News (1573)
In Africa, telecom operators used to shun rural areas, which were deemed not attractive enough. However, with the acceleration of digital transformation, most of them are operating strategic repositioning.
Last Tuesday, Orange -through Orange Côte d'Ivoire- announced a service agreement with tech innovation company Vanu Inc to extend its network coverage in Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso and Liberia. The agreement includes the provision of technology upgrades and will be based on the innovative "Network-as-a-Service" (NaaS) model. It will begin with the rollout of 1,070 sites, including 700 in Côte d'Ivoire, 170 in Burkina Faso and 200 in Liberia.
According to Nafy Coulibaly (photo), Orange's deputy general manager in charge of operations in Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso and Liberia, "Orange will roll out its services by strategically improving/increasing its network coverage so that no one is left behind.”
“Our goal is to provide free and open access to digital services, anywhere and to as many people as possible [...] to make digital services accessible to millions of people in rural areas of Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso and Liberia who were not covered before,” she added.
The partnership between Orange Côte d'Ivoire and Vanu, Inc. is part of Orange's IDEAL program, which aims to extend network coverage in rural areas to 20 million people through the construction of 5,000 sites over four years. Rural areas in Africa, where a large proportion of the population still resides, are poorly covered by telecom networks. Yet, they have high-growth potential.
By strengthening its presence in rural areas, Orange Group is moving to increase its subscriber base, facilitate access to digital services and ultimately become the main operator in the targeted markets.
Muriel Edjo
The funding comes almost one year after the U.S.-based international organization awarded initial capital to the three associations working for digital inclusion in Africa.
Last Tuesday, the Internet Society Foundation, the global organization that promotes internet access, granted the third round of grants to promote digital inclusion in Bangladesh, Colombia, and Senegal. The grants provided under the SCILLS (Strengthening Communities, Improving Lives and Livelihoods) program aim to support five innovative projects in the three countries.
"The SCILLS program reflects our commitment to promoting equitable digital transformation through Internet skills development. We are thrilled to renew our support to these five projects that are promoting digital inclusion for communities in Bangladesh, Colombia, and Senegal," said Sarah Armstrong, Executive Director of the Internet Society Foundation.
In Senegal, the foundation will fund two major projects to the tune of about US$400,000. The first, CTIC (Croissance TIC) Dakar, is a growth accelerator that will receive US$249,493 to train 30 early-stage entrepreneurs with high growth potential in entrepreneurial and digital skills and facilitate their access to financing.
The foundation will also fund SENUM (Synergy for Digital and Media Education), an association whose mission is to train and sensitize young people, their parents, and teachers on the educational use of digital technology. The US$149,421 granted to SENUM will be used to train teachers in the use of the Internet to improve the quality of education and help students acquire ICT skills through "tech clubs" and inter-school hackathons.
The SCILLS program, which is currently established in only one African country, will be expanded to Ghana in 2023. This is the second financing provided by the Internet Society Foundation in Senegal under the SCILLS program. In 2021, the foundation funded Association Jeunesse Espoir, the Simplon Foundation, and SENUM to help residents of beneficiary cities acquire digital skills that are essential for academic and economic improvement.
Samira Njoya
The platform aims to develop the Egyptian industrial sector, which grew by 6.5% and contributed 17% to GDP in 2021.
Egypt will soon launch a digital industrial platform. For that purpose, last November 2, the Ministry of Planning and Economic Development, the Ministry of Trade and Industry, and financial service provider E-finance -a subsidiary of eFinance Investment Group- signed a memorandum of cooperation for the development and management of the said platform.
The platform aims to offer investors and manufacturers improved services, accelerate the exploitation process and streamline the required procedures. Using the platform, firms can test the new services before presenting them to their clients.
According to Business Today Egypt, the “platform also offers other services such as cloud platforms, secure infrastructure, internet of things, cybersecurity applications, artificial intelligence, big data, and more.”
Like several African countries, Egypt is betting on digital transformation to accelerate its development. In 2017, the country became an attractive hub for large tech firms, thanks notably to strategic actions taken by the government.
The new platform is therefore one of the government’s actions to accelerate existing digital transformation efforts.
According to the statement announcing the signing, the platform will be launched at the Cairo ICT conference, which will be held on November 27-30, 2022, in collaboration with global digital transformation pioneers such as Pure Storage, Dell, IBM, Cisco, Redhat, Huawei, and many others.
The memorandum of cooperation is part of Egypt's Vision 2030 and its digital transformation strategy, which aims to enhance economic and social development across all sectors and make the country a digital hub of excellence in Africa.
Samira Njoya
Technical and financial support is key for startup development. Such support is usually provided by accelerators, making their jobs crucial in Africa, where the number of startups created is ever-rising in recent years.
Venture capital firm 500 Global and GIZ (German agency for international cooperation) will launch a program to train accelerators to help them meet expectations in their respective digital ecosystems. The inaugural edition of that program, dubbed Bootcamp for Accelerator Managers (BAM), will launch next Monday. Fifteen accelerators have been selected to participate in that first edition. They are notably Orange Startup Studio, Westerwelle Startup Haus Kigali, Mountain Hub, Ennovate Ventures, WomHub, Africarise, Stanbic, Wennovation Hub, CTIC Dakar, Kosmos, Plug n Play, Norrsken Health Tech Africa, Venture Park, MEST Africa, and Growth Africa.
"500 Global is thrilled to be working alongside GIZ to ensure that African accelerators have the tools they need to support startups. 500 has been investing in companies in Africa for a decade and continues to be excited about the growth of the African tech ecosystem. We believe that the next phase of this evolution will be led by homegrown accelerators, like the ones joining BAM," said Mareme Dieng, the African lead for 500 Global.
The program will draw on a real-world project and scenario-based instruction, inspired by the work of 500 Global, which runs more than 80 accelerator programs worldwide, and GIZ's experience with innovation in Africa. It will start with a 5-day face-to-face training in Kenya. Then the participants will take part in a one-year virtual program.
In recent years, Africa’s digital economy has risen significantly. By leveraging digital and tech tools, entrepreneurs are developing innovative solutions for local problems. It is therefore urgent for the institutions supporting them technically and financially to up their technical and operational skills to offer effective support.
Let’s note that the accelerators selected for this first edition of the BAM were chosen based on their experience, seniority, market leadership, and track record. For Matthias Rehfeld, Head of GIZ's Make-IT in Africa program, "this program represents another cornerstone in Make-IT in Africa´s efforts to support African innovation on a local, pan-African and global scale.”
Samira Njoya
The move aims to introduce students to digital tools and at the same time save them from moving around with heavy books and bags.
Last Saturday, the Algerian Minister of National Education Abdelhakim Belabed met, remotely, with government officials and education directors. During the meeting, the government officials announced the upcoming inauguration of a program aimed at digitalizing textbooks.
"More than 3 million third, fourth and fifth grade pupils will be ridden of the textbooks, that add weight to their school bags, thanks to measures approved by the President of the Republic, Mr. Abdelmadjid Tebboune,” said Minister Abdelhakim Belabed while urging officials to make it easy for parents to acquire the digital textbooks.
In Algeria, the issue of the weight of school bags comes up every back-to-school time. Unions that deem the weight too heavy for students (because notably of the textbooks) have repeatedly called for a review of the educational program.
Last September, the Minister of National Education said that several "unprecedented measures" had been taken by the government to find definitive solutions to the problem. The most important of those solutions is the provision of electronic tablets to more than 1600 schools across the country.
Thanks to the tablets, students will access the digital version of their textbooks free of charge. They will access also additional resources such as videos, audio, animations, and interactive features.
The measures were included in the government program approved by the parliament. They are part of the project initiated to generalize the use of tablet computers in schools, starting from the 2022/2023 school year that kicked off in September 2022.
Samira Njoya
Yango is stepping up its actions in Cameroon. In July, the company launched a bike hailing service in Douala.
Last Wednesday, ride-hailing service Yango announced the upcoming launch of the IT education project Practicum in Cameroon to boost digital education.
The Practicum project will allow Cameroonians to acquire practical experience in modern and sought-after professions like computer science, coding and web development through experiments.
"As a carpooling application, Yango is constantly taking action to boost digital adoption. By providing access to this online platform, we want to continue our mission and expand Cameroonians' access to technology and knowledge by providing more learning options. In other regions, we have successfully implemented Practicum in several fields including education, rehabilitation, and advanced training. Our team is confident that they will achieve great results in Cameroon and train more tech experts to drive development in the local market," said Didier Theze, Yango Country Manager in Cameroon.
Yango entered the Cameroonian market on November 15, 2021. Within just one year, its popularity has grown significantly and, it intends to go up a notch by giving Cameroonians the opportunity to learn through Practicum, a US-based online platform. The platform organizes intensive boot camps that equip learners with essential skills to become more effective in the job market. It claims 87% of its alumni have found a tech job in the six months after completing the boot camps.
In Cameroon, though the effective launch date is still unknown, we know that the boot camps offered will include data analytics and web development as those professions are among the most in-demand in the region and contribute to the country’s economy. The courses to be taught in Cameroon were developed with contributions from Yango's engineers, who contributed their development and integration expertise for effective impacts.
Samira Njoya
In Africa, the coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the development of the e-commerce sector. The development calls for better structuring to streamline the sector and make it more efficient.
Lome will host a national e-commerce seminar from November 10 to 11, 2022. The seminar initiated by the Togolese Ministry of Trade is being organized in partnership with the World Trade Organization (WTO).
It aims to teach young Togolese entrepreneurs how to use new online marketing platforms amid the current acceleration of digital transformations and the rise of the e-commerce sector, which is presented as a major opportunity for economic actors.
New businesses are invited to register their interest in the seminar before November 7. According to the Ministry of Trade, women-led businesses are strongly encouraged to register.
Let’s note that a similar seminar is organized for actors in the textile sector, on the sidelines of the International Exhibition of African Textiles (SITA2022), being held in Lome (November 4 to 6, 2022).
Ayi Renaud Dossavi
In August 2021, Seychelles decided to accelerate its digital transformation for an efficient digital economy. The platform is one of the results of the strategy implemented in that regard.
Seychelles inaugurated, last Monday, "SeyID," its national digital identity platform. According to Vice President Ahmed Afif (photo), the new platform is one of the initiatives carried out by the Department of Information and Communication Technology (DICT) to accelerate the country's digital transformation.
"Having a digital ID through the SeyID platform will not only be a means of proving your identity digitally or accessing digital public or private services. It will also allow you to digitally sign documents, another growing requirement when transacting digitally. Through this platform, digital signing will be far much easier to do compared to what is the case presently,” he said.
According to the World Bank, in 2020, Seychelles’s GDP dropped to a negative 13.5%, due to the coronavirus pandemic, which disrupted economic activities. In February 2021, to diversify and expand its economy, the country announced plans to accelerate its digital transformation. SeyID is one of the results of that plan.
The platform is developed by WISeKey International Holding, a Swiss cybersecurity firm. It will give Seychellois the tools they need to prove their identity online, but it will also facilitate access to many public and private services that choose to integrate with the SeyID platform thanks to interconnecting application programming interfaces (APIs).
The SeyID app is already available on the Play Store. According to Finance Minister Naadir Hassan, “the SeyID platform is based on WISeKey’s WISeID platform which guarantees a high level of Digital Identity and online security.”
It “will be accessible through both web-based and mobile-based applications and both are supported with strong authentication techniques. This is to ensure the security of the SeyID platform users,” he added.
Samira Njoya
The Ghanaian headquarters is the first opened by the micro-blogging platform in Africa, sixteen years after its creation.
US microblogging platform Twitter has officially inaugurated its Ghanaian headquarters in Accra. It was announced on Tuesday, October 1, by Kafui Sokpe, Senior Associate Director of Twitter Africa. The new headquarters will allow the firm to coordinate the activities of Twitter Africa.
“A year ago Twitter entered Africa via Ghana. Today we officially opened Twitter’s Africa HQ in Accra, and for the first time all [Twitter users] in the region left their home desks and convened to work as one team. Worth celebrating amidst all the back-to-back news headlines,” Kafui Sokpe tweeted.
On April 21, 2021, Twitter announced that it chose Ghana as the headquarters for its African operations due to the country’s appointment to host the AfCFTA secretariat and its openness toward the internet.
"As a champion for democracy, Ghana is a supporter of free speech, online freedom and the Open Internet, of which Twitter is also an advocate. Furthermore, Ghana’s recent appointment to host The Secretariat of the African Continental Free Trade Area aligns with our overarching goal to establish a presence in the region that will support our efforts to improve and tailor our services across Africa,” the platform explained in a statement.
It also indicated it hired 11 people in Ghana, inviting more people to join. With this new office, Twitter follows its biggest rival, Facebook Inc, which opened its first African office in Johannesburg in 2015 and announced, in 2020, a second office in Lagos. The initiative is in line with the growth strategy of Twitter, which aims to become more involved in the communities that fuel daily discussions across the continent.
Samira Njoya
Morocco is currently developing its human capital to become a global tech hub. To do so, it is partnering with various actors.
The Moroccan Ministry of Industry announced, Tuesday (November 2), two memorandums of understanding with international consulting agency Capgemini.
The memoranda aim to create the conditions required to train tech talents and develop the local engineering talent to make the country a leading destination for tech investments.
In a press statement, the government explained that the MoUs would help create 1,500 additional highly skilled jobs in the engineering sector by 2026. The “investment embodies the growing confidence in Moroccan skills and confirms the attractiveness of the Kingdom as a technological and engineering destination of choice for outsourcing,” added Minister of Industry Ryad Mezzour (photo, left).
According to a study financed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), Morocco is faced, for years now, with a shortage of engineers and technicians. To address the issue, the government has inked partnerships with several international companies to develop diversified skills and competencies in a range of innovative sectors. In April, the country signed four more MoUs for investment projects that are expected to create over 5, 000 jobs in the outsourcing sector.
CapGemini launched its Moroccan subsidiary in 2007. Since then, it has become the largest tech company in the country. According to Idriss Elasri (photo, right), Managing Director of Capgemini Engineering Morocco, the company hired 800 new staff in 2021 and 1,100 in 2022.
Samira Njoya
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According to the report "Data Center Market in Africa - Industry Outlook and Forecast 2020-2025" (ReportLinker), the African data center market is expected to grow at a 12% annual rate and reach US$3 billion in 2020-2025.
Pan-African data center operator Raxio Group announced, Monday (October 31), the launch of construction works for its first data center in Grand-Bassam, 30 km from downtown Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire. The foundation stone of that infrastructure will be laid tomorrow, November 3, we learn.
"Our primary mission is to help lay the foundations of the African digital economy with groundbreaking technologies aimed at ensuring the performance, security and service levels required to meet information systems’ security needs,” it explains.
Raxio group unveiled its plan to build a data center in Côte d’Ivoire, in October 2021. The plan was in line with the continental expansion plan it launched, in 2019, to meet the African growing demand with ten to twelve more data centers. In the framework of that expansion plan, it currently operates a 1.5MW facility in Kinshasa, while others are under construction in Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Uganda.
According to the group, Côte d'Ivoire is the fastest growing economy in Francophone West Africa. This is notably why it chose it to host its first Tier 3 data center in the region so that it “will serve customers in Abidjan and the wider UEMOA region at a time when digital transformation, data and content consumption, and connectivity are all increasing at historic rates.”
The data center, scheduled to be operational by Q3-2023, will be headquartered at the ICT and biotech park VITIB, in Grand-Bassam. According to the company, Raxio Côte d'Ivoire will offer “customers an optimized environment for their IT equipment in a state of the art, modular facility, fully equipped with industry best in technology, security, AC/DC power compatibility and redundancy.”
Samira Njoya
The new director general was appointed to save the public postal company from its various woes.
Senegal’s public postal company “La Poste” will undergo an extensive digital transformation in the coming months, new director Mohamadou Diaïté indicates.
According to the director general, who assumed office last Monday, digital transformation is one of the priorities of the "Strategic Plan for the Expansion of the Post (PSE-P)." The said plan includes actions like the modernization of the company’s logistics, the development of electronic banking and e-commerce, and the addition of innovative financial services.
"It is not conceivable that in 2022 we will still be issuing manual receipts. We need to diversify our products and make up for our lateness to ensure improved profitability,” he said.
In recent years, the national postal company has faced several issues affecting its operations. The issues include low-tech tools integration and poor management of customers’ new ICT needs.
To address the various issues identified, in 2021, the posts and telecommunication regulator ARPT organized a workshop for the development of a new strategy that would modernize the postal sector. The strategy focuses on four areas, including the promotion and use of ICTs to improve the overall performance of the sector.
Mohamadou Diaïté wants to ensure the continuity of the actions suggested. He plans to address the issues by "judiciously exploiting the objective and scalable opportunities presented by the" national postal company. For that purpose, an institutional transformation is needed to create a postal bank, he explained. He added that there is a need to accelerate digital transformation, diversify products and services to cover a broader range and introduce more innovation by strengthening and modernizing logistics, electronic banking, and e-commerce
Samira Njoya
According to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), global oil demand would grow continually till 2035, driven by developing countries in Africa, India, and Asia. To capture part of that demand and attract investors to its energy sector, Algeria has multiplied initiatives in recent years.
The Algerian Agency for the Valorization of Hydrocarbons Resources (Alnaft) announced, Sunday, the launch of EXALT (EXplore Algeria Today), a digital platform that provides information on the country’s mineral and sustainable resources.
According to Alnaft chairman Nour Eddine Daoudi, the platform is "an unprecedented opportunity in the history of the Algerian energy market.”
“It will allow investors to check new deposits, peruse and assess the national hydrocarbon potential,” he added.
The "fully integrated" tool, developed by international oilfield services provider Schlumberger (SLB), will help demonstrate the value of domestic upstream opportunities. It will also help promote Algeria's hydrocarbon resources thanks notably to future tenders. For Nour Eddine Daoudi, it can be accessed by everyone, everywhere in the world.
Algeria is a notable oil exporter with one of the largest oil and gas reserves in the world. In its World Economic Outlook, published last October 11, the IMF estimates that the country’s economy would grow by 4.7% in 2022, thanks in particular to an increase in its oil export revenues.
Samira Njoya
Computers and smartphones are undoubtedly useful in our daily lives. However, their excessive use can have negative impacts on users’ physical and mental health. It can also negatively affect children’s psychosocial development. To prevent those consequences, Gabon is implementing awareness-raising actions.
Gabon will launch a national digital awareness campaign in the coming months. In a prelude to that campaign, last Friday, it organized a conference under the theme: "The dangers of overexposure to screens: impacts on behavior and health." The national campaign, initiated by consulting agency Blanc Cristal and the rehabilitation center Mot à Mot, is organized thanks to the Ministry of Digital Economy’s support.
According to Virginie Mounanga, CEO of Blanc Cristal, it aims to alert parents on the dangers of overexposure to the Internet and screens. "We have met with several doctors, specialists, and school principals who complain about children and adolescents being addicted to the Internet, cutting themselves off social activities [...] and affecting school performance. So, we need to alert parents and educators of the dangers, allowing them to mitigate those impacts,” she explained.
Gabon, like many African countries, adopted digital technologies to keep socio-economic activities going during the coronavirus pandemic. The pandemic changed internet consumption habits, boosting demand for connectivity. Consequently, the average time spent in front of screens has risen sharply. This caused several health (myopia, sedentarization), behavioral (sleep and mood disorders), and social (language delays, attention disorders, and school difficulties) problems.
According to the professionals who took part in the conference, some measures need to be taken to address the problems. They include limiting internet time, turning off Wi-Fi intermittently, and developing social and family activities.
They also mentioned the Canadian method of limiting screen time for children. According to the specialists, it involves forbidding screens to children before the age of 2 and monitoring usage time for those older than 2.
Samira Njoya