Ghana to Buy 6 Aircraft for National Carrier, Google Limits Political Ad Targeting, and Iran’s Internet Blackout Reaches Day Four

Africa

Ghana signs MoU to purchase aircraft for national airline

The Ghana government has signed an agreement with The Boeing Company and DeHavilland Aircraft for the purchase of aircraft to relaunch its national airline, it has been reported. The deal will see Ghana purchase six Dash 8-400 worth $877.5 million according to reports. “We are very excited to be working with De Havilland Canada to develop our fleet with a modern aircraft that will support the development of our new national airline and provide a strong foundation as we work to build a broader network and become the aviation hub of West Africa,” Aviation Minister Joseph Kofi Adda said. The Dash 8-400 will help relaunch a regional airline in Accra with a vision to add routes beyond Africa in the near future.

Safaricom’s Fuliza product wins the Business of Tomorrow Award

Fuliza, a product by Safaricom and Huawei, has been awarded the Business of Tomorrow Award at AfricaCom 2019 in Cape Town, it has been reported. Fuliza is a Mobile Money Overdraft Service that allow M-PESA customers to borrow money to complete their transactions. There was $62 million worth of transactions through Fuliza one month after it launched in January 2019. The service is powered by the Huawei Mobile Money Finance Overdraft Platform which allows multiple overdraft services within a secure environment. “Fuliza enriches our mobile financial services portfolio further fulfilling our promise to always provide our customers with relevant products and services that meet them at their point of need.” Safaricom CEO Michael Joseph said.

The Americas

Google to limit political ad targeting

Google has announced that it would no longer allow political ads to target individuals based on their supposed political leanings, a BBC report has said. In addition, ad campaigns would have no access to Google user database in an attempt to reach prospective voters anywhere in the world. The new rules will first be implemented in the UK within the week, according to the report. This is a further departure from both Twitter and Facebook, each of whom are implementing different rules ahead of the election season. Twitter has banned all political ads while Facebook has said it would not fact-check claims made in ads published on its platform. “We recognize that robust political dialogue is an important part of democracy, and no one can sensibly adjudicate every political claim, counterclaim, and insinuation,” Scott Spencer of Google Ads said.

Colombian stock exchange launches crowdfunding for startups

The Colombian stock exchange has launched an internet crowdfunding platform to allow small businesses raise funds from the public, it has been announced. Called the “a2censo,” the platform would allow individuals to purchase company bonds from as low as $58. “The initiative is meant to create an alternative source of financing for the more than two million small and medium-sized businesses via a technology tool that will allow companies to gather their financing needs with the savings that people want yields from,” Joan Cordoba of Colombia’s stock exchange said. a2censo is supported by Inter-American Development Bank, the commerce ministry as well as other organisations.

Asia

Iran internet shutdown enters 4^th day

Iran’s internet blackout has reached its 4^th day after connections started going dark on Saturday, it has been reported. The connections started going down following demonstrations over increases in fuel prices. Internet monitoring site, NetBlocks, has revealed that internet access has plummeted to 5%, leavings majority of the 80 million-people of Iran with no way to contact each other. Families living abroad have also found it hard to reach their relatives in Tehran and elsewhere. “This is on a different scale to other instances we’ve seen around the world,” Alp Toker of NetBlocks said. This is especially so because the internet network in Iran doesn’t have a single kill switch to explain the sudden failures. The internet blackout has affected both fixed lines and smartphones.

SoftBank company faces antitrust case over patent practices

SoftBank-owned company, Fortress Investment Group, is facing an antitrust case filed by Intel and Apple for its alleged use of patenting processes, it has been revealed. The company allegedly stockpiled patents and sued tech firms for more than $5 billion for supposed breaches. This is despite Fortress allegedly not building any products based on the patents it filed or those filed by companies whose portfolios were under its control. “Apple has suffered economic harm in the form of litigation costs and diversion of resources away from innovation to respond to these entities’ serial nuisance suits,” Apple wrote in its statement.

Europe

Deutsche Telekom to maintain multi-vendor equipment strategy

Deutsche Telekom will continue to rely on a multi-vendor strategy when it comes to network equipment, according to Reuters. The German company declined to comment on a report about it phasing out Huawei equipment from its systems. Wirtschaftswoche had reported that Deutsche Telekom was planning on replacing Huawei equipment in its core network as it rolled out 5G services. A Deutsche Telekom spokesperson said, “Fundamentally, we are pursuing a multi-vendor strategy and source network components from several vendors. Security comes first,” in an email response to the query. While Washington has urged its allies to drop Huawei due to an alleged backdoor via which the Chinese government could have access to data being transferred, Germany has opted for rules that required telecoms vendors to meet minimum governance and technical standards.

Vodafone secures 7-year partnership with Ryanair

Vodafone Business has secured a 7-year technology partnership to handle budget airliner Ryanair’s booking and passenger boarding services, it has been reported. This partnership is an extension of an existing partnership that would cover 153 million travellers across 40 countries. Vodafone Business would also handle 300 Ryanair websites serving different customer segments. “Airline passengers will demand even more in the coming years, and we will work alongside Ryanair to help them prepare for the future using our full portfolio of products and services,” Vodafone Business’s Vinod Kumar said. Vodafone Business offers cloud infrastructure to small and multinationals and allows them to have unlimited Internet-of-Things connections for their devices.