Industry News

The latest African roaming agreement comes from the west of the continent, where the governments of Liberia, The Gambia and Sierra Leone have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) aimed at reducing telecommunications costs through improved roaming services.

The agreement, which covers voice, SMS and data services, is set to begin its phased implementation on 2 May 2025, allowing travellers from Liberia to Sierra Leone to receive calls free of charge and make calls, send SMSs, and use mobile data at local rates without the need for a new SIM card.

From 1 July, citizens of Liberia and The Gambia will also be able to enjoy similar benefits without incurring additional international roaming charges. Some 16 million people in total live in the three countries.

According to Liberia’s Oracle News Daily, the initiative, driven by the Liberia Telecommunication Authority (LTA) in collaboration with the National Communications Authority of Sierra Leone and the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority of The Gambia, seeks to promote economic growth and ease communication for citizens traveling within the three countries.

There is still some way to go until all West Africans can roam anywhere without facing increased charges. However, the LTA Chairman Abdullah Kamara has been quoted as saying after the signing: “With these MoUs, we are making decisive progress towards implementing the ECOWAS regulation on roaming within the region, an initiative aimed at eliminating high roaming charges.”

Change is most certainly coming. Among a growing number of agreements in Africa, Ghana last year implemented free roaming with Benin and Togo and 2023 saw a Senegal-Mauritania deal.

Source: extensia.tech

Vodacom Group is optimistic that the violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) will be resolved.

Shameel Joosub, CEO of Vodacom Group, expressed optimism about the situation today when he gave an update on the company’s performance for the quarter ended December 31, 2024.

“While we remain hopeful that the conflict in DRC will reach a resolution, our immediate focus is to safeguard our people, extend relief through our foundation’s initiatives, and ensure that our customers stay connected,” said Joosub.

Vodacom is the leading mobile telecoms company in the DRC, with a customer market share of more than 34%, providing a wide range of communication services including mobile voice, messaging, internet, mobile money, and converged services to more than 21 million individuals and corporate customers.

In the current reporting period, Joosub said DRC delivered high single-digit US dollar growth.

Regarding other key metrics of Vodacom’s international division, Joosub said: “Tanzania continued to deliver excellent local currency results, while normalised M-PESA and data revenue growth was strong at 10.2% and 15.4% respectively. “

He went on to say: “Our International business customer base reached 58.4 million, up 8.6%, supported by strong commercial execution and a further R1.4 billion network investment in the quarter.

“Data traffic grew by 31.1% while smartphone users were up 1.5 million in the quarter to reach 19.0 million, as we look to accelerate smartphone penetration with innovative financing options, including a new daily repayment model.”

Source: extensia.tech

Namibia’s Minister of Information and Communication Technology Emma Theofelus said the country has made significant progress in cybersecurity. She made the statement at the ministry’s annual staff meeting earlier this week.

“The ministry has signed another agreement with LifeLine/ChildLine Namibia to promote safer online behaviours and inculcate a culture of cyber hygiene among different age groups. Similarly, the National Child Sexual Abuse Reporting Portal will be popularised. This portal allows anyone to anonymously report digital abusive content against children, in a bid to combat cybercrime against them,” she said.

The statements come as the country has faced waves of cyberattacks. The data of 600,000 Telecom Namibia customers was recently compromised due to a cybersecurity breach. According to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Namibia has a score of 36.93 out of 100 and is classified in the Tier 4 category in 2024.

According to the ITU, the country “demonstrates a fundamental commitment to cybersecurity through government actions that include assessing, establishing or implementing certain generally accepted cybersecurity measures in at least one pillar, or several indicators and/or sub-indicators.”

To address these situations, the government has made investments including one of 131.5 million Namibian dollars (approximately 7 million USD) to, among other things, set up a National Cybersecurity Incident Response Team (Nam-CSIRT).

Source: extensia.tech

Senegal aims to make the space sector a key lever in its digital transformation strategy, dubbed the “New Deal on Technology.” This ambition was at the center of discussions during a workshop organized on Friday, January 24, by the Senegalese Agency for Space Studies (ASES), in collaboration with the African Regional Satellite Communication Organization (RASCOM).

Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye (photo) plans to officially launch the “New Deal in Technology” in February 2025. This strategy, which succeeds the “Senegal Digital 2025” plan, aims to modernize the country’s economy by integrating information and communication technologies into all sectors.

As part of this program, Senegal, which launched its first satellite in August 2024, plans to develop a satellite constellation and create a national space ecosystem by 2028. The country’s goal is to position Senegal as a digital hub in Africa.

The deployment of satellites is expected to improve connectivity across the country. “We know that alongside terrestrial networks, we have satellite networks that generally cover areas not covered by terrestrial networks. So, the satellite has a big role to play in the connectivity of our territories ,” explained Bara Mbaye, representative of the director of the Telecommunications and Postal Regulatory Agency (ARTP), during the workshop.

However, significant challenges remain. Senegal does not yet have its own launch infrastructure, making it dependent on foreign partners to launch its satellites. This dependence raises concerns, particularly regarding control of technologies and access to data.

Source: extensia.tech

The telecommunications sector experienced significant growth in the first quarter of financial year 2024/2025, with an increase in broadband subscriptions, mobile SIM, smartphone use, and mobile money, indicating continued industry responsiveness to customer needs.

The Communications Authority of Kenya (CA)’s quarterly Sector Statistics report covering July-September 2024, which was released today shows whereas there was a slight decline in 3G broadband subscriptions and data consumption, but an increase in 4G and 5G technology adoption.

The country is poised for significant advancements in both 4G and 5G uptake which is driven by the continued investments and increased consumer demand for high-speed connectivity.

– reads part of the report

Mobile data subscriptions grew to a record 53.7 million by the end of the quarter, with 4G constituting 58.1 percent. The adoption of 4G and 5G technologies has continued to grow, mainly driven by the growing demand for high-speed Internet for activities such as streaming, online learning, remote work, and e-commerce.

The number of active mobile (SIM) subscriptions grew by 1.6 percent to 70.0 million by the end of September 2024 from 68.9 million recorded in the previous quarter representing a penetration rate of 135.8 percent Subscriptions to mobile money services increased from 39.8 million to 40.6 million, translating to a penetration rate of 78.9 percent during the reference period.

The total number of mobile phone devices connected to mobile networks was 68.1 million, representing a penetration rate of 131.5 percent. At 37.4 million devices, smartphones take the lead with a penetration rate of 72.6 percent, while the 30.7 million feature phones accounted for account for 59.6 per cent penetration rate.

The volume of outgoing domestic voice traffic grew by 5.5 percent from 24.9 billion to 26.2 billion. “This growth is attributed to service providers’ special offers and promotions during the review period, where consumers could pay as low as KES 20 for 10 minutes of all-net calls, 20 SMS, and 50 MB of data. Similarly, domestic SMS traffic grew to 13.7 billion messages, from 13.5 billion reported last quarter,” the report noted.

The total average minutes per on-net call remained unchanged at 1.8 minutes, whereas off-net calls grew to 1.3 minutes from 1.2 minutes recorded last quarter. Airtel Networks Limited customers spent more time on a single on-net call, averaging 2.8 minutes, whereas Safaricom PLC and Jamii Telecommunications Ltd consumers spent more time on off-net calls, averaging 1.4 minutes. Incoming international mobile voice minutes grew by 11.9 percent to 134.2 million during the reference period. On the other hand, outgoing international mobile voice traffic dropped from 175.7 million to 175.3 million. International incoming mobile SMS rose to 8.4 million whereas outgoing mobile SMS declined to post 2.6 million.

The total data/Internet subscriptions rose by 4.9 percent to 1.57 million from 1.50 million recorded as of June 30th, 2024. Satellite Internet subscriptions recorded a significant increase of 104.7 percent during the reference period, attributed to a customer acquisition campaign run by Starlink Internet Services Kenya that introduced an option to rent satellite equipment at a reduced cost.

In terms of market share in subscriptions for the mobile services, Safaricom PLC leads in mobile (SIM) subscriptions with 65.7 per cent, followed by Airtel Network Kenya Limited with 29.6 per cent, Finserve (Equitel) Ltd has 2.1 per cent while Telkom Kenya has 1.7 per cent. In mobile broadband subscriptions, Safaricom PLC has 63.1 per cent market share, followed by Airtel Networks Kenya Ltd at 32.6 per cent. Telkom Kenya has 1.7 per cent, Finserve (Equitel) Ltd 1.6 per cent while Jamii Telecommunications Ltd has one (1) per cent.

Safaricom PLC has 92.3 per cent market share in mobile money services, followed by Airtel Money at 7.6 per cent, while T-Kash has less than one (1) per cent.

The total available/lit international Internet bandwidth capacity in the country increased from 22,154.438 Gbps recorded in the previous quarter, to 24,195.320 Gbps. Further, utilized undersea bandwidth rose by 1.1 percent to15,287.222 Gbps out of which 12,333.402 Gbps was used in the country and 2,953.820 Gbps transited to other countries. Utilized satellite Internet capacity grew significantly by 152.8 percent to reach 2,124.438 Gbps.

The total number of users registered to .KE domains dropped by 0.1 percent to 106,722. During the quarter, total cyber threat events detected by the National KE-CIRT/CC stood at 657.8 million with 9.6 million advisories issued during the period.

Source: extensia.tech

Open-access fibre infrastructure and connectivity provider Dark Fibre Africa (DFA) has invested more than R800 million to upgrade and future-proof its national fibre network.

Part of the Maziv group, DFA’s network provides connectivity and backhaul for mobile operators, data centres, Internet service providers, and public sector institutions.

“We have improved the average number of new circuits delivered from 800 to 1,500 per month,” says Andreas Uys, chief technology officer at Maziv.

“In one month, we delivered nearly 2,000 new connections — a new record for us. We’re also enabling higher line speeds and increasing available capacity to meet the changing needs of our customers.”

Uys added that the operator is focused on reducing delivery times while maintaining high-quality service.

“Our target this year is to deliver up to 2,500 connections per month,” he said.

“We could potentially deliver fibre connectivity to buildings already on our network within 14 days, and to non-connected buildings within 55 days.”

DFA noted that the latest investment follows its R400-million Dry Underground Distribution Cabinet network enhancement project launched in 2023.

That project focused on stabilising and future-proofing DFA’s network infrastructure. DFA notes that the investment is already delivering measurable results.

This includes a 40% improvement in new circuit delivery times and a 100% improvement in the meantime to repair (MTTR), where the new architecture is operational.

According to Maziv’s chief operating officer, Dewald Booysen, DFA has been focused on improving its customer experience since late 2022, when it received complaints about network instability and slower service delivery.

“We’ve worked tirelessly to address these challenges,” he said. “Our network upgrades have vastly improved resilience and diversity in the network.”

“We still maintained a national uptime of over 99.5%, even during high-incident periods. Currently, we’re performing at an exceptional 99.99% uptime.”

Booysen also noted the improvement in MTTR. He said the 100% improvement had come despite challenges like third-party construction damage, vandalism, copper theft, severe whether, and other environmental factors more than doubling in the past two years.

“We are seeing consistent and predictable improvements month on month,” said Booysen.

He added that DFA’s service challenges were primarily in Gauteng, not the entire country.

“Of the 15,000 kilometres of fibre, about 40% of that infrastructure is in Gauteng, where we experienced the bulk of our challenges, which is just under 5,000 kilometres of fibre,” he said.

Source: extensia.tech

The global smartphone market rebounded in 2024 with Apple leading shipments, marking the first significant growth after two years of decline, Canalys research showed.

The analyst house found that global smartphone shipments increased by 7 per cent year-on-year to 1.2 billion units, with Apple shipping a total 225.9 million iPhones, giving it top spot for the second consecutive year.

Strong sales in North America and Europe coupled with expansion into new markets helped the vendor offset a downturn in China sales.

In second place, Samsung shipped 222.9 million units, while Xiaomi followed with a 15 per cent increase to 168.6 million units.

Transsion claimed fourth spot for the first time with a 15 per cent increase and Oppo rounded out the top five with 3 per cent growth.

Emerging trends
Apple and Samsung’s strong performance was driven by a growing demand for premium smartphone models in the high-end segment, according to Sanyam Chaurasia, senior analyst at Canalys.

Apple’s iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max registered an 11 per cent increase in shipments compared to sales of the 15 Pro and Pro Max models in 2023. Meanwhile, Samsung saw its best S-series sales since 2019.

Consumers increasingly chose premium models of flagship devices, “helped by vendors’ clearer differentiating models within their flagship series in an already price-inelastic segment”, he explained.

Runar Bjorhovde, analyst at Canalys, said the 2024 market recovery marks “the highest annual global shipment volume post-pandemic”, as consumers replaced pandemic-era smartphones and vendors capitalised on a mass-market demand surge with affordable products. However, he countered that prioritising volume also led to margin pressure for many vendors.

Bjorhovde added that vendors should brace for a challenging 2025. While emerging markets drove growth in 2024, their slowing expansion and factors including economic instability and potential US tariffs add uncertainty to the market. “Finding the right balance between short-term performance, inventory management and long-term investments will be key for vendors to succeed,” he said.

Source: Mobile World Live

OpenAI chief Sam Altman inked a deal with tech giant Kakao in South Korea on Tuesday as the US firm seeks new alliances after Chinese rival DeepSeek shook the global AI industry.

Kakao, which owns an online bank, South Korea’s largest taxi-hailing app and KakaoTalk, announced a partnership allowing them to use ChatGPT for its new artificial intelligence services, joining a global alliance led by OpenAI amid intensifying competition in the sector.

Altman’s company is part of the Stargate drive announced by US President Donald Trump to invest up to $500 billion in AI infrastructure in the United States.

But AI newcomer DeepSeek has sent Silicon Valley into a frenzy, with some calling its high performance and supposed low cost a wake-up call for US developers.

“We’re excited to bring advanced AI to Kakao’s millions of users and work together to integrate our technology into services that transform how Kakao’s users communicate and connect,” said Altman.

“Kakao has a deep understanding of how technology can enrich everyday lives,” he added.

Kakao’s CEO Shina Chung said the company was “thrilled” to establish a “strategic collaboration” with OpenAI.

Also on Altman’s agenda were meetings with two top South Korean chipmakers, Samsung and SK hynix, both key suppliers of advanced semiconductors used in AI servers.

Altman met with SK Group chairman Chey Tae-won and SK hynix CEO Kwak Noh-jung in Seoul to discuss collaboration on AI memory chips, including high bandwidth memory (HBM), and AI services.

He is also expected to meet with Samsung Electronics chairman Lee Jae-yong later Tuesday.

Jaejune Kim, executive vice president of Samsung’s memory business, said last week that the company was “monitoring industry trends considering various scenarios” when asked about DeepSeek.

DeepSeek’s performance has sparked a wave of accusations that it has reverse-engineered the capabilities of leading US technology, such as the AI powering ChatGPT.

OpenAI warned last week that Chinese companies are actively attempting to replicate its advanced AI models, prompting closer cooperation with US authorities.

OpenAI says rivals are using a process known as distillation in which developers creating smaller models learn from larger ones by copying their behaviour and decision-making patterns — similar to a student learning from a teacher.

The company is itself facing multiple accusations of intellectual property violations, primarily related to the use of copyrighted materials in training its generative AI models.

Source: www.msn.com