Airtel Sierra Leone Finally Rebrands to Orange Sierra Leone

By Adedapo Adesanya X, formerly known as Twitter, has announced plans to introduce voice and video calls to the platform. This is the latest move by the billionaire owner, Mr Elon Musk, to turn his app into what he calls an “everything app” modelled after China’s super app, WeChat. These features, when introduced, would place X in direct competition with WhatsApp, Telegram, and other social media apps offering the same services. Making its features unique, Mr Musk said users would not need phone numbers to make calls on X. According to the Twitter owner, the features would work on different

By Aduragbemi Omiyale For the fifth consecutive year, Interswitch has received the ISO 22301 recertification for Business Continuity Management (BCM) after a rigorous surveillance audit process. A leading provider of audit and certification services in the field of information security and privacy, MSECB, served in the capacity of auditors for the certification process. The certification process involved rigorous audits and evaluations of Interswitch’s business processes, contingency plans, and disaster recovery capabilities. In a statement, Interswitch enthused that maintaining the ISO 22301 certification is a testament to its comprehensive approach to risk assessment, mitigation, and recovery planning. The achievement of the

By Adedapo Adesanya After a three-year hiatus, the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI) has moved to restart the Delta-2 project, a technology transfer programme between Nigeria and the Czech Republic. The Nigerian agency and its Czech equivalent, the Technology Agency of Czech Republic (TA-CR) signed a Memorandum of Understanding in 2014 in Prague on critical areas of technology transfer and innovations, which resulted in the co-funding of the Czech-Nigeria Bilateral R&D project on the Delta-2 Programme. The programme started in 2020 but got stalled. Now, NASENI, in a statement, said the project may soon continue as the

By Adedapo Adesanya The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has said Nigeria now ranks seventh in terms of mobile phone usage globally while it takes the 11th spot in terms of internet penetration. The NCC Executive Vice Chairman/Chief Executive Officer, Mr Umar Danbatta, disclosed this while speaking at the opening ceremony of a two-day workshop on emerging technology forum for the telecommunications industry in Abuja on Thursday. Mr Danbatta, who was represented by Mr Abraham Osahadami, the NCC’s Head of Spectrum Database Management, said 82 per cent of the country’s 200 million+ population are telecom subscribers while just 29 per cent

By Dipo Olowookere The Ogun State government has concluded plans to host a Youth Convention between February 7 and 8, 2017. The programme, scheduled to hold at the June 12 Cultural Centre, Kuto, Abeokuta is being organized by the state government in collaboration with the organized private sector, civil society and international agencies. With the theme, ‘Ogun Youths: Exploring New Frontiers’, the convention is a direct response of the Governor Ibikunle Amosun-led administration to the challenge of youth unemployment and under-employment. The 2016 National Youth Survey Report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) indicates that approximately 56 percent

By Modupe Gbadeyanka The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) ended last week bearish, closing 1.27 percent lower to widen the year-to-date loss to 4.4 percent. Business Post reports that during the week, investors lost a total of N169.8 billion to profit taking, which reduced the market capitalisation to N13.233 trillion. The weekly loss came despite President Muhammadu Buhari assuring the investing community that his administration will use its second term to improve the economy, security and fight corruption; all which were his main focus during his first term in office. The President, who gave this assurance during his June 12 speech,

By FBNQuest Research Our look today at state governments’ internally generated revenue (IGR) shows a decline in the aggregate collection from N801 billion to N756 billion in 2015. Collection as a proportion of total revenue improved but perhaps the more important trend is that a minority of states is moving away from the rest. Both Ogun and Enugu joined Lagos in achieving a ratio for IGR/total revenue above 50 percent in 2015. One other state (Rivers) managed 40 percent, three 30 percent (Kano, Oyo and Abia) and five 20 percent. We are working with the data provided in the CBN

By Dipo Olowookere MasterCard has called for applications for its next Start Path Global 2017 class, open to African start-ups across the world rethinking banking and payments and have also raised a significant seed or Series A round of investment. The initiative is to support innovative later-stage start-ups reshaping the future of commerce with the focus on Africa. Applicants have been urged to submit their entries. During a six-month virtual programme, Start Path will provide start-ups with the operational support, mentorship, and investment they need to develop the next generation of commerce solutions and grow their operations. Selected companies will

By Adedapo Adesanya Nigeria is expected to continue facing a weakening Naira amid tightening global financial conditions, says a new report from the African Development Bank (AfDB). This will be a worse-case scenario as African economies remain resilient with a stable outlook in the 2023-2024 fiscal year. The report, Africa’s Macroeconomic Performance and Outlook (MEO) 2023, estimates Africa’s average GDP to stabilize at 4 per cent in the next two years, up from 3.8 per cent in 2022. In a statement from the bank on Wednesday, this was presented on the sidelines of the recently concluded 36th African Union Assembly

By Dipo Olowookere President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday, August 30, 2017, presided over his first Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in Abuja after his return from the United Kingdom, where he spent over three months for medical attention. Mr Buhari returned to the country over a week ago, but failed to convey the FEC meeting last Wednesday against expectations of some observers. During his absence, the FEC meeting was held weekly, but when the President cancelled last Wednesday’s meeting, his aide claimed there was no law that says members of the executive must meet every week. At the meeting today,

By Cowry Asset Last week, the local currency depreciated week-on-week (w-o-w) against the US Dollar at the Investors & Exporters Forex Window (I&E FX) by 0.06 percent to close at N360.20k amid 13.47 percent week-on-week decrease to $0.95 billion in transactions at the I&E FXW. Elsewhere, the Naira/Dollar rate remained unchanged at the interbank foreign exchange market, the parallel (black) market and the Bureau De Change (BDC) segments at N330/$, N362/$ and N360/$ respectively as Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) continued its weekly interventions of $210 million into the foreign exchange market; of which $100 million was allocated to Wholesale

By Dipo Olowookere Nigeria’s leading e-Commerce company, Jumia, in response to customers’ unrelenting demands for free delivery service to be replicated in other cities within the country, has announced the extension of its free delivery service via Jumia Express to more cities. The newly added cities are: Abuja, Port Harcourt, Ibadan and Abeokuta. Before now, the free delivery service only applied to orders above N15,000 within Lagos. However, large items such as Air Conditioning, Dishwasher, Fridge/Freezer, Fitness machines, Home furniture, Mirror, Rug, Musical instrument, Television, etc. are not eligible for free shipping. But, customers can still expect to receive their