Author: Duncan McLeod

The Wacs cable, one of two cable systems damaged earlier this month due to a suspected undersea earthquake, will probably only be fixed on 8 February.

With a fixed-line business under pressure, an IT services company feeling the pinch and a mobile business facing strong competition, Telkom CEO Sipho Maseko has a difficult road ahead of him. By Duncan McLeod.

Telkom has blamed the dominance of Vodacom and MTN as well as “fundamental changes” sweeping South Africa’s telecoms industry for its decision to let go of as many as 3 000 employees.

Sikonathi Mantshantsha, a fierce media critic of Eskom, has been appointed as the company’s new national spokesman.

Naspers plans to sell about 22 million shares in Prosus to increase the free float of its European-listed Internet spin-off.

Extreme weather has delayed the departure of a ship from Cape Town, whose crew has been tasked with fixing two subsea cable breaks that are negatively affecting international connectivity in South Africa.

Liquid Telecom on Monday confirmed that it will launch a wholesale 5G network “early in 2020”. Vodacom is set to be one of the first customers to use it.

Communications minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams has slammed a Sunday Independent report, in which she is accused of misusing taxpayers’ money, describing the article as a “malicious smear campaign”.

A major electronics manufacturing facility in East London, which until recently made decoders for MultiChoice, faces possible liquidation after it reportedly failed to make repayments on a R200-million loan.

Both the Wacs and Sat-3/Wasc cables providing international connectivity from South Africa to international markets were knocked out on Thursday, causing slow connections for some consumer and business users.