Technology
9mobile Sale: Why Glo May Finally Lose Out
By Dipo Olowookere
There are strong indications that Globacom, one of the four GSM service providers in Nigeria, may not be given the nod to acquire the troubled 9mobile, one of the mobile phone operators in the country.
9mobile, formerly Etisalat Nigeria, is desperately in need of a new investor after it was taken over in July 2017 following a N541 billion debt.
The telecoms firm obtained a syndicated loan from 13 Nigerian banks and after it failed its repayment plan, the lenders attempted to take over the company, but the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) prevented this.
After the regulators took over Etisalat Nigeria, Mubadala Group, the major investor from the United Arab Emirates, pulled out of the firm and said its brand name must not be used any longer, leading to the birth of 9mobile weeks later.
Barclays Africa, an arm of the Barclays Group, was appointed to shop for a new buyer of 9mobile and five companies have emerged the top bidders.
The firms are Bharti Airtel, an Indian telco that owns Airtel Nigeria; Globacom, the Nigerian company owned by Mike Adenuga Jnr; Teleology Holdings Limited, promoted by Adrian Wood, the pioneer CEO of MTN Nigeria; Smile Telecoms Holdings, a telco operating in Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, Congo DR and South Africa; and Helios Investment Partners LLP, an investment company.
According to a report by The Cable, Globacom desperately wants to acquire 9mobile, but it would take a miracle for this to happen.
This, according to the report, is because Glo does not have the financial muscle to revive 9mobile, which hopes to clear its debt with the banks.
“It is public knowledge that 9mobile is in dire need of real financial injection because of the debts, as well as a strong governance culture in view of its recent history.
“Glo is not the most financially buoyant to revive 9mobile, neither does it have the best-practice governance culture that 9mobile requires. Adenuga runs Glo like a kiosk or corner shop, and this cannot help the situation of 9mobile,” the insider was quoted as saying by TheCable.
However, it was gathered that Mr Adenuga desperately wants to acquire the telco and this is to claim the bragging rights of the largest telecom company in Nigeria.
Glo is currently the second largest operator in Nigeria with 37 million voice and 26.8 million internet subscribers, according to the October 2017 statistics from the NCC.
If it acquires 9mobile, it will automatically become the biggest network in Nigeria by adding 17 million to voice and 11.5 million to internet subscription base, he hopes.
Combined, the new entity’s 54 million voice lines and 38.3 million internet subscriptions will surpass MTN Nigeria’s 50.7 million and 32.5 million respectively.
“This, in sum, is why Adenuga wants 9mobile badly, despite the serious challenges Glo itself is facing in its business model,” the source said.
Glo would move from its 26.4% share of the market to 38.5%, including the benefit of recording more subscribers porting to its network.
Mr Adenuga’s company currently has the lowest number of gains from porting — an average of less than 1,000 per month — while 9mobile recorded a monthly average of 12,000 porting subscribers in 2017, industry’s highest by a distance, the journal reports.
Although the transaction is being handled by Barclays Africa, an arm of the Barclays Group, the telecom regulator, NCC, and the banking watchdog, CBN are expected to play a key role in the final decision.
NCC controls 9mobile’s operating licence while CBN regulates the banks. Both intervened to save 9mobile when it was going down.
The involvement of CBN and NCC, which had previously complained about “lack of transparency” by Barclays in the transaction, is not likely to do Mr Adenuga any favours.
However, Globacom remains confident that it would win the bid.
“Dr Mike Adenuga Jnr is never tired of pushing for improvement. Globacom boasts of arguably the most inspired and most passionate workforce in the industry.
We have the edge,” an insider told TheCable, refusing to be named because of internal rules.
Glo is the second national operator (SNO), licensed to provide national backbone for other networks as well as roll out landlines across the country.
“Since Adenuga got the SNO licence in 2003, he has not yet fulfilled the conditions of the licence. This is 14 years and counting,” a senior government official told TheCable on the condition that he would not be named.
“By now, it should have rolled out landlines nationwide and provided broadband access to millions of homes. The huge benefits to the economy have been lost over time. The notion that Globacom can get such an important licence and refuse to fulfill the conditions is unacceptable.”
Globacom was recently kicked out of the Republic of Benin after failing to meet conditions for the renewal of its licence, despite the fact that it took years for the company to roll out its service as a result of regulatory requirements.
The telecom company’s services in Ghana are also not well rated.
By Modupe Gbadeyanka
An additional $200,000 will be invested in Artificial Intelligence (AI) media literacy initiatives across Sub-Saharan Africa, TikTok announced during its third annual Sub-Saharan Africa Safer Internet Summit in Nairobi, Kenya.
The platform hosted government officials, regulators, online safety partners and industry leaders for the event, reinforcing its commitment to collaborative approaches to online safety.
The funds will be provided in ad credits to help support local organisations in the region to expand AI media literacy.
This investment builds on the company’s initial $2 million AI Literacy Fund, launched in November 2025, which awarded 20 global non-profits to create content that boosts public understanding of AI.
In Sub-Saharan Africa, TikTok initially supported three organisations to advance digital literacy and combat misinformation.
“With the rapid advancement of AI, we are committed to educating our community online, so they feel empowered to have responsible experiences with AI, whether that’s as viewers or creators.
“We are partnering with trusted local organisations that communities already know and rely on, because their expertise and deep local connections are essential to making AI literacy programs truly impactful,” the Global Head of Partnerships, Elections and Market Integrity at TikTok, Mr Valiant Richey, stated.
Earlier, the Head of Government Relations and Public Policy for Sub-Saharan Africa at TikTok, Ms Tokunbo Ibrahim, said, “As we host the 3rd Annual Safer Internet Summit here in Kenya, our mission is clear: to share learnings, insights, tackle common challenges and collaboratively advance actionable solutions that protect citizens online.
“By bringing together a diverse coalition of policymakers, tech innovators, and creators, we are ensuring that the conversations we have at this Summit are all-inclusive and lead to a more resilient digital landscape.”
The summit featured expert panels and discussions on critical topics, including TikTok’s Trust and Safety efforts, protecting young people online, and policy frameworks for responsible AI governance.
A key highlight of the event was showcasing how TikTok uses AI to transform how people share their creativity and discover new passions, while ensuring the community remains safe through transparent and responsible AI practices.
The platform also shared more about how recent advancements in AI are helping the platform moderate content faster and more consistently at scale, by improving automated moderation and empowering human teams with better moderation tools.
With over 100 million pieces of content uploaded daily to TikTok, these advances, which work alongside human moderation teams, are helping get violative content down faster, reducing the likelihood of the community seeing it.
According to the latest Community Guidelines Enforcement Q3 2025, TikTok removed over 14 million videos across Sub-Saharan Africa, with 96.7 per cent detected and removed proactively using automated technology, underscoring TikTok’s commitment to proactive moderation and swift action.
By Modupe Gbadeyanka
The winners of the Technovation 4.0 Hackathon, themed The Wicked Hackathon, organised by Interswitch, have been given N10 million in cash prizes for their efforts.
At the one-day finale event, which took place on Wednesday, March 4, 2026, at the Interswitch Innovation Lab and Co-Working Space, the money was shared among the top teams whose innovative solutions stood out during the rigorous multiple phases of the competition.
Team Quickteller Fashion emerged as the overall winner, securing the grand prize of N4 million for a solution that impressed judges with its originality, practicality, and strong strategic relevance. Team Kampe claimed second position with N2.5 million, while Team Stable placed third, receiving N1.5 million. Up to N300,000 worth of cash prizes were also awarded to the fourth, fifth and sixth qualifying teams.
For nine months, cross-functional teams from across the organisation collaborated to conceptualise, validate, develop, and refine solutions, moving from raw ideas to minimum viable products (MVPs) with ready-to-market potential and deployment across the business.
The atmosphere at the grand finale reflected that of preparation and anticipation as the top 9 teams presented their innovations through live demonstrations and detailed pitches, fielding questions from a distinguished panel of judges before the top three winners were selected. Each presentation highlighted rigorous validation processes, thoughtful market considerations, and a strong emphasis on measurable impact.
While many of the solutions remain confidential due to their strategic relevance, the diversity and depth of ideas showcased during the hackathon’s final underscored the organisation’s growing culture of intrapreneurship and structured innovation. The projects illustrated how technology-driven thinking can unlock efficiencies, strengthen operational capabilities, and open new pathways for growth across the digital payments and commerce ecosystem.
“Technovation continues to reflect who we are as an organisation, bold, forward-thinking, and deeply committed to building impactful solutions from within. Over the years, we have seen ideas conceived during this programme evolve into meaningful capabilities that strengthen our ecosystem.
“The passion, discipline, and ingenuity demonstrated by our teams this year reinforce our belief in the power of African innovation to solve complex challenges and shape the future of technology on the continent,” the Chief Innovation Officer for Interswitch, Ms Adaobi Okerekeocha, stated.
By Modupe Gbadeyanka
The language support for its AI Search features has been expanded by Google, with the inclusion of Yoruba and Hausa in Nigeria.
This is part of a broader effort to make AI more inclusive across the continent, with support now extending to a total of 13 African languages.
Under the AI Overviews and AI Mode, speakers of both Nigerian languages can utilise AI-powered Search experiences in their mother tongue for quick summaries and conversational exploration.
This means existing AI features in Google Search are now accessible to people like the student in Kano asking a question in Hausa, and the trader in Ibadan seeking advice in Yorùbá.
By addressing language barriers, this update ensures that technology reflects the identity and culture of the people it serves. With this expansion, more people can now use AI Mode to ask complex questions in their preferred language, while exploring the web more deeply and naturally through text or voice.
The 13 languages now supported across Africa include Afrikaans, Akan, Amharic, Hausa, Kinyarwanda, Afaan Oromoo, Somali, Sesotho, Kiswahili, Setswana, Wolof, Yorùbá, and isiZulu.
These languages were chosen based on the vibrant search activity across the continent, ensuring that our AI experiences reach the communities that need them most.
Commenting on the development, the Communications and Public Affairs Manager for Google in West Africa, Taiwo Kola-Ogunlade, said, “Building a truly global Search goes far beyond translation — it requires a nuanced understanding of local information.
“With the advanced multimodal and reasoning capabilities of our custom version of Gemini in Search, we’ve made huge strides in language understanding, so our most advanced AI search capabilities are locally relevant and useful in each new language we support.
“This is about ensuring Nigerians can converse with Search in their mother tongues, making information more helpful for everyone.”
To use AI Overviews and AI Mode in the local language, users must open the Google app on an Android or iOS device, or via the Web. They are required to tap on AI Mode within the Search experience. Thereafter, they can type or speak the question in their preferred language, such as Hausa or Yorùbá, and let the AI guide the journey.
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