Author: Cyrus

  Uganda’s latest home entertainment pay television service, Zuku TV, has set high ambitions for the Uganda market. Having launched and set in place an elaborate countrywide distribution and customer service network, Zuku believes it is confident of breaching the One hundred thousand subscriber mark in Uganda within the first two years. Zuku TV is ramping up Ugandan distribution by boosting the team of resellers with additional agents that will complement the Simba Telecom outlets. The company has completed a training module for 150 agents who will work with Simba and installation team to deliver the product to customers doorstep and provide after…

The National Police Service recruits who are currently undergoing training under the new curriculum,recently received 100 computers and 3 printers from the Kenya Bankers Association (KBA). The ICT is not only for upgrading the Police Service but also enabling them to handle challenges in modern day policing. The National Police Service trainees to benefit from the ICT support from KBA will be from Kenya Police Training College at Kiganjo, GSU Training School and the Administration Police Training College-APTC Embakasi. The Police Reforms Implementation Committee Chairman Mr. Titus Naikuni said that the computers will equip them with knowledge, skills and attitude to…

Facebook has recently rolled out a whole bunch of new features and changes that the it hopes will cement its position as the social media platform of choice.  The social network has apparently increased the status update character limit to 5,000 from a only 500 characters from what we have tested. Facebook has also changed other stuff including the new news ticker bar on the right pane. The news ticker shows your friends current activities on Facebook, including leaving comments, status updates and uploading photos. Facebook has also pushed out the floating navigation bar we’ve heard so much about. With 500 characters,…

UAP Insurance  has launched a mobile based personal accident cover that targets the largely uninsured population segment and looks to increases accessibility to insurance by more Kenyans. The product named Salamasure, covers the entire transaction with the customer from start to finish. Customers will register, pay and report their claims on their phone. The claim will also be paid directly through the phone. The entire process of going on cover takes less than two minutes. UAP Insurance Managing Director, James Wambugu, say that it took UAP over two years to develop Salamasure. The platform will also allow UAP’s large network…

Huawei has commenced its  annual Mobile Broadband (MBB) road show to demonstrate its  latest technologies in Kenya . The demo truck arrived in Nairobi after a successful tour of South Africa, and will later visit Tanzania, Uganda, among other countries in Africa. Huawei SMART MBB is an end-to-end (E2E) ALL-IP solution that is designed to increase network capacity and improve efficiency. With Huawei SMART MBB, operators can have smarter, more precise and effective ways of optimizing hotspots and overall throughput, and thus be able to guarantee a satisfactory user experience, which will save lots of total cost of ownership (TCO)…

Nokia Siemens Networks has launched a new way to deliver broadband, Liquid Net. The Liquid Net system allows an operator to set up its network to self-adapt to meet capacity and coverage requirements based on demand. The new approach is aimed at improving the quality of broadband services delivered worldwide. The sudden surge in demand for real broadband means networks must be ready to cope with personal data consumption of more than 1GB per mobile user per day. Broadband demand has also become highly unpredictable, fluctuating between locations at different times as people use broadband at home, at work and…

Airtel Kenya and ezetop are pleased to announce the launch of International Top Up, which enables the Kenyan community living or working abroad to directly recharge Airtel prepaid mobile for their families back home in Kenya. The new service will be offered in partnership with ezetop, a company based in Ireland that enables relatives abroad to support friends and family back home by delivering airtime credit directly to mobile phones.

Rwanda which has already been recognized by the UN as East Africa’s high-tech hub, has partnered with Carnegie Mellon University to offer graduate degrees in Engineering. Both parties have announced the creation of Carnegie Mellon Rwanda, an academic program based in Kigali.   The program will offer advanced training on engineering and management coupled with international internships and job placement. The centre is meant to benefit students from East Africa. The program initially will offer a master of science degree in information technology, and more academic tracks will be added over time. A Ph.D. program has been proposed but that proposal isn’t definite, says Pradeep…

We just got some more photos on the upcoming Tablet which is said to be the first to be designed in Africa. The tablet will be called Way-C and is designed by VMK from Congo Brazaville. It is set to become available in parts of Africa in October. The tablet has been manufactured in China. Some Specs of the tablet; Android 2.3.3 1,2 Ghz 512 Mb RAM 4Gb HDD Wifi B/G/N Screen Resolution is 800 x 480 We will be updating you as we get more details

Authorities in Indian state of Tamil Nadu have started a program where over 6.8 million school children will each be given a $290 laptop for free within a period of 5 years. The program will cost a total of $2 Billion and has had critics of the system say that the money could have been used in better ways. The free laptop is part of the promise made by politicians led by J Jayalalitha during the last elections. Supporters of the system believes that Tamil Nadu is a state in a good position to offer such incentives to children since it…

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has been forced to allay rumours and threats which has been doing rounds to the effect that some calls will cause death to users of mobile phones who receive such calls. Text messages have been making the rounds in the last two days that several people have died in Abuja, Rivers, Lagos, Oyo and Ogun  states while receiving calls from a particular phone number (09141). NCC has said that it is “unimaginable that somebody will die while receiving a call.” The commission spokesman Reuben Muoka added: “It is only very gullible people that will believe such a rumour.”…

Yesterday, Robert Scoble (popular blogger), posted on Google+ a claim to the effect that Google was developing a social news read which many techies have claimed to be the Flipboard killer. Scoble said that the app will be available in both the iPad and Android. Robert wrote: “I heard from someone working with Google that Google is working on a Flipboard competitor for both Android and iPad,” posted Scoble. “My source says that the versions he’s seen so far are mind-blowing good.” Kara Swisher of All Things Digital has confirmed that “Google is indeed working on rolling out the new product,…

So guys tell me. Linda Holt who is a former owner of Capital FM and the current CEO of RedSky advertising agency is said to have been arrested and arraigned in a Nairobi court on charges of possession of 6.8 grams of Cocaine worth Ksh 27,000. Linda was arrested after several weeks sting operations by the police. She has been receiving the drugs from a Nigerian based at the Kenyan coast and since the parcel bears her name, the police intercepted it but efforts to lure her into receiving it had been futile. Details are sketchy but is said that…

Craig Newmark, 59,is an Internet entrepreneur known for being the founder of listings website Craigslist. Techmtaa.Com conducted a short email interview with him. Craig has not had a managerial role at Craigslist.Com for 10 years. He still is the nerd he was when he founded the site. What is Your Educational Background? What Did you want to do in  life when growing up? How did you end up being a techie and a  nerd at that? I got two degrees in Computing Sciences from Case Western Reserve University. Originally, I wanted to get into physics, maybe quantum physics or similar,…

UK Advertising Standards Authority has snatched the self-proclaimed title from Samsung Galaxy S2. The authority has declared that it is iPhone 4 and not Galaxy S2 which is the slimmest phone in UK. The standards body says that although the Galaxy S2 has its slimmest parts measuring 8.71mm while iPhone 4 measures 9.3mm, the Galaxy S2 cannot claim the “slimmest” title because its thickest parts measures 9.91mm. The draw back to Galaxy S2’s claim to the slimmest cellphone title in UK is the thick lower hump. This latest declaration is a small but important win to Apple which has many…