By Dr. Phil Osagie
Global Lead Strategist
Jsp Communications

Apple launches news subscription service.  Photo: New York Times

Given Apple’s sound reputation monopoly and its insanely legendary sense of innovation, when Apple sneezes, the competition catches a cold! With the latest launch of a News Subscription service in a fiercely competitive news market, it is not so clear which side will catch the cold this time around!

Strategy Professors W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne in their best-selling book, Blue Ocean Strategy – How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant describe two types of market playing fields: Red oceans, where competition is fierce in bloody waters, strategy centers around beating rivals, and wins are often zero-sum. The cutthroat competition often results in nothing but a bloody red ocean of rivals fighting over a shrinking and shark-infested profit pool

Blue oceans, on the other hand, is where a market space is new and uncontested, and strategy is built around creating a leap in consumer value, thereby making the competitors irrelevant. It is about unlocking new demand and outperforming rivals in a whole new level.

Apple, in an expansive effort to build more services to run on its various devices, has just rolled out a subscription service for news featuring some of the biggest newspapers and magazines.

The company said its Apple News+ (Plus) subscription will include access to 300 magazines, including The New Yorker, National Geographic and InStyle. It will also feature newspapers like The Los Angeles Times and The Wall Street Journal. The subscription will cost $9.99 a month and will start out from the United States and Canada.

Apple describes the new service as News you can trust- All in one place. Apple News promises to “provide the best coverage of current events, curated by editors and personalized for you. Dive into your favorite topics or discover new ones. And stay up to date with rich videos, breaking news notifications, and subscriptions to some of your favorite publications.”

The subscription service builds on a free news app that the company released in late 2015 that comes installed on the company’s iOS software. Apple said about five billion articles are read monthly on Apple News.

The news subscription is part of a series of announcements of Apple’s new services, including a streaming video offering.

The New York Times reported that the new services represent an evolution of Apple’s business model. For years, Apple focused mainly on selling hardware products, counting on consumers to upgrade phones and tablets every few years. But as technology and design improvements have become less apparent, demand for the iPhone, the company’s flagship product, has flattened.

The company is now shifting its focus to selling content and services for Apple’s roughly 1.4 billion active devices, which include Apple TV boxes, Apple Watches, Mac computers and iPads.

Apple already has 56 million subscribers to its streaming music service and it generated $10.9 billion from services in the last quarter of 2018, compared to $73.4 billion of hardware sales.5 billion articles are read on the current Apple News app each month.

Spotify and some other competitors in the streaming business are already screaming foul at Apple’s dominant strategy of stifling competitive services and .abusing the marketplace power of its App Store.

The question is will this News subscription service be another money spinner for Apple or will it eventually end up as another me-too news outlet?

The news segment is already a bloody red ocean with many entrenched players including Google News, Microsoft News, HuffPost, Flipboard, Reuters News, CNBC and hundreds of others.

Apple is however expected to leverage the Apple brand name, pedigree and psychology marketing to change the rules of the game and redefine the market.

”This Is How We Do It” was the monster hit song by Montell Jordan some years ago. Will Apple soon be singing this song loud and clear over its latest News Service or will Apple quietly bite the dust this time?

Africa still lags behind the rest of the world in its digital transformation, and in spite of a growing number of innovative solutions, the on-going lack of adequate infrastructure and connectivity is preventing the continent from realising its true economic potential.

The best and fastest way to overcome these barriers may lie in heightened cooperation between countries and their various regulators.
This is according to James Claude, CEO of Global Voice Group (GVG) (www.GlobalVoiceGroup.com) – a provider of IT solutions to governments and regulatory authorities – who says that while many countries in Africa are individually working to increase their infrastructure and digital capabilities, the most effective solution will be to approach these challenges from a regional perspective.
While attending the 5^thCrans Montana Forum in Dakhla, Morocco in March of this year, Claude noted that African governments have a crucial role to play in taking the continent to the next stage in its digital evolution.
“Businesses, universities and young entrepreneurs are increasingly contributing to the digital economy and fostering innovation in Africa. Governments now need to work towards helping these private sector players to grow their solutions more rapidly and affect real change on the continent. This will require harmonising regulations that allow businesses and services to expand beyond country borders.”
Africa’s potential as a global leader in the world’s digital economy grows significantly with each passing year. Africa’s population is increasing exponentially, and is expected to reach between 1.379 billion and 1.486 billion by 2025. In addition to this, the market penetration of digital technology is accelerating. Importantly, it is predicted that half of Africa’s entire population is expected to own smartphones by 2020, which already goes a long way towards overcoming infrastructural barriers to digital transformation and connecting people and services online.
“Building on this, mobile money platforms such as M-Pesa have fundamentally changed the way that money is circulated on the continent. E-commerce is also growing rapidly as a result of mobile money, with online retailers that accept mobile money payments even providing people without bank accounts access a greater variety of goods. Similarly, small and medium businesses are able to increase sales and overcome many infrastructure restraints.”
Claude explains that governments across the continent must build on this by creating more digital services based in Africa, facilitating more local tech companies, and continuing to invest in education and incubators that allow citizens to fully access and benefit from digital transformation.
“Equally vital, is to ensure that regulators in every region and country have the visibility, transparency and the necessary data to make informed decisions that will help the digital economy across the different jurisdictions. This is an area in which GVG already has a lot of experience, having pioneered the regulatory technology solution, RegTech on the continent.”
GVG has been helping regulators and government agencies to play a proactive and relevant role in developing their digital agenda.

“Our solutions provide key data that help regulators to migrate from paper-based institutions to digital ones. We will continue to play this role and focusing on Big Data for better regulation, compliance monitoring, revenue assurance, fraud prevention and also Digital Identity. We believe that these will be the key enablers allowing Africa’s citizens to become active participants in the digital economy instead of mere consumers of imported digital goods. Digital ID will also be key to improve better government services delivery,” Claude concludes.

In 2016, it was estimated that telecom companies in Uganda on annual basis were losing about $60 million due to illegal redirection of international calls traffic.

The amount in part led to revenue from voice services to remain flat or grow sluggishly in 2015, 2016 and 2017 – according to telecom revenue analysis in those three years. The illegal redirection is known in technical terms as SIM boxing.
SIM boxing is a practice in telecommunications whereby a person or group of people set-up a device that can take up several SIM cards (a SIM box) and use it to complete international calls it receives from the Internet as voice over IP (VoIP) and in turn serve them to the in-country mobile network subscribers as local traffic.

The SIM boxer thus bypasses the international rates and often undercuts the prices charged by local mobile operators.

How Does it Work?
Normally, for example, if you are making a call from the United Kingdom to Uganda, the subscriber will call via their operator (provider A – i.e. Vodafone) that has an International Gateway (e.g. BICS, TATA, etc.) and has termination agreements with operators in Uganda including network X (could be MTN or Airtel). They send the call via their connections to Network X that looks for its subscriber and terminates the call.
In this scenario, all operators – A, BICS, X and the government receive their fees as per set agreements and taxation laws.
This is the legal mode of operations and guarantees revenue for all parties involved.  However, some unscrupulous individuals have found a way around this. The time this issue became rampant or visible, was when the One Area Network (OAN) was launched in 2015, which unfortunately became the transit route for calls originating from other countries.
If someone made a call from the UK to Uganda, on your phone it would be displayed as a call from Kenya because it would have been diverted by some unscrupulous individuals.
The SIM Box has several SIM cards of operators and could also take advantage of any existing on-net (same network) voice bundles and thus ends up paying very little or nothing for the termination of the said call – that is disguised as a local call.
In this scenario, the interconnect operator C undercuts the market interconnect rates and offers cheap rates by spoofing quality. The GSM operator in Uganda (Network X) is cheated of charging the call at premium international rates but rather gets local rates or even earns nothing (if already purchased voice bundles are utilised). The government is also cheated of the USD $9 charged on international calls per minute.
This route is also sometimes referred to as the “Gray Route”.
So, the telecom companies do witness an increased number of calls due to bundled offers but then this doesn’t translate into increased revenue. That means, there is someone else benefiting by rigging the system.

Government Revenue Affected
As stated, the telecoms were estimated to be losing about $60m annually as a result of the gray routing. A loss to the telecom means that they will also be unable to remit the excise duty charge on calls to the government.

With the excise duty charge at about 36 percent, that means government revenue loss of about $21.5m annually. These are amounts that can help the government continue to provide services for Ugandans.
As the telecom operators and the government are counting their losses, the unscrupulous individuals that have only spent a meagre amount to acquire a SIM box machine are reaping at the expense of legitimate business and causing financial loss to government in the form of lost tax revenue.

These SIM boxers can breakeven in less than 1 month and continue to rake in profits for years. There is no deliberate under declaration of telecom revenue because of the investment made in order to be compliant with the tax authorities.
The efforts to reduce this vice has led to some arrests. In 2017, six individuals were arrested, and some convicted in court after they were found to have SIM box devices. They had up-to 250 SIM cards that they used to re-route the calls.

Increased surveillance by all the telecom companies and the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) played a role in having these individuals arrested, however the problem persists.
UCC did recommend that operators have SIM box detection tools that need to be updated often because the SIM boxers keep finding new ways of bypassing the traditional operators.
This vice affects the quality of international calls of subscribers and is a threat to both telecommunication companies and government – they should work together to keep ahead or altogether eliminate this ever-evolving criminality.

About the Author
Derrick is an independent ICT consultant offering services to government entities, individuals and private companies. He is a seasoned telecoms Executive with, over 16 years’ broad expertise in the set up and operations of 2G, 3G and 4G Telecommunications networks right from network design, rollout, to operations.
He has previously worked as Chief Technical Officer responsible for the Technology strategy and Technical Regulatory matters in two international companies and is passionate about driving technological innovations that change the way businesses are run and increase efficiencies across the organisations.

By Derrick Sebbaale
Independent ICT Consultant

MTN South Africa has partnered with global customer engagement company, Clickatell to launch MTN Chat, enabling its customers to engage with the telco over WhatsApp.
MTN Chat will enable customers to initiate purchase of airtime and data bundles within their WhatsApp chat session. Over time customers will be able to also access customer support and self-service options, including performing upgrades, managing their accounts, and receiving low balance alerts.

MTN Chat is part of the MTN vision to significantly enhance its digital business offering to boost its customer base through advanced services.
“Clickatell understands that mobile operators are under increasing pressure to deliver excellent customer service over the digital channels their customers prefer. By offering convenient services over a secure, convenient channel, MNOs can both increase their transactional volume and attract and retain customers – something that is paramount in an age of continuous digital transformation and growing competition,” explains Pieter de Villiers, Clickatell Founder & CEO.
Clickatell has already helped Absa Bank, GTBank, First Bank of Nigeria and United Bank of Africa successfully deploy chat banking capabilities on WhatsApp across Africa.
Clickatell is a WhatsApp Business solution provider. The WhatsApp Business API provides brands the ability to send out notifications and conduct two-way conversations with consumers within WhatsApp once they have opted in. Clickatell’s Touch Flow and Connect platforms gives MTN the capability to unify its communications channels, customise user workflows and connect to internal systems.
“It is imperative that companies focus on improving their self-service experiences in order to retain and grow customers. The Clickatell offerings provides an easy, secure and convenient way of giving users control over their accounts through WhatsApp, a platform they already have an affinity for,” comments says Jacqui O’Sullivan, Executive for Corporate Affairs at MTN SA.
De Villiers says Clickatell’s low effort, high return offerings can propel mobile network operators onto a digital transformation road that differentiates them from their competitors.
“Clickatell has worked hard to ensure that its solution deployments are far less challenging than typical enterprise platform integrations. With over 1.5 billion people in 180 countries using WhatsApp every month, delivering chat commerce experiences on WhatsApp is one of the most efficient ways to reach a majority of consumers who can immediately benefit from the services offered on the channel. There is no doubt this solution is perfect for MNOs around the world where WhatsApp is frequently used.”
There is no doubt this solution is perfect for MNOs around the world where WhatsApp is the dominant social engagement channel.”

Former Nigerian Minister for Communications Technology, Dr. Omobola Johnson, delivered the UN Economic Commission for Africa’s (ECA) annual Adebayo Adedeji at the on-going Conference of Ministers in Marrakech, Morrocco.
Held in memory of the Nigerian scholar, Adebayo Adedeji – arguably one of Africa’s leading proponent of regional integration – the lecture focused around the question of digital transformation in Africa: Hype or Reality? “There is enough evidence that Africa can be digitally transformed. But what is holding us back? asked Dr Johnson when she delivered the lecture to ministers and a host of experts attending the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) Conference of Ministers.
As the world-wide-web celebrates 30 years, its inventor Tim Berners-Lee told a Nigerian audience recently that the country represents both the present and future of the web, when you look at how it is impacting lives in Nigeria, but also across the continent.
Adedeji was the ECA’s 3rd and longest serving Executive Secretary (1975- 1991). He was renowned and admired for his relentless calls for Africa to move away from conventional ideas of international trade and economic development.

He is also credited for championing calls that led to the creation of ECOWAS. It is also widely accepted that his ideas form part of the pillars on which the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is anchored.
Economic experts agree that, in the currently environment, the success of this continental trading bloc, will hugely depend on digital technology, tools and skills. Johnson cited a number of success stories across the continent and how they have used technology to provide services to the hitherto uncatered for or under served, but said that many challenges remained.
“Affordability is an issue: the internationally agreed target is for 1gb of data to cost no more than two percent of the average national monthly income. In Africa this currently stands at 8.76%, compared to 3.5% in Latin America or 1.54% in Asia. And the latest affordability reports show that this has increased over the past year,” she said.
She also noted disturbing tax trends, both on digital infrastructure and utilization taxes, which although seductive, can often have unintended consequences, such as increasing the cost of digitisation and curbing its transformative impact.
She called for an urgent need to strengthen the infrastructure and fibre network.
Currently when connecting Cape to Khartoum, she said, the connection will take them via London, New York, San Jose and Tokyo to arrive in Khartoum 409milliseconds later.
She also decried how most of Africa’s connections are via undersea cables connecting via Europe or elsewhere. “It is the private sector that can solve this issue,” she said, “…but they also need to be supported and incentivized.”
“When you recognize these challenges and accept that there is a lack of scale amongst our start-ups it could be argued therefore that this digital transformation we speak about might be hyped. But the increased ownership of mobile phones and those that have access to it is having a true impact.,” she stated
She added that many companies across different sectors using tech to transform their sectors from energy, to agriculture to healthcare. “But it’s work in progress,” She further urged governments to be more supportive and develop a long-term digital strategy. “We also need to be more innovative in our financing mechanisms to allow VC to borrow at low rates and help scale up innovators.”
She mentioned the urgent need to develop a pool of skilled talent that can turn the continent into the world’s digital talent pool in the same way that China became the world’s factory, through a large labour force and targeted government policy.
Invited to respond to the lecture, Tawanda Sibanda, partner at global consultancy McKinsey, looked back at the predictions they made in their Lions Go Digital report to assess progress. In the 5 years since the report was released the results have been mixed, he said.

They had estimated that by 2025 digital transformation could raise GDP by 8% by 2025 and make $300billion of economic impact across health, education, retail, agriculture and financial services.
Despite certain metrics being ahead of schedule – smartphone penetration for example – this has not translated into macro-economic numbers as would have been expected. The percentage of banked for example, has only increased from 26% to 33% in those five years.

The annual Economic Commission for Africa Conference of African Ministers of Finance, Planning and Economic Development – COM2019 – kicked off recently in Marrakesh, Morocco with emphasis on the importance of digitalisation in enhancing African economies as the continent celebrates the first anniversary of the highly hailed and historic signing of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area – (CFTA).
The weeklong event, which has also drawn various seasoned experts and policy-makers from inside and outside Africa, will weigh and evaluate this year’s theme – Fiscal Policy, Trade and the Private Sector in the Digital Era: A strategy for Africa – against the backdrop of recent economic and social development on the continent.

With the value of the global digital economy estimated at over $11.5 trillion and set to rise to over $23 trillion by 2025, according Vera Songwe – ECA Executive Secretary– the effects of digital trade and economy in Africa are points of key debate.
“The potential of Africa is, and has always been, promising… the continent has all the pre-requisites for rapid economic transformation in the next decade…[but] the importance of digitalization and the digital economy in driving growth and structural transformation, as well as optimizing fiscal performance in Africa cannot be overstated,” she said adding:
“It is currently estimated to represent 15.5 per cent of global GDP and is expected to reach 25 per cent of global GDP in less than a decade [and] there has been a rise in the digital innovation hubs on the continent, such as the Silicon Savannah in Nairobi and the Kumasi Hive in Ghana, not to mention more solution-oriented technologies such as Flutterwave which has enabled global payment processing in Nigeria through a single, seamless platform. In 2018, this application was reported to have processed $1 billion worth of transactions.”
“Such digital developments can have a transformative effect across the economy by reducing barriers to entry and expanding market reach for businesses, creating jobs, and boosting both domestic and foreign trade in goods and services,” she emphasised.
Zouhair Chorfi, secretary general at Morocco’s Ministry of Finance Morocco and incoming chair of the Committee of Experts of the CoM, adds further “Digitalisation is a great opportunity for Africa. It can transform Africa by increasing competitiveness, promoting strong integration, reducing the cost of doing business. Morocco is ready to play its part.”

His predecessor, lsadig Bakheit llfaki Abdalla also proffered on the issue: “With the advent of digital age, Africa can leapfrog and use new technologies to push the continent’s drive for sustainable development.
The conference commenced with the official opening of 38th Meeting of the Committee of Experts deliberating on the 2019 theme itself amongst other statutory issues.

This set the tone for the week’s discussions, which will center on leveraging digital technologies to mobilize Africa’s domestic resources, strengthen competitiveness and speed up growth in all developmental sectors.
The conference will also provide a platform for delegates to review fiscal policies for the implementation of the CFTA.

Adopted on 21 March 2018, the agreement is now 2 ratifications away from 22 member countries needed to enforce the trade bloc that envisages, among much more, a gross domestic product of more than $3trillion and the creation of 300,000 direct and more than 2 million indirect jobs. Africa’s largest economy, Nigeria and the host country Morocco are among those yet to ratify.
The week will also see a broad array of sessions and side events. Some highlights will include the launch of the ECA 2019 Economic Report on Africa – which assesses performance of fiscal policy and analyses both challenges and opportunities in Africa.

There will also be the launch of the African Fintech Network and a roundtable on trade and private sector development in the digital era.
Gender, youth, and climate change are also among other key issues in the spotlight as well as a special focus on the United Nations’ support to the African Union’s Year of Refugees, and Internally Displaced Persons.