The Philippines’ ICT regulator reportedly said it held crunch talks with operators today (April 24) to potentially extend its hard SIM registration deadline of April 26, which could see over half of total subscribers cut off from connectivity services.

In another example of the growing interest in 5G shown by many industries, Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL)-Bokaro Steel Plant (BSL) has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd (TCIL) to explore the potential of applications of 5G and other wireless communication technologies in its SAIL-Bokaro Steel Plant.

Rack Centre, which describes itself as the only carrier and cloud-neutral Tier III Constructed Facility Certified data centre in Africa, has revealed plans to build a new 12MW data centre in the Ikeja area of Lagos in Nigeria.

STC’s tower infrastructure company Tawal signed agreements to acquire towers in Bulgaria, Croatia, and Slovenia from United Group for €1.2 billion, as part of a wider move to expand overseas.

Panama’s regulator has recommenced its attempts to find a taker for Digicel Panama’s licence after the sole bidder General Internacional Telecom Panama (Gitpan) failed to provide adequate documentation.

Huawei announced it has developed a key enterprise IT management software to cut its use of a solution from Oracle, as the vendor strives to become less reliant on US technology.

Africell has launched its mobile money platform Afrimoney in Angola as the operator highlighted low mobile finance penetration in the country in its pursuit of growth.  

Tanzania's incumbent telecom operator Tanzania Telecommunications Company Limited (TTCL) has signed a Tsh 37.3 billion (US$15.9 million) contract with tech giant Huawei for the extension of the country’s National ICT Broadband Backbone (NICTBB) to 23 districts.

Submarine cable activity seems to be far from slowing down in Africa. In fact plans for two more cables, one connecting France and Tunisia and one involving the ECOWAS region, have recently been announced.

Nokia has announced the results of a trial conducted last year over a 3,551 km subsea cable between Jurong in Singapore and Manado in Indonesia – and they are pretty impressive.

Huawei is set to supply Teletalk Bangladesh with a suite of solutions aimed at preparing the operator for 5G and boosting rural operations.

Hondutel, the national fixed line provider of Honduras, has signed a new agreement with Starlink to deliver satellite connectivity to remote areas of the country.

Mobile money accounts grew 13% to 1.6 billion in 2022 as daily transactions reached in value of US$3.45 billion, according to trade body the GSMA.

The Philippines’ Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) rebuffed operator requests to extend its SIM registration deadline, demanding operators ramp up efforts to register subscribers who risk being deactivated.

Customers of Icosnet , Algeria’s sole private ISP provider, will now be able to access Liquid Dataport’s digital communication services following a new agreement between the firms.

The Nepalese Telecommunications Authority (NTA) has reportedly pulled Smart Telecom’s licence again for failing to pay its renewal fee and associated fines on time.

Ericsson says it has enhanced its remote management feature on Etisalat Egypt by e&’s network by implementing the Ericsson Smart Connected Site solution, enabling diesel generators that run in shorter bursts to save up to 40% in fuel cost and in carbon dioxide emissions.

Nokia is supplying its WDM optical network solutions for Lightstorm’s network expansion into the Eastern and Northern regions of India.

The latest landing of the 2Africa cable has been announced: it’s at Port Said, at the northern end of the Suez Canal, on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast.

Network International, an enabler of digital commerce across the Middle East and Africa (MEA) region, says it has renewed its partnership with one of Nigeria’s largest financial service providers, Polaris Bank Limited, to deepen financial inclusion and digital transformation.

Chinese vendor ZTE has won two more notable contracts. One, in India, is from Vodafone Idea. The other, in Brazil, is from new entrant Unifique.

Now Telecom completed the last bit of paperwork needed to secure a full grant from the US Trade and Development Agency (USTDA), paving the way forward to construct its full 5G network for the Philippines-based operator.

Key executives at PLDT have left their posts following the operator’s massive PHP48 billion (US$853 million) budget overspending, including the operator’s chief financial officer.

Cellcom, a leading service provider in Israel, and open RAN software platform provider Parallel Wireless have announced the launch of what they describe as their first-of-a-kind pilot, which will demonstrate the deployment of autonomous 5G standalone (SA) core sites in Israel.

Following on from last year’s announcement, reported on this site, that internet exchange operator AMS-IX had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with MainOne’s Lagos data centre, MainData Nigeria (MDXi), AMS-IX and MDXi have announced the launch of a new internet exchange in the city.

A sustainability-linked debt facility of up to US$170 million in multiple tranches has been secured by Raxio Data Centres, a leading pan-African data centre developer and operator.

The Vietnamese communications regulator announced it will auction off 4G and 5G spectrum with companies only having two days to submit interest.

Telekom Romania Mobile has entered the country’s 5G market with a stealth launch via its existing spectrum holding.

4iG group has announced that DIGIMobil customers will be switched over to Vodafone Hungary’s network from 1^st June.

Apple sales in India surged to hit almost US$6 billion in the year through March according to sources speaking to Bloomberg.