Kenyan developer wins Appstar challenge

The winners of the 2013 Vodafone Safaricom Appstar challenge have been announced.

Kenyan app Automs.gs has won the 2013 Appstar Challenge - a partnership between Safaricom and Vodafone designed to give support mobile app developers in emerging markets. At the finals in Nairobi yesterday, Bernard Mukangu's Automs.gs was named the overall winner. Automs.gs is an SMS scheduler app that allows the automatic sending of personalized text messages on pre-scheduled dates.

India’s Kunal Mahajan’s Matchbox puzzle game app was the runner up, while South Africa’s Lynette Huundermark took third place with the GoMetro commuter information app.

A total of 2,200 apps developers registered for this year’s Appstar challenge and eight developers from Kenya, India, South Africa and Tanzania reached the finals to compete for cash prizes valued at USD 22,000.

“The idea to come up with Automs.gs was born when I forgot to send my girlfriend a message to wish her a happy birthday and as a result she was very cross with me. From that day I purposed to develop an application that would ensure that I would never forget important events in the lives of those I care about both at a personal and professional level,” said Mukangu after being named the grand winner of the 2013 Appstar Challenge.

Mukangu started his career at Nairobits incubation hub in South B, where youth from informal settlements are given a chance to study mobile Apps development for free.

“The best innovators are not people who create things because they are smart. Truly innovative people are those who try to find a way of addressing current unsolved problems, unmet needs and unresolved inadequacies in the societies they live in. They understand that every problem or challenge in the society is in fact an opportunity,” said Bob Collymore, CEO Safaricom Limited.

source: www.biztechafrica.com

safaricom buys yu stake in fibre firm to launch 4g grid

Safaricom has acquired the full shareholding of rivalEssar in the undersea fibre optic The East Africa Marine system (TEAMs) for an undisclosed fee.

The Nairobi bourse-listed telecom confirmed it acquired the 10 per cent from Yu mobile to offer faster and more efficient Internet data services as well support the upgrade of its network to 4G.

The deal has pushed Safaricom's ownership of undersea fibre optic network to 32.5 per cent, a share that guarantees the operator additional capacity in Teams, which is offered based on shareholding.

Other shareholders are the Kenya government (20 per cent), Telkom Kenya (20 per cent), Kenya Data Networks (10 per cent) and Jamii Telecom (6.25 per cent).

Essar, which has been looking for a strategic investor to inject cash and stave off a liquidity crisis, says it used proceeds from the deal to sustain operations.

"The stake was sold to Safaricom in September at undisclosed figure. The finances from this sale went towards yuMobile's operations," said Madhur Taneja, the Essar Kenya CEO.

"It was an investment made by Essar, which was not being used for operations. This bandwidth had always been idle since we acquired it five years ago."

Teams, which began operations in 2008, offered bandwidth to telecom firms that feed their fibre optic cables that have been laid on land.

Yu, unlike Safaricom, is yet to lay down its own terrestrial fibre-optic cable, prompting the equity sale in Teams.

Safaricom said Friday it was the only shareholder in Teams that showed interest in snapping the Essar share.

"The additional shareholding in Teams entitles Safaricom to have increased capacity on the 1.28 TB/s international cable," said Safaricom.

"It is an integral part of our data strategy to have sufficient international capacity to feed the demands of our growing customer base and to support our terrestrial fibre strategy and LTE (4G network) plans. 

The firm said earlier it was going to spend about Sh8 billion over the next four years to lay down 2,300km of inland fibre-optic cable and support a rising customer base.

source: www. hispanicbussiness.com

Nairobi hosts East African telecom investment summit as sector enters critical phase

The TMT Finance East Africa 2013 Conference will be held in Nairobi amidst unprecedented fixed-line and mobile consolidation and increasing investment in new infrastructure and spectrum predicted for the next 12 months.

Leading executives from companies including Safaricom, Bharti Airtel, Orange Telkom, Eaton Towers, Helios Towers, Standard Bank, Citi and regional government representatives are meeting at the TMT Finance & Investment East Africa 2013 Conference (http://www.tmtfinance.com/eastafrica) on November 26 at the Inter Continental Nairobi to tackle the critical opportunities and challenges for the region.

"Investment opportunities in Africa are immediate, significant, diverse and potentially very lucrative," said Enda Hardiman, Managing Partner, Hardiman Telecommunications, who will be leading a session on infrastructure investment at the conference. "Consolidation is in prospect and the fixed-line vista has changed out of all recognition. Landing of new submarine cables has increased connectivity by several orders of magnitude, while deployment of fibre in access networks is now common."

The conference will also include sessions on Regional Telecom Growth Strategies, Regulating Telecoms, Mergers and Acquisitions, Datacentres and Cloud, Applications and Mobile Banking, and Mobile Infrastructure.

"This is a really critical time for the East Africa region as critical decisions about the framework for investment, particularly regulation and spectrum allocation for 3G and 4G, will have a fantastic impact on regional growth," said Chris Buist, Director, Coleago Consulting, who will be chairing the session on regulation at the conference. "There are a number of important spectrum auctions coming up across the region and operators are looking at how best to use spectrum, infrastructure sharing, new technologies and business models to meet the massive demand for data services."

Mobile tower management and investment will also be an important topic at the conference.

"Specialist tower companies are now active continent-wide – all of which have recently engaged in successful fund-raising. Selloff of towers numbering 80,000 by the five major pan-African operators is now also in prospect," said Hardiman. "The investment vista is developing rapidly. The traditional "Big Five" operators continue to have vibrant investment programmes in place. This is now being complemented by focused interest on the part of the specialist, multi-billion dollar Private Equity funds. Sovereign wealth funds and specialist investors also continue to be active."

source: www.prweb.com