All the latest technology news from South Africa and around the world.
Cellular network operator Cell C is about to announce the sale of its 50% stake in Virgin Mobile SA, TechCentral has learnt exclusively from a well-placed industry source. The deal must, however, still be referred to the Competition Commission for approval.
MB Technologies co-founder Leo Baxter has sold his 45% stake in the IT distribution business to Investec Bank for an undisclosed sum. The company says Baxter has decided to focus all his efforts on his medical recovery following a polo accident in 2007 which left him paralysed. The treatment has produced encouraging results and Baxter has regained some movement.
Telkom will pay US$80m (R604m) to settle its nine-year long legal wrangle with Telcordia Technologies. In 1999, Telcordia signed a contract with Telkom to supply a customer-care solution to SA’s fixed-line business. Telkom terminated the contract two years later, saying the US-based business was in breach of contract by not providing the product to the agreed specifications.
Communications minister Siphiwe Nyanda has dismissed allegations in a newspaper report that he may suspend department director-general Mamodupi Mohlala as “false, spurious and malicious”. Nyanda’s spokesman Tiyani Rikhotso says in a statement that the minister “exercises political oversight over the department and gives it policy direction in line with his statutory and constitutional mandate”.
Johannesburg- and London-listed technology group Datatec is on track to produce revenues of between US$4,1bn and $4,2bn by the end of its financial year. In an interim management statement released to shareholders on Thursday, the company said the recovery of global markets had driven an improved half-year for the technology business over the same period last year.
The proposed acquisition of Dimension Data by Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp (NTT) is more about the Japanese telecommunications group than about the SA-based IT firm. That’s the view of consulting company Frost & Sullivan, which says NTT has embarked on a “fairly aggressive acquisition drive over the past two or three years”.
Africa’s largest mobile phone operator MTN is planning to sell 4% of the company’s equity to black investors in what could prove to be the largest broad-based empowerment deal in SA’s telecommunications industry. MTN’s empowerment deal was expected to happen last year with the unwinding of the Alpine Trust-owned investment company Newshelf 664.
Communications minister Siphiwe Nyanda is planning to suspend department director-general Mamodupi Mohlala, according to a newspaper report. Business Day reports on Thursday that Nyanda may suspend Mohlala following “repeated disagreements over tenders she refused to sign”.
In a development laced with irony, Symantec’s World Cup 2010 website has fallen victim to the same spam threats it’s constantly warning its own customers about. The company unveiled its 2010 Net Threat site just before the start of the soccer spectacle, using it to detail a variety of World Cup-related information security threats.
The surprise resignation of Telkom chief financial officer Peter Nelson could point to deeper problems at the telecommunications group, say analysts. Birgitta Cederstrom Nicholson, technology research head at Frost & Sullivan, says Nelson’s resignation and the early exit of the company’s CEO, Reuben September, is reason for concern.
