Vodacom Eastern Cape said on Tuesday that it has completed targeted network upgrades in the Addo region and along the R335 route to fill mobile coverage gaps in a bid to combat truck hijackings.

Nepalese telco Ncell says it has become the first mobile operator in the country to expand its Voice over Long-Term Evolution (VoLTE) international roaming service to include outbound travellers.

Malaysian clean energy solutions provider Gentari and cloud services giant Amazon Web Services (AWS) have signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) for an 80MW wind power project in Tamil Nadu, India, a state on the south-eastern coast of the Indian peninsula.

Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organisation (KALRO), a research institution dedicated to enhancing agricultural productivity and rural development in Kenya, has partnered with SatSure Analytics India, a leading Earth Observation (EO) data refinery platform, to revolutionise agricultural productivity and resilience in Kenya through the use of advanced satellite data and analytics.

Indian state-owned operator Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) and Numaligarh Refinery Limited (NRL), an oil and gas refinery in Assam in northeastern India, have signed what they call a landmark memorandum of understanding (MoU) relating to private network provision.

Vodacom has committed to investing ZAR620 million ($34.5 millon) in South Africa’s Mpumalanga province during its 2025–26 financial year, as it seeks to meet rising demand for connectivity.

The Bank of Central African States (BEAC) has launched a new mobile application called BEAC NG2020 to help the public and financial professionals authenticate BEAC banknotes from the Type 2020 series.

Czech telecoms firm České Radiokomunikace (CRA) says that it has obtained a building permit to construct a data centre on the outskirts of Prague, in the Zbraslav – Jíloviště area.

Operator MTN Uganda, its mobile finance business MTN Mobile Money (U) Limited, and the Uganda Hotel Owners’ Association (UHOA) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU), marking what they call the beginning of a strategic partnership aimed at accelerating digital transformation in Uganda’s hospitality sector.

Xtelify, a fully owned subsidiary of Indian operator Bharti Airtel that houses Airtel’s digital assets and capabilities, has announced the launch of what it describes as a sovereign, telco-grade cloud platform called Airtel Cloud, along with software platform deals in a number of territories.

Satellite communications firm EchoStar is moving ahead with plans to join the global direct-to-device (D2D) satellite race via a new LEO satellite constellation, and has awarded an initial US$1.3 billion contract to MDA Space to help build it.

PLDT and its wireless arm Smart Communications said on Monday they are testing fixed wireless access (FWA) technology from Radisys as a potential alternative for fibre-to-the-home (FTTH), particularly in areas in the Philippines where fibre is difficult to deploy.

Lao Telecom’s fintech unit Lao Mobile Money – which operates the MmoneyX mobile wallet – has become a strategic business partner with Visa in a deal aimed at boosting digital payments and financial inclusion in Laos.

Sri Lanka-based operator Dialog Axiata has expanded its 5G roaming footprint to 40 countries through partnerships with more than 150 operators worldwide.

MTC Namibia has reportedly teamed up with Letshego Micro Financial Services to launch a pilot for a new mobile microlending platform that will provide instant loans to customers via their mobile phones.

Indian telco Vodafone Idea said on Thursday it is launching 5G service in Meerut in Uttar Pradesh as of today, making it the ninth city this week and the 13th city in the past month where Vi has switched on its 5G network.

Operator MTN’s mobile money business in South Africa, known as MoMo, has announced plans to make 4G and 5G smartphones available on credit to prepaid customers – without the need for background credit checks.

Kyrgyzstan has decided to nationalise access to international internet traffic for a year. A presidential decree earlier this week said the government was "establishing a temporary 100% state monopoly on the supply and provision of international internet traffic on the territory of the Kyrgyz Republic”.

Philippines-based Globe Telecom has closed the sale of 96 more towers raising a total of PHP89.3 billion ($1.5 billion) since kicking off its sale-and-leaseback initiative three years ago.

Eutelsat said on Wednesday it has signed a new agreement with India-based maritime communications firm Station Satcom to incorporate Eutelsat’s OneWeb LEO satellite services into its maritime connectivity portfolio.

Google is reportedly planning to invest US$6 billion to establish its first data centre in India, with a planned IT load capacity of 1GW that would make it one of the largest such facilities in Asia-Pacific.

Reliance Industries, the parent company of Jio Platforms, is reportedly considering listing a 5% stake in its mobile unit in India, which could raise an estimated US$6 billion.

Space42, a UAE-based spacetech company, has announced the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with tech giant Microsoft and GIS mapping software specialist Esri to deliver high-resolution, scalable base maps across all 54 African countries, serving over 1.4 billion people.

Money transfer services continue to make headlines in Africa. This time it’s the turn of Zambia where Western Union, Zoona Transactions Zambia Limited and Chipper Cash have announced the launch of international money transfer services in the Chipper Cash app.

Mauritania’s digital transformation ministry MTNMA (Ministère de la Transformation Numérique et de la Modernisation de l’Administration) and EllaLink, the owner of a high-capacity optic fibre submarine cable directly connecting Europe and Latin America, have signed a contract for the construction, operation and maintenance of an international link that will directly connect Mauritania to Madrid in Spain.

Orange has raised its full-year targets after its Africa and Middle East unit was once again recognised as the group’s primary growth engine.

Nokia revealed on Wednesday that Indonesian digital infrastructure provider Solusi Sinergi Digital (a.k.a. Surge) has deployed its subsea optical solution in a new subsea fibre network connecting Jakarta and Singapore.

Thai telco True Corp said on Tuesday it has begun implementing dynamic spectrum sharing (DSS) technology on the 2600-MHz band that it says will improve the performance and efficiency of its 4G and 5G services.

Private network development is, arguably, one of the few successful applications of 5G technology so far. Indeed, Eviden, a specialist in advanced computing, cybersecurity products, mission-critical systems and vision AI (and a brand of the digital transformation-focused Atos Group), has just announced that it has been awarded a strategic contract to deploy a 5G mobile private network at the Port of Ploče in Croatia.

India’s Birla Cable, a fibre optic cable manufacturer, and Nedia Fiber, a US-based optical fibre cable supplier, have formed a strategic alliance to accelerate the delivery of high-performance fibre optic solutions across the Americas.

Two banks with a strong Latin American focus, development bank IDB Invest and multinational bank Bladex, have joined forces to provide a financing package to Millicom-owned operator Telemovil El Salvador – aka Tigo – of up to US$205 million.

Morocco’s telecommunications regulator, the ANRT, has awarded 5G licences to the country’s three main operators - Maroc Telecom, Inwi, and Orange Morocco - raising MAD2.1 billion (US$210 million) for state coffers and marking a major step forward in the country’s national digital transformation agenda.

Thailand’s telecoms regulator has reportedly instructed Advanced Info Service (AIS) and True Corp to submit detailed plans to shut down their 2G and 3G networks by the third quarter of 2026, ostensibly as part of an anti-fraud strategy.