Author: Cyrus

Mobile phone subscribers in Tanzania now have a reason to keep calling more, following Vodacom’s move to reduce cross networkj call rates by 50%. The leading telecommunications company has introduce the Bonga tariff, an offer that will apply to calls to all networks and will be accessible to prepaid and Vodajaza customers only. With Bonga there is no need for customers to change their SIM Cards or carry multiple handsets. For the first time in Tanzania, Vodacom’s Bonga tariff virtually allows a customer to call any network at his/her convenience from Vodacom thus saving on money and time which could be devoted to other things. There will be no cost for…

Africa’s premier web and emerging tech event, Tech4Africa, is here for the third year. The event which still attract some of the best tech and innovative minds will be held on Wednesday 31st October and Thursday 1st November at The Indaba Hotel, Gauteng, and the theme is “Unlocking the next billion consumers”. Most of the sessions of the 2012  version of the annual event will be focused around mobile and content, the enterprise opportunity, entrepreneurship and financing, social business and innovation. The event attract an all round audience which cut across the whole tech ecosystem of developers, social media marketers, technologists,…

  Samsung is looking to make a name tagging on the coat tails of Apple. After the court fights which found that Samsung copied Apple’s innovations in almost every sense, the company is now resorting to making adverts mocking Apple fans and products hoping to gain some acceptance with the Apple fanatics. Samsung Ad Apple fan-boys response The new 90-second ad making a debut on US networks tonight show iPhone enthusiasts queuing for the iPhone 5 and taunts them by showing off what the Samsung guys think at the new cool features of the Galaxy S III. The desperation of Samsung might…

Cisco introduced a set of security solutions designed to protect data centers in Kenya against the threats they face in moving toward more consolidated and virtualized environments, while also enabling businesses to take advantage of new cloud-based models. 70% of the world’s Internet traffic and 35% of the world’s email traffic flows through Cisco networks. This enables Cisco to gain intelligence from throughout the network to make more informed security decisions placing them in the best position to see and protect against threats before they affect customers’ networks. Collectively, the new offerings extend data center and security professionals’ power to enforce end-to-end security for high-capacity data centers and mobile workforces. The offerings include new highly…

yuCash, the mobile money service of yuMobile is now available at all Postbank branches thanks to a partnership agreement with Postbank signed today. This is the third financial institution to partner with yuCash after signing with Equity and Cooperative banks respectively. yuCash customers will be able to go to any Postbank branch and register, deposit and withdraw funds from their yuCash Accounts. More services such as bill payments that will enable customers to send money from their yuCash accounts to Postbank accounts are planned for the future. Subscribers can also register their yuMobile SIM lines at any Postbank branch.

Sony yesterday unveiled a new gaming console, Sony PS3, at its pre-Tokyo Game Show briefing. Revealing a new body design, the PS3 is going to be 20% smaller and 25 percent lighter than the current PS3. The new PS3 console will be available in 250GB and 500GB models unlike the current one which is available in 160GB and 320GB. It will also be available in black (to be available from October 4) and white (to be available on November 22) colours. Sony announced the 250GB model of the new PS3 will cost 370 USD. Sony has not revealed the pricing…

Kenyans looking for the Monday’s by-elections results have been venting their anger on Twitter as the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission’s (IEBC) website crashed due to the sudden surge in traffic. For the better part of the evening into the night, the website has been down and it might not be soon that the site might return to normal. The website seems to have crashed due to the high numbers of queries into the database supporting the site. The development exposes the inadequacies in the electoral management body. Today’s by-election had only 3 constituencies and few civic wards going for votes.…

There seems to be a problem at Safaricom. East and Central Africa’s biggest telco is facing senior management problems as the Board of Directors of Safaricom feel that the shareholders are not getting a good return on their investment. Citing various touchy issues, the board members sitting sometime last week before the annual general meeting (AGM), were rumoured to have demanded that Bob Collymore resign as the CEO of the listed company. Bob Collymore is one very flexible and hands-on manager if you ask me. He is a keen listener and a team player unlike Michael Joseph who was more…

Below is the exchange a friend had with The Star’s public editor. Read; From: Public Editor <publiceditor@radioafricagroup.co.ke> Date: September 11, 2012 11:14:46 PM GMT+03:00 To: Vince <@gmail.com> Subject: Re: Caroline Mutoko should apologize My apologies; I thought that what was published on that website was Caroline’s column. I will look into this. Best, Karen Rothmyer Public Editor The Star —– Original Message —– From: “Vince” <@gmail.com> To: “Public Editor” <publiceditor@radioafricagroup.co.ke> Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2012 12:43:18 PM Subject: Re: Caroline Mutoko should apologize So in short you’re saying plagiarism is ok? Regards, Vincent Chepkwony Sent from my iPad On Sep 11, 2012, at 2:58 PM, Public Editor <publiceditor@radioafricagroup.co.ke>…

Airtel Kenya and Postal Corporation Kenya Limited have today announced a countrywide partnership that will see Airtel Money Customers access Airtel Money services in all 465 Posta outlets countrywide. Commenting on the development, AIrtel Kenya CEO Shivan Bhargava said; “This partnership with Posta marks yet another great stride in deepening the availability and accessibility of Airtel Money to our customers throughout Kenya. With the 465 Posta branches spread across the country offers Airtel Money customers a guaranteed access to deposit and withdraw money, making it easier for them send and receive cash to and from anyone in Kenya.” Mr. Bhargava…

SEACOM has today announced the appointment of Byron Clatterbuck as its Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) with immediate effect. An industry veteran with more than 15 years experience in the telecommunications industry, Byron Clatterbuck has held a number of senior international executive positions during his career, most recently as President of Tata Communications’ Global Service Provider Segment, a company operating the largest private subsea cable system network in the world. Before that, Mr.Clatterbuck held senior executive positions at BT, Level 3, and REACH. Commenting on the appointment, Mark Simpson, SEACOM’s CEO, said: “The SEACOM system has changed the African ICT landscape, and it is now time for us to continue…

By Ronny After reading Clay Muganda’s work I have come to the conclusion that the nation columnist is highly unoriginal and a plagiarist. He recycles the same phrases regularly in his column. For examples; Clay Muganda repeats the Idiom  “ Throws toys out of pram” regularly. He used it twice in August (28th and 6th) this year.  It was recycled again in an article in the Saturday nation on November 26th 2011. Then on September 27th. Also on February 22nd 2011. Not forgetting on Friday may 21st 2009. “Forge behind” or “Forging behind” is his next favourite phrase. I have noticed that he regularly recycles it. It was…

A journalist traveled to Zambia. Simnikiwe Mzekandaba, an editorial assistant at IT Web, was entering the country as a team of journalist invited by Samsung. What the journalist witnessed is not what he expected even though the South Korean company has made lots of investment in Africa. Samsung is not the only company that is making significant investment in the continent but it is the only company which has its special passport control desk at an African country’s international airport. Even during 2012 version of Samsung Africa Forum (the biggest Samsung event), there was no special passport control desk at any…

Kenyans have been killed in the last two weeks. More than 100 Kenyans have been massacred. The President does not care to comment or order any action to stop the killings. Ethnic media houses like Nation Media portion blame in some ignorant way like they will always do, “President and PM.” Who does not know that Prime Minister Raila Odinga has no power to command even watchmen in Kenya? Nation Media is playing ethnic reporting and so their reporting and analysis of Tana River killings must be thus treated. Kibaki is the commander-in-chief and for him as long as his…

HootSuite which is the business behind the social media management service, has announced that it has acquired Seesmic. Seesmic which was founded by Loic Le Meur of Le Web and started as a video blogging site has become a major player in the social media though they have been losing market recently. The deal with HootSuite seems to be so much targeted at the great user base of Seesmic and not the platform. In a blog post HootSuite announced that it has acquired Seesmic and that it will continue to support the platform while transitioning its business users to HootSuite’s services. HootSuite…