Major operators and the Kenya Communications Authority (KCA) have mutually agreed to set new interim mobile termination rates (MTR) and fixed termination rates (FTR). 

The Ivory Coast government has announced it will sell a part of its minority stake in Orange’s unit in the country, as the company prepares for an IPO.

The Botswana Unified Revenue Service (BURS) has signed a ten-year contract with authentication solutions company Authentix, under the terms of which Authentix will provide a marketplace governance programme to BURS for the digital marking and tracking of tobacco and alcohol products.

The Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA) has updated its roadmap for the issue of 5G spectrum, covering airwaves in the 700MHz, 2600MHz and 26GHz bands.

Orange Egypt has resigned Nokia to a five-year contract to modernise its subscriber data management (SDM), a move Nokia said will bolster reliability and security for Orange customers and prepare the operator for a commercial 5G launch.

Internet para Todos (IPT) has expanded its contract with Gilat for 4G cellular backhaul services in Peru.

Telecel Group announced it has opened dialogue with the Ghanaian government to acquire Vodafone’s unit in the country after the country’s regulator revealed it has not approved the deal.

Iraqi fixed-line provider Kurdtel Communications has selected solutions from digital enablement firm Alepo to modernise its network.

Veon subsidiary Banglalink has signed a tower sharing agreement with BTCL (Bangladesh Telecommunications Company Limited).

NK 108 Empreendimentos e Participacoes (NK 108) has made a binding offer to acquire 8,000 fixed telecoms infrastructure sites from Brazil’s Oi.

Omnichannel messaging services provider Mitto has now attained direct connectivity with all mobile network operators in Argentina following the announcement of its partnership with CATEL’s MVNO imowi.

Two of the partners in what is described as the first subsea cable connecting Latin America with APAC and Oceania have issued a request for proposals (RFP) to begin construction of the estimated 15,000-kilometre Humboldt Cable.

Indian utility group PGCIL (Power Grid Corporation of India Limited) has selected Tejas Networks to provide and install its optical networking equipment as part of an upgrade of PGCIL’s pan-India telecom backbone and access networks.

In a fascinating development very close to the launch of its new venture in Ethiopia, Kenya’s Safaricom has announced that current chairman of the board Michael Joseph has stepped down to lead the company’s Ethiopian campaign.

Some seven months after going into insolvency, and nearly four months after being saved from receivership by Singapore-based IoT solutions firm UnaBiz, Sigfox, the supplier of a proprietary narrowband technology designed specifically for IoT, has launched in South Africa.

The Ghanaian government has extended the deadline for people to register SIM cards with the Ghana Card, the document mandated for SIM registration.

It’s been a busy weekend for social media controversies in Kenya, as both Facebook and the government have scrambled to deal with bad news regarding alleged online hate speech.

Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison (IOH) reported a decline in profit despite booking growth in total revenue, mobile subscribers and ARPU in its second quarter results.

Fintech firm VYZYO has announced that its subsidiary TDFP (Tunisian Digital Finance for People) has signed a partnership agreement with local Al Baraka Bank to launch and operate a new mobile wallet service.

Huawei has deployed over 100 5G-ready base stations for MTN Nigeria as the operator gears up to launch a commercial 5G offering from 24^th August.

Vodafone Group has reportedly agreed to sell off a majority stake in its Ghana unit to rival Telecel Group, a move to refocus on key markets, Bloomberg reported.

Morocco’s National Agency of Telecommunications Regulation (ANRT / Agence Nationale de Reglementation de Telecom) has issued Maroc Telecom Group a cumulative fine of MAD2.45 billion (US$238 million).

Botswana’s BoFiNet has selected Ribbon Communications to upgrade and enhance its national backbone network.

Vodacom expanded its connectivity investment plan by pledging to pump ZAR600 million (US$35.5m) into the province of Mpumalanga this financial year.

A major debt finance deal promises to enable open access fibre provider MetroFibre Networx to bring more fibre connectivity to underserved markets in South Africa.

Niger’s Zamani Telecom has completed a wide-ranging upgrade of its 4G TD-LTE network.

Operator Zain South Sudan has gone live with a new digital service provisioning system (DSPS) supplied by Tecnotree, which describes itself as a global provider of digital transformation solutions for communication service providers (CSPs) and digital service providers (DSPs).

The South African Communications Workers Union (CWU) moved to urge authorities to block MTN’s acquisition of Telkom, claiming the buyout will lead to lower competition and mass redundancies.

Underlining the dominance of South Africa in general, and Johannesburg in particular, in the African data centre market, US-headquartered Vantage Data Centres, described as a leading global provider of hyperscale data centre campuses, has announced the delivery of the first facility on its Johannesburg campus.

Safaricom chief executive officer Michael Joseph calmed mounting interest in the operator spinning off its successful mobile money division M-Pesa into a seperate company.

Airtel Africa confirmed its Kenyan unit bought 60MHz of additional spectrum in the 2600 MHz band from the Communications Authority of Kenya for US$40 million, a move to expand its 4G network.