Browsing: Opinion

The price war in South Africa’s mobile industry is starting to take its toll, evidenced this week by the declining subscriber numbers at MTN, which conceded that it had been too slow in cutting its rates to match its rivals. But behind the scenes a much more interesting battle is brewing

I know sections of the media and the IT industry have reservations about me. Ja, okay, the guy works hard and has been in politics for a while, but what does he really know about ICT, they say. And, of course, the Democratic Alliance and

Rarely are the kings of one era the kings of the next. Just as Nokia and BlackBerry were the kings of the pre-smartphone era, so they were eclipsed by Apple and its fast-follower, Samsung. The same is true of Palm, which reigned in the preceding age of the personal digital assistant

In the wake of another set of poor quarterly results tied to weak consumer demand for its new smartphones, BlackBerry on Monday announced that it was exploring “strategic options”, including the possibility of selling the business. But who would want to buy

Electromagnetic spectrum is the crude oil of last-mile connectivity, especially in Africa where more traditional kinds of last-mile communications infrastructure are not especially well developed. As in the oil business, anyone who has gained control of spectrum in the last 10 or 20 years

New communications minister Yunus Carrim is set to face his first big test. How he responds will set the tone for his tenure and define his approach to Telkom and to competition in the sector. A decision by the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) this week to publish

Has the country’s foremost value-destroying monopolist finally seen the error of its ways? On the surface, that seems to be the case. In mid-July, Telkom meekly agreed to pay a R200m fine for anticompetitive abuses committed between 2005 and 2007, and to split its wholesale and retail businesses. TechCentral reported

For the longest time, little much has really happened in South Africa’s broadcasting sector. But big changes are now looming. Barely a week seems to go by now without significant new developments in broadcasting. In recent weeks alone, there’s been news of plans to launch South Africa’s first comprehensive trial of digital

Apple has hit a plateau. Its quarterly earnings results revealed flat revenues, falling iPad sales and markedly lower profits. But the company is not doomed to collapse, despite what some of the more excitable pundits are claiming. Apple is clearly going through a rough

Don’t look now, but something profound is happening at Telkom. The new management team, led by group CEO Sipho Maseko and board chairman Jabu Mabuza, appears to be actively trying to change (well-founded) perceptions that the company is a litigious and rapacious