponsored…

Tech processor manufacturer, Qualcomm Inc. has disclosed in a statement that it will continue to partner with Samsung Electronics to further improve customer experiences with the latter’s Galaxy devices. The two companies made an agreement to extend their patent license agreement through 2030. According to the release, their patent will cover the third to sixth generations of wireless mobile telecom tech. A subsidiary of Qualcomm Inc., Qualcomm Technologies also agreed to continue partnering with Samsung to give users premium experiences in line with their track record and commitment. President and Chief Executive Officer at Qualcomm Inc., Cristiano Amon, has indicated…

IT and business consulting services firms, CGI Global has launched CGI Sense360 its cloud-based, smart analytics platform that gives emergency responders holistic and accurate situational awareness in the event of a disaster. As per a recent media release, CGI Sense360 is a “cloud-based, smart analytics platform” designed to aid organizations by creating a visual representation of events of disaster. This representation guides emergency organizations in mobilizing and attending to these situations. Furthermore, the data platform, in the event of any disaster, gathers recent information from various data points that is important to the disaster and creates an “augmented reality, situational…

Africa-focused ICT service providers BCX and CMC Networks have partnered to add scale to SD-WAN services for BCX customers. Jonas Bogoshi, CEO of BCX South Africa, said the partnership will extend BCX’s footprint by adding more than 110 service locations. These service locations are global, said Bogoshi, with the majority located across Africa, Middle East, Europe and USA. Bogoshi stressed that through the alliance, they will gain access to 51 African and 12 Middle Eastern countries. CMC Networks is focused on supporting businesses in efforts to address complex network requirements, offering advanced connectivity and cloud on-ramp solutions across Africa and…

Airtel Zambia’s B2B silo Airtel Business has launched a new enhanced fibre connectivity solution, Gigabit Passive Optical Networks (GPON), to connect more businesses in the country. Airtel Zambia said it already has over 4,000 km of fibre spread across the country, and with the new solution in place, backed by a US$1-million investment, additional SMBs (initially in Lusaka, Ndola and Kitwe) will be connected. Thereafter, the company has committed to further investment to roll out the solution in other regions. The company added that the fibre network infrastructure will benefit businesses by offering guaranteed bandwidth, scalable plans, high performance, reliability…

The Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) has said African Fintech companies Flutterwave and Chipper Cash are not licensed to operate remittance and payment services in the East African country. Compliance with regulation has impacted tech companies over the past few months, and affected cross-border payments, US Dollar virtual payments and other card processing functions. Chipper Cash and Flutterwave have been singled out by Patrick Njoroge, Governor of the CBK, for not having operator permits. Kenya, which is delaying launch of a central bank digital currency, is considered to be a major growth market for mobile-based remittances from…

Twitter and Amref Health Africa, a leading Nairobi-based health development organisation, have announced their continued collaboration to provide skills and capacity-building training in best practices for health reporting. This comes on the heels of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and amid growing concerns about recently reported cases of monkeypox across the continent. Since its launch in 2020, the media scholarship programme by Amref Health Africa in partnership with Amref International University and Twitter, has awarded scholarships to high-achieving African journalists to pursue Health Communication and Journalism courses. The partnership between Amref and Twitter, which has been renewed in 2022, aims to…