Android, Google’s mobile operating system, is set to contest the top spot in market share from Symbian within the next four years, says international technology research firm Gartner. Android was launched in late 2007 and has climbed steadily towards being the most popular operating system since.
Mobile operator Cell C has made a further move to restructure its crippling debt. The company, which accrued the debt rolling out its second-generation voice network over the past decade, said on Friday it had offered to purchase for cash its outstanding €400m “first priority senior secured notes” due 2012.
Nokia is replacing its CEO, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, with a top Microsoft executive, Stephen Elop, as the Finnish handset manufacturer seeks to make up for ground it has lost in recent years to rivals such as iPhone-maker Apple and BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion. But already a senior Gartner analyst is questioning the move. “I’m in two minds about this,” says Gartner vice-president Nick Jones.
MultiChoice, which operates the DStv service, has been awarded a digital mobile television broadcasting licence by default after the other bidder, Super 5 Media, withdrew its application. The Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) announced on Friday morning that MultiChoice would become the second mobile TV broadcaster after e.tv was awarded a licence earlier this year.
State-owned broadcast signal distributor Sentech is establishing test transmission sites in order to pilot digital terrestrial television broadcasts based on Brazilian and Japanese standards. In an exclusive interview with TechCentral, Sentech chairman Quraysh Patel says the two countries, whose terrestrial broadcasting standards are similar, have asked to set up test broadcasts at their costs.
Cabinet should look carefully at all the implications of a review of the policy on digital migration. This is the telling conclusion reached by the parliamentary portfolio committee on communications in a report detailing a review of two television standards being considered for SA’s move from analogue to digital terrestrial television.
Events conspired against us and we missed last week’s TalkCentral recording. But we’re back with a bumper episode 9 of SA’s business technology podcast, and there’s plenty to talk about. Your hosts, Duncan McLeod and Candice Jones, delve in detail into Cell C’s launch of its broadband wireless network and look at how it’s taking the fight to bigger rivals MTN and Vodacom.
SA’s spending on research and development (R&D) has dropped slightly in terms of GDP for the second year running. Science and technology minister Naledi Pandor told journalists at parliament on Thursday that while R&D spending rose in nominal terms, from R18,6bn in 2007/08 to R21bn in 2008/09, gross spending as a percentage of GDP slipped from 0,93% to 0,92%.
Three SA technology start-ups are heading to Seedcamp week in London to compete for a possible €50 000 (R460 000) investment from the micro seed funder. Cognician, iSigned and GetAGreatBoss were chosen from a group of 11 SA start-ups in the first round of selections. They will join 20 other small businesses from around the world to compete for the funding.
Construction of a new, high-capacity submarine telecommunications cable system linking SA, Angola, Nigeria and Brazil should start early next year and be ready for service some time in 2012. That’s the word from Lawrence Mulaudzi, MD of eFive Telecoms, the SA-based company that is driving the project.