MTN Ghana CEO Selorm Adadevoh said the unit is expected to exceed the US$1 billion infrastructure investment target it set out in 2021 by 2026.

Telekom Networks Malawi (TNM) claims to have launched the country’s first 5G network pilot.

MTN Nigeria expanded its 5G network to 13 cities since its commercial launch in September last year and revealed there are no plans to shut down 2G and 3G networks. 

Angola Cables and Orange have agreed to an infrastructure sharing agreement on the West African Djoliba Network.

A Kenyan government official has promised that the country will unveil its first locally made – and affordable – smartphones in the next two months in an attempt to increase the penetration of internet-enabled mobile phones in the country.

New and expanded Microsoft Airband partnerships are set to provide high-speed internet access to nearly 40 million people across Latin America and Africa, the company says.

Zimbabwean state-owned mobile provider Telecel has been placed under bankruptcy protection measures to avoid its liquidation.

West African internet service provider Tizeti has expanded its collaboration with Microsoft to bring internet access to almost five million people in Cote d’Ivoire.

The Tanzanian government, with support from the World Bank, has embarked on a project called Digital Tanzania in partnership with mobile network operators that will, it says, see the extension of broadband services to 713 wards – around 1,407 villages – and benefit over 8.5 million Tanzanians across the country upon its completion.

Liquid Dataport, a business of Cassava Technologies, a pan-African technology group, has launched what it describes as the first terrestrial fibre route connecting Mombasa to Johannesburg.

Ghanaian broadband wireless access (BWA) provider Surfline Communications has shuttered its data centre and radio access network (RAN), citing financial problems.

Guinea’s telecom minister Ousmane Gaoual Diallo has confirmed that state-owned player Guinee Telecom – formerly Sotelgui (Societe des Telecoms de Guinee) – has commenced the public test phase of its mobile network.

An investment consortium led by Zimbabwean businessman Edd Branson is mobilising a US$100 million fund to obtain holdings in mobile network providers in Benin, Chad and Gambia.

As seen in other global markets, smartphone shipments in the Middle East and Africa have fallen 11% year-on-year, the lowest Q1 shipment figure since 2016, as macroeconomic factors continue to batter economies.

MTN and Airtel Africa have confirmed that their respective Nigerian units will renew their 2100MHz spectrum licences for a further 15 years.

ThinkWiFi, an Africa-based ad-tech free Wi-Fi internet service provider, and Mawingu, an internet service provider backed by Microsoft, have announced the launch of the first outdoor Telecom Infra Project (TIP) OpenWiFi network in Kenya.

Senegal’s regulator ARTP (L’Autorite de Regulation des Telecommunications et des Postes) has confirmed plans to launch national mobile roaming this month, ahead of 5G licence allocation by end-July.

MTN celebrated its super app Ayoba for gaining 25 million monthly users in four years after launching, with ambitions laid out to reach 100 million by 2025.

South Africa’s Eastern Cape is getting its own internet exchange point (IXP). INX-ZA, an autonomous division of the Internet Service Providers’ Association (ISPA) of South Africa, has launched the Nelson Mandela Bay IXP, or NMBINX in Gqeberha, about 770 km east of Cape Town, providing what is described as a boost for business and for the growth and development of the Eastern Cape internet ecosystem.

As promised earlier this year, South African operator Rain is no longer a data-only service provider. It is now part of the country’s highly competitive mobile network space, joining Vodacom, MTN and Telkom with a network offering national voice, SMS and data coverage.

Underlining the massive streaming potential of the mobile phone user market in Africa, Wi-flix, described as the fastest-growing streaming platform in Africa, has expanded its presence to Zambia following the launch of packages with mobile telecommunications giant MTN.

Vodacom has become the first operator in Mozambique to launch commercial 5G, with its network now available in Maputo City.

4G is about to become a reality in São Tomé and Príncipe in the Gulf of Guinea, off the western equatorial coast of Central Africa, thanks to Unitel STP, which has announced that it has become the first mobile operator to launch commercial 4G services in the country, after receiving approval from regulator AGER.

The Ghanaian National Communications Authority (NCA) set a hard deadline for the 11 million remaining unregistered SIM cards to be signed up, warning those SIMs will be cut off from services at the end of the month. 

Tomorrow will see a potentially significant development for the Sierra Leonean economy as the Bank of Sierra Leone officially launches the National Payment Switch, a system that, it is hoped, will move the country closer to achieving the objective of building a cashless economy.

Camtel, MTN and Orange have been ordered by the Cameroonian government to immediately fix mobile services after subscribers staged protests over the lack of quality service.

The African Development Fund and the Smart Africa Alliance have jointly launched a US$1.5 million project to streamline digital trade and e-commerce policies across 10 African countries.