ADC orders 20 years of solar power

21 March 2023

Africa Data Centres (ADC) has penned a 20-year power purchase agreement with DPA Southern Africa (DPA SA) to supply its facilities in South Africa with renewable solar energy.

DPA SA is a 50:50 joint company of Distributed Power Africa and French utility company, EDF, and the two companies intend to develop hybrid energy solutions for clients across Africa.

Under the terms of the agreement, DPA SA will supply 12MW of renewable solar energy to ADC facilities, partly from the solar farm it is developing near Bloemfontein.

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Conversational experiences trending for consumers

20 March 2023

New research from Infobip reveals the growing trend towards conversational experiences for customer communications.

The data, from 449 billion communications interactions on Infobip’s platform across 2022, shows the rapid growth of interactions on chat apps such as WhatsApp Business Platform and social media channels such as Instagram for many customer needs.

Customers have access to more channels and devices than ever before. Infobip’s analysis shows that traditional channels like SMS still play an important role for time-sensitive messages, two-factor authentication, and one-time passwords. But when it comes to engagement and support, customers are shifting to more conversational experiences over chat apps.

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Seacom goes live on Equiano cable

17 March 2023

Seacom has gone live with express connectivity on the Equiano subsea cable connecting Cape Town to Lisbon in Portugal, which it says is the fastest direct route between Africa and Europe.

Initially announced in 2019 by Google, the Equiano subsea cable landed at Melkbosstrand north of Cape Town in August 2022.

The cable starts in Western Europe and runs along the West Coast of Africa, between Portugal and South Africa, with branching units along the way that can be used to extend connectivity to additional African countries.

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Zambia to extend fibre network and build commercial DC

16 March 2023

The Zambian Ministry of Science and Technology has signed a memorandum of understanding with technology company Liquid Telecommunications (Jersey) Limited to build a commercial data centre and extend the country's fibre optic network.

The partnership also includes the connection of schools and health centres to high-speed internet as part of the Giga project led by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).

This initiative is part of the actions undertaken by the Zambian government to improve access to information and communication technologies (ICT) as the digital transformation continues to accelerate. Furthermore, digital and innovation are among the pillars of Zambia's 8th National Development Program (2022-2026). The said program is geared towards achieving the ‘Vision 2030’ which aims to make Zambia a prosperous middle-income nation by 2030.

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