APO Group, the Pan-African communications consultancy and press release distribution service, has announced a multi-year strategic partnership with the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), providing the public broadcaster with sports content from the whole of Africa. SABC is South Africa’s national broadcaster. It broadcasts across 19 radio stations (AM/FM) and six television channels, and is […]

South African cellular operator Vodacom has joined telco Telkom in confronting regulator ICASA over its decision to take back “temporary” spectrum. It means that South Africa’s three largest telcos (including MTN) are all now pursuing ICASA through the Pretoria High Court and arguing that ICASA’s timing is not right. The spectrum was made available in […]

South African telco Telkom is arguing that an upcoming withdrawal of cellular spectrum would cause significant disruption as people are still forced to work from home, and the move would harm the provision of services for those users. Telkom has applied to the South African High Court in Pretoria and asking for a review of […]

South Africa’s telco Telkom is suing the broadcasting and communications regulator ICASA over the withdrawal of the temporary spectrum that’s coming to an end in November. The spectrum was made available in April 2020 to help cope with extra demand from home working and the pressures from Covid. The government extended the emergency spectrum access […]

South Africa, after almost a dozen false starts, will switch off its analogue TV transmissions by March 2022. The adoption of digital TV is some 10 years late and, while digital broadcasting is already a reality in some parts of the nation, it is far from nationwide. South Africa’s president Cyril Ramaphosa, following a cabinet […]

South Africa suffers regular electricity load shedding, where local power supplies are cut during heavy demand. Now the country’s business leaders are arguing with regulator ICASA that much the same risks apply to spectrum bandwidth. Business Leadership South Africa (BLSA) head Busi Mavuso said that if ICASA proceeds with its plan to take back temporarily […]

South Africa’s Openserve, currently a subsidiary of telco Telkom, and which looks after the operator’s wholesale business division, is to be given a listing on the Johannesburg stock exchange (JSE). This move is additional to the separate JSE listing of the spinning off of its Swiftnet masts and towers division – and a likely 20 […]

RTÉ and United Rugby Championship (URC) have launched URC TV, a new global streaming service offering fans around the world the opportunity to watch games live and on-demand, and follow their team home or away. URC TV will be a single destination for fans to watch all 151 games when and where they want, with […]

Virgin Mobile, having been present in South Africa for 15 years, is to close its service on November 1st. The cellular operator went into South Africa’s version of Chapter 11 bankruptcy reconstruction (Voluntary Business Rescue) in November 2020. Virgin Mobile now says that there have been major shifts in South Africa’s cellular operations. “In recent […]

MultiChoice, the South Africa based pay-TV operator, insists that it doesn’t have to pay the 50 per cent of the overall $4.34 billion back tax claimed by Nigeria’s Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) for its pay-TV activities in Nigeria. MultiChoice, in a statement, said it believes the actual amount due is “substantially” less than the […]