A new analysis of 5G across the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region has been published by industry association the GSMA. It has revealed wide disparities in 5G readiness across the region.

There’s fascinating news from Nigeria regarding two of the country’s biggest operators, one of which is issuing a debt instrument for investment purposes, while the other has had further support for its banking ambitions.

The Ethiopian government has switched up a national payment law to pave the way for Safaricom to launch its popular M-Pesa mobile money platform in the country.

African digital payments company DPO Group has announced the introduction of a new form of payment that will allow merchants to get paid by their customers via a USSD code. This new feature, says DPO, allows merchants to receive payments from customers who don’t have access to mobile banking or a payment card.

Ghana-based operator Glo has entered into a nationwide roaming agreement with state-owned AirtelTigo covering voice, data and SMS, a move to enhance coverage and service performance.

MTN Mobile Money Uganda Limited and Jumo, a technology company building next-generation financial services for emerging markets, have launched MoSente, a new service that allows MTN customers to access credit facilities.

A ‘green’ high-speed underwater backbone communication network is coming to Brazil’s Amazon River thanks to a partnership between Seja Digital, a non-governmental, non-profit institution created by regulator Anatel, and HMN Tech, a provider of turnkey submarine network solutions.

Negotiations for tower sharing and number porting between Papua New Guinea’s (PNG) operators Digicel, Telikom and Vodafone are being actively pushed by the government, as the country aims to boost its super-low connectivity penetration rate.

Operator Vodacom Tanzania has reportedly signed a contract with the country’s National ICT Broadband Backbone (NICTBB) – the government-owned fibre optic cable infrastructure system.

Venezuela’s Digitel has confirmed its aim of launching a VoLTE offering in 2023.

WIOCC has landed Google’s Equiano subsea cable in Lagos, Nigeria.

France-based Sigfox has secured a buyer for its operations in the form of fellow IoT communications service provider Unabiz for an undisclosed fee, as the bankrupt company looked to protect its assets. 

Telebirr, a mobile payment and digital wallet service launched by Ethiopia’s state-owned operator Ethio Telecom in May 2021, has reached over 17.6 million subscribers with a cumulative transaction value of 12.58 billion birr (about $245.2 million) to date.

After last year’s announcement of plans for a scheme to support drone manufacture, five drone manufacturers and nine drone component manufacturers have now been selected as initial beneficiaries of the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme to boost drone manufacturing in India, the aviation ministry has announced.

The Communications Regulatory Authority of Namibia (CRAN) has announced it will review its frequency band every four years, a move to be in line with International Telecommunication Union (ITU) guidelines, which promote cross border interoperability and support for new technologies.

Princeton Digital Group (PDG), a leading developer and operator of internet infrastructure headquartered in Singapore, and the Indonesian Internet Service Provider Association (APJII), which supports internet development in Indonesia, have announced a collaboration to boost Indonesia's internet infrastructure.

STC, Nokia and MediaTek have revealed a joint effort to verify 3 Component Carrier Aggregation (3CC-CA) in a 5G standalone network for the first time in the Middle East, a method to optimally combine spectrum assets to enhance 5G experiences.  

PP Telecommunication (PPTEL), a leading network service provider based in Sarawak in Malaysia, has selected Juniper Networks, which describes itself as a leader in secure, AI-driven networks, to provide solutions to build a new core network that will support its growth plans.

Indian data centre growth – or proposals for such growth – continues. Late last week saw the news that Indian data management specialist VueNow is, according to local press reports, proposing to build dozens of edge data centres across the Indian state of Bihar, although this proposal is as yet some way from the approval stage.

Smartphone brand Infinix has launched the Infinix Wallet, a digital wallet app co-developed with mobile financial services platform PalmPay. The aim of the app is to provide a seamless digital financial experience to users across emerging market economies, starting with a number of African markets.

Viettel Group has announced the international Asia Direct Cable (ADC) is now connecting Vietnam, a subsea cable state-owned operator has invested in.

Google’s first-ever African product development centre is to open in Nairobi, underlining the importance to the company of the African market and its growing base of internet users.

As part of the operator’s wide-ranging network upgrade, Nokia will deploy its XGS-PON equipment for Cable Bahamas (REV)’s new fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) network.

Chile’s Entel has pledged to invest more than US$665 million throughout 2022 into its operations across Chile and Peru.

The merger between True and Dtac is again seeing opposition as a government committee tasked with analysing the merger, will push to delay the deal because of legal ambiguities and questions about the Thai telecoms regulator’s authority on the deal.

Broadband internet via satellite is coming to 500 rural communities in Mexico thanks to Spanish telecommunications satellite operator Hispasat and Mexican internet service provider GlobalSat.

As recently happened – more than once – in Nigeria, the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) has extended SIM card registration in the country beyond last week's deadline.

Digital infrastructure services provider Summit Digitel has announced that it has signed an agreement with Indian operator Bharti Airtel to provide its tower infrastructure for Airtel’s wireless network rollouts.

Senegal’s telecoms regulator has reduced fines imposed on operators Sonatel, Free and Expresso Senegal, but demands they allocate funds to improve coverage and service quality.