I noticed multitudes of GOtv Africa banners and balloons in the ancient city of Ibadan Nigeria in the last quarter of 2011. The similarity with the name/logo of DStv was clear. Promotional drives were ongoing at different vantage points in Ibadan. GOtv is a new digital terrestrial TV (DTT) service by Multichoice Africa, operators of DStv. Instead of broadcasting via satellite, GOtv broadcasts from TV masts, sending encrypted digital signals to ... [Read more]
Too many people in Africa happen to fall within the low-income bracket. Thus, one would expect budget airlines to be commonplace on this continent, catering for the masses. This is not so. Budget airlines are rather common in high-income countries of Western Europe, North America, India and many Asian countries. The relatively few airlines that ply major African cities do so at rather exorbitant fares. As of 21 Nov 2011 7:30am GMT: a return ... [Read more]
From Wikipedia: The 2011 Horn of Africa famine is a famine occurring in several regions in the Horn of Africa as a result of a severe drought that is affecting the entire Eastern Africa region. The drought, said to be "the worst in 60 years", has caused a severe food crisis across Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya that threatens the livelihood of more than 10 million people. Other countries in and around the Horn of Africa, including Djibouti, Sudan, ... [Read more]
Mobile Number Portability (MNP) launched in Ghana on 7th July 2011, enabling mobile subscribers to move from one mobile network to another, whilst still retaining their full mobile number. It has generated some buzz in the Ghana's mobile communications sector with all the mobile providers offering mouth-watering incentives to woo subscribers from other networks whilst keeping their existing subscribers. As of this morning (18th July 2011), over ... [Read more]
I got the following message from a reader of this blog: Good day Mr. Ajao. I am a post graduate student at the university of Northampton, United kingdom, studying MA International Marketing Strategy. I am really proud as I see a Nigerian like you writing good articles on current issues on the internet. I have read about 4 of your articles and I must that I am very impressed. You are making us proud here in the United Kingdom. After reading one ... [Read more]
This is the 3rd and final part in a series of posts related to Esoko. Esoko: The Platform Esoko is an agricultural market information platform. It takes advantage of the explosive growth of mobile communication services in Africa. Managed on the web and delivered via mobile, individuals, agri-business, government and projects use Esoko to collect and send out market data using simple text messaging. The Esoko platform provides automatic and ... [Read more]
Following the launch of Mobile Number Portability (MNP) in Ghana on 7th July 2011, the mobile networks all launched campaigns geared towards enticing mobile subscribers to port to their network. Newspaper ads, radio jingles and TV ads have taken the lead but since the internet is slowing going mainstream in Ghana, the leading mobile networks have taken their marketing the internet, as well. I am highlighting the web campaigns ... [Read more]
Infinity TV, a direct-to-home satellite TV service on Astra 2B has gone premium. Most of the channels they offer which have hitherto been free since early 2010 are now ... [Read more]
Infinity TV, a direct-to-home satellite TV service on Astra 2B has gone premium. Most of the channels they offer which have hitherto been free since early 2010 are now encrypted. This is not much of a surprise since Infinity TV had always set-out to be a premium service. Their TV channels currently include: 9JA TV Vive Viasat Nature Africa Viasat History Africa Infinity Bollywood Galaxy TV (Nigeria) Sky News ... [Read more]
This is the 2nd part in a series of posts focused on Esoko. While many web/software development entities in Africa focus on fancy applications (apps) that have little meaningful impact on their society, a fast-growing software company headquartered in Accra is focused on improving some agricultural processes through creating software for collecting, analysing and sharing data related to agriculture. Esoko Ltd is championing an unusual mix in ... [Read more]
