Friday News Round-Up

The digital world is changing: new business models, new players, new services. The emerging markets of Africa, the Middle East and Eurasia are pioneering ways to make the most of the new opportunities. To catch up on the latest examples of innovation and business developments, we put together a weekly list of the Hot stories we come across. The Com World Series team live and breathe emerging markets, so we want to make sure we spread the news!


Hot Stories in Africa & Middle East

Google launch SMS version of Gmail in Africa
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-18898967

South Africa's FNB integrates mobile banking to Facebook
http://www.techcentral.co.za/fnb-takes-banking-to-facebook/33582/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+co%2FUqJF+%28TechCentral%29

Kenyan and Ugandan start-ups make location pay its way"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18858897

Mobile apps increasingly help Muslims observe Ramadan
http://www.ameinfo.com/mobile-apps--help-muslims-ramadan-306925

Saudi Telecom profits exceed forecasts
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/18/saudi-telecom-results-idUSL6E8IIHIC20120718

Webinars

Webinar: Boosting Customer Retention
http://webinars.telecoms.com/webinar/customer-retention-and-arpu/

The Com World Series team concentrates on emerging markets in Africa, the Middle East and Eurasia 24/7 – 365 days of the year. You can follow the news with us by joining our online communities.

OTT PROVIDERS DEFINE THE FUTURE OF THE COMMUNICATIONS LANDSCAPE IN THE MIDDLE EAST

Last week’s Middle East Telco World Summit in Dubai was a buzzy affair with over 1,400 executives drawn from the entire Middle Eastern telecoms ecosystem in attendance.

Reflecting the changing landscape of the telecoms industry, the keynote panel discussion questioned “How are OTT Providers Disrupting the Operator Business Model?”. CEOs and Vice Presidents from operators and OTT providers debated the next step in competition or collaboration to maximise the potential of OTT service provision for all parties.

A packed conference room heard the views of Google’s Vice President Emerging Markets , Mohammad Gawdat, Ahmed Nassef, VP and Managing Director Middle East Yahoo!, Osman Sultan, CEO, du, Nawras’ CEO Ross Cormack, Khalifa Al-Fora SVP Technology and Network Strategy, Etisalat, Medhat Amer, CIO Mobily , Andrew Hanna, CCO VIVA Bahrain, Jigar Budhdev, General Manager MENA, Nimbuzz and Areeba Areeba’s CEO Ayman Irshaid.

Delegates were invited to join the launch of a report by the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women. . With the growth of the mobile tech industry comes opportunity. It makes social & economic sense to include women and the report, prepared by the Foundation in collaboration with STC, provides an in-depth study on the opportunities for women entrepreneurs in the mobile industry report provided an in-depth study of the opportunities available.


The 2nd day focus on LTE highlighted the region’s recent commercial launches. Case studies from Etisalat, du and STC demonstrated the reality of LTE, the impact on the consumer experience and the challenges and opportunities that remain for the operator.


The country focus sessions enabled delegates to gain a deeper understanding of the highlighted markets. Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt and Pakistan/Afghanistan were examined in detail with keynote presentations and panel discussions drawing out the successes and opportunities in each market.

The summit concluded, as it opened, with a panel discussion on OTT – this debate asking “Should OTT Players Pay for their Data?” With representation from the vendor, operator and OTT communities the lively discussion was a fitting end to a conference that demonstrated the need for operators to adapt to the changing communications world.

The Biggest Show on Earth ... well Africa, anyway

Next week sees our 17th Annual Africa Com take place in South Africa.  We are welcoming thousands of speakers, exhibitors, press, delegates and visitors from all over Africa and the world and it is hugely exciting to see representatives of the entire digital ecosystem flocking to beautiful Cape Town in their hordes.

The weather outlook, so far, is predicted to be sunny & bright and I'm sure this will be echoed in the speakers' visions of how they see the development of the African Digital economy.

Our colleagues in the Informa Telecoms & Media analyst division have long been heralding the impending explosion in African internet connectivity.  Describing Africa’s internet age as largely a "nomadic experience" they talk of the 2nd decade of the 2nd millenium as the age where the internet reaches the people.  By 2015,  20% of internet traffic in Africa will be carried by cellular networks, as compared to a global equivalent of just 3%. 

One of the key drivers of this growth will be highly valued and relevant content - there are plenty of international offerings - adpated for local consumers or otherwise - on the scence but the domestic African content provider market is still nascent.  But as we'll no doubt hear next week this will change rapidly.

If you have any questions you'd like to put to any of the panel sessions at AfricaCom do email them to us and we'll endeavour to get them put before the experts...

Africa Com launches it's record breaking, 13th annual congress agenda

We’ve now been running and growing our flagship event, AfricaCom for 13 years and there has been much excitement surrounding our recent launch of this year’s conference agenda. We’ve taken on board a lot of the requests from last year’s attendees to broaden the list of topics that delegates can choose from, particularly introducing new topics previously not covered in what started as a purely mobile centric event.

Coming under the overarching umbrella of “Driving the Next Stage of Growth in African Telecoms“ we’ve included topics spanning all aspects of the continent’s ecosystem including some new “hot” technologies yet to hit the market. Special Focus sessions include Efficiency and ROI Strategies; LTE; VAS; Marketing, Pricing and Loyalty; Mobile Money; Fibre Optics; Broadband Data Services; WiMAX; and Capacity & Wholesale Africa.

We’ve worked hard to ensure that our speaker panel broadens in step with the congress agenda. The speaker line-up has reached the golden landmark of 100 and new names are coming on board every week. All in all we’re hoping that this is going to be AfricaCom at it’s best yet!