All Tech News

DE-CIX (German Commercial Internet Exchange), a leading operator of internet exchanges, has announced plans to establish interconnection platforms across Africa through the DE-CIX as a Service (DaaS) partner model, and, as an initial step, has announced strategic partnerships in three African markets.

Neptune Communications has received authorisation from Jamaica’s Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR) to launch satellite broadband in the market.

Angolan operator Unitel has signed a three year partnership agreement with Chinese vendor Huawei.

Saudi Arabian operator Mobily has signed a strategic memorandum of understanding (MoU) with North African service provider Telecom Egypt to build the first submarine cable system to directly connect Saudi Arabia to Egypt.

Satellite operator and connectivity provider SES has been in the news recently with backhaul deals in Papua New Guinea (PNG), Peru and Chile aimed at supporting remote connectivity.

Satellite broadband and related services in India are being promised a boost after a new deal involving Indian media and communications company NXT Digital (NDL) and Thailand’s Thaicom, a leading Asian satellite operator.

Could free fintech-enabled smartphones be coming to unbanked women in Africa? That’s the promise of a new strategic partnership that aims to help women to be able to save, invest, and access loans from the convenience of their own phones – even if they live miles away from a bank.

Hayo Telecom, a Senegalese mobile network operator, has chosen Telesmart.io, a provider of global number and messaging services, to provide it with a fully API-enabled number and messaging platform.

Pakistan operator Jazz, a major internet and mobile broadband provider, has signed an agreement with fibre infrastructure and services provider Nayatel, through which it will connect all of its mobile towers directly to fibre in Lahore. This fibre to the site (FTTS) project is expected to be completed by December 2022.

Egyptian bank ADCB-Egypt has extended its collaboration with Temenos to deliver next-generation digital payments on the latter’s open platform for composable banking.

The Philippines regulator the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) late last week announced its approval of the registration of Starlink Internet Services Philippines Inc. as a value-added service (VAS) provider, according to local press reports.

Vittel IDC has deployed Cloudian’s HyperStore object storage as the foundation for its storage service offerings.

This week saw a significant announcement in the field of satellite communications by the BRICS countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. It’s the launch of what is called The Joint Committee on Space Cooperation.

Two Brazilian MVNOs have reportedly been the winners of a tender process to provide mobile connectivity to up to 700,000 students via the public network across the country – the first time that MVNOs have won a bid from the federal government to provide mobile connectivity.

Thailand and the Philippines are set to benefit from a partnership involving a US-based pioneer in waterborne data centres and a leader in luxury property development in Thailand.

It’s been a few days since the Peruvian telecommunications regulator Programa Nacional de Telecomunicaciones (Pronatel) sprung a surprise by calling a halt to a tender to take over the operation and maintenance of the national backbone network Red Dorsal Nacional de Fibra Óptica (RDNFO). But two questions still remain to be answered.

Following the demonstration of low earth orbit (LEO) satellite support for 5G backhaul in Latin America, reported yesterday, there’s now news of medium earth orbit (MEO) satellite applications for 3G and 4G in Kazakhstan.

Brazil can claim its first 5G backhaul demonstration over low earth orbit (LEO) satellite, according to satellite operator Telesat and international service provider Telefónica, which have together announced the successful completion of the demonstration in Brazil and Latin America.

NEC Corporation and Juniper Networks have partnered with Algeria Telecom to deploy the operator’s nationwide IP metro commercial network.

Wireless broadband technology Curvalux has announced a collaboration agreement Brazilian ITC Consultancy Tree Net to bring highspeed Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) solutions to Brazil.

Madagascan operator Blueline has selected Ribbon’s Apollo Optical Networking solution to upgrade the bandwidth capacity of its communications network.

Egypt and MEA-focused digital solutions and ICT infrastructure provider Benya Group has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with OneWeb, the low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite communications company, relating to satellite coverage in MEA.

Trinidad and Tobago’s Public Utilities Minister Marvin Gonzales has confirmed that TSTT (Telecommunication Services of Trinidad and Tobago) is set to shutter its legacy copper networks by September this year.

Brazilian data centre firm Odata has opened its first Mexican data centre to add to its operations in Brazil, Colombia and Chile.

With the Safaricom Ethiopia launch still some months off, the country’s state-owned incumbent Ethio Telecom has again taken advantage of its sole service provider position with the introduction of another mobile finance-related service in Africa’s second most populous country.

Apple has reportedly shifted even more to production outside of its main manufacturing hub of China, as the country continues its strict lockdown measures. 

Avanti Communications has signed a five-year partnership agreement with Free which will see the latter firm build and host a new satellite gateway in Senegal for Avanti’s HYLAS 4 state-of-the-art Ka-band satellite.

stc Bahrain has launched a 5G Standalone network which it claims marks a first for the Kingdom.

Malaysia’s controversial shared network access approach to 5G may have received another setback with rumoured demands for a bigger stake and reviews of the plan from the four largest Malaysian operators, Celcom Axiata Bhd, DiGi Telecommunications, Maxis Bhd and U Mobile.

Two recent announcements underline the continuing drive on the part of fintech groups to bring their technology to African institutions and consumers.