Base Station emissions may be over by 2021 –Forum

Emissions from Base Transceiver Stations (BTS) may soon be a thing of the past any time soon from 2021.

This, participants at a recent one-day forum said is anticipated in the next 10 to 15 years given the speed with which Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools are turned out.

Participants at a one-day forum on BTS in Lagos recently organised by eBusiness Life Communication Limited in collaboration with the Consumer Affairs Bureau of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) also agreed that due to advancement in the management and transmission of radio frequency power as base stations will be linked by fibre optics, this dream is attainable.

A communiqué made available to ITRealms Online and endorsed by the chief executive of eBusiness Life, Mrs. Ufuoma ‘Daro, participants at the Forum focused on BTS and its impact on health and environment as there have been arguments and fears by telecoms consumers and indeed the general public about the effects of these BTS on health and environment.

She noted that a school of thought views this as mere communications infrastructure; some others as a means to wealth for land owners and government, but the majority see BTS as a source of health hazard.

According to her, the implication is that operators have difficulty getting land to deploy these very important means of transmission, thereby posing a challenge to provision of quality service.

The forum also recommended the need for the regulatory agency, NCC, to take a proactive stand after due investigation and local research with appropriate health professionals and engineers.

“It was also agreed that enough enlightenment campaign has not been done to assure Nigerians of the safety or otherwise of the infrastructure,” part of the communiqué read, adding that participants believe that the federal government through the Ministry of Communications Technology, the NCC and such organizations as the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), ATCON, ALTON and other stakeholders should be part of forums geared towards enlightening the public.

She pointed out that while participants agreed that there is sufficient claim that radiation emission from other electrical and electronic gadgets such as television sets, handsets, electric power antennas, among others are more than the emission from base stations, they argued that these could be regulated by users, whereas base stations could only be regulated by appropriate government authorities, and should as such be properly monitored.

Participants further agreed that the level of ignorance is still very high, thus NCC should do more awareness campaign and further research on the issue alongside the operating companies.

Additionally, she said that recommendation was made that appropriate funding be provided for media practitioners to carry out campaigns geared towards public enlightenment and research since they have the power of ‘mass information.’

Whereas, the federal government was tasked to put deliberate policies in place to accelerate the deployment of fibre optic links in order to ensure strict compliance as it is seen to be safer, even as the consumer education continues.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D

Student, businessmen win prizes @ MTN Mega reward

A Library Science student of the University of Maiduguri, Ms Kande Waziri, has joined the top winners in the MTN Mega Reward as she won the N10 million in the ongoing reward scheme.

Ms Waziri who received her prize money at the sixth presentation ceremony at the Multipurpose Hall of the Magean Hotel in the ancient city of Kano, was evidently excited, eulogised MTN for the reward.

She expressed gratitude to the telecommunications giant, at the sideline of the ceremony, declaring that no other telecommunication network has given out such a huge reward.

“I feel so loved and appreciated by this gesture because I didn’t have to participate in any competition nor increase my calls. I only registered my MTN SIM and continued using It as usual and yet I was chosen to win N10 million. No other network has done such a thing,” she asserted.

Equally elated as Waziri for winning the ultimate prize of N10 million, were Funmilola Adebisi, a business man based in Kano State; Remi Odiase, an Abuja-based seamstress; Stephen Umoh a Kano-based businessman who were on hand to pick up their cheques as the latest members of the noveau riche with notable personalities that graced the prize presentation included a Nollywood actress, Maryam Ibrahim Hotoro.

While the winners of the N10 million were celebrating, so were another set, fifteen of them, jubilating for carting away N100,000 each.

Guests at the occasion were not left out as some of them went home N10,000 richer after a surprising lucky dip.

MTN Master Brand Manager, Mr. Innocent Oboh who represented the Consumer Marketing Manager, Mr. Kola Oyeyemi, encouraged subscribers to register their SIM cards and stand a chance to win in any of the forthcoming prize presentations.

“Our goal at MTN is to make Nigerians richer by creating opportunities for them to achieve their dream and the MTN N1 Billion Mega reward is a clear demonstration of that resolve” Oboh said.

He explained that the reward scheme which started in Lagos on September 19, 2011, was MTN’s way of saying thank you to its subscribers for 10 years of patronage and to encourage them to participate in the SIM registration exercise, which has produced 60 ten million naira winners.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D

Ericsson, Sony dangle N3.2m on W/African developers

A collaboration between Ericsson and Sony Ericsson is dangling the sum of €15,000, about N3,249,566.11 cash prize for the winner of the 2012 Ericsson Application Awards (EAA 2012) with theme ‘Apps for the Networked Society.’

A press statement from these companies, indicated that the partnership is for the competition  for application developers in West Africa, thus inviting local developers to submit their innovative ideas and mobile applications for the contest.

They quoted Gary Dewing, Country Manager of Ericsson Nigeria as saying that application entries, would be automatically registered for the global competition with a chance to win a €15,000 cash prize.

These plans the partnership said is expected to run a regional competition for application developers on the Android platform.

He also said that the competition titled ‘Apps for Africa’ is to run under the aegis of the 2012 Ericsson Application Awards (EAA 2012) and is an ongoing annual competition for application developers worldwide organized by Ericsson Research.

Dewing added that the ‘Apps for Africa’ was designed to promote the development of innovative ideas and mobile applications from a variety of environments and situations peculiar to the region.

“These are expected to enable new opportunities for people to collaborate, innovate, learn, care and participate in more efficient ways that positively impact our environment,” part of the statement read.

He described the competition as an amazing opportunity for local talent to showcase their capabilities in the global community of innovators and developers.

 “It reflects our ambition to use technology to change lives for the better,” he said.

Members of the winning teams in each region, he said, would each receive a Sony Ericsson Xperia phone, while teams in second place will receive Business Experience Packs which include Sony Ericsson MW600, office pro, McAfee, and a micro USB cable.

Equally speaking, Head of Market Unit Africa at Sony Ericsson, Mr. Jorgen Berg,  said the  objective for Sony Ericsson is to be the preferred choice for Android devices by delivering the most entertaining smartphones and adding value to people’s lives.

“We are thrilled to run this Android Application Competition which will bring about innovative solutions to enrich the user experience of our Xperia handsets,” he said. 

The competition, the partnership said, is open to students and to small and medium sized enterprises in Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone, urging interested developers to register teams of two to four people online at  www.ericssonapplicationawards.com/apps-africa-west  before February 01, 2012 and submit either a video of idea or an Android based application that addresses the theme and makes use of at least one Ericsson Labs Application Programming Interface (API), that is Mobile Location or Text To Speech before February 28th, 2012.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D

Upperlink sweeps NIRA’s registrar awards

Accredited Internet Registrar, the UpperLink Nigeria Limited has won the Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NIRA) monthly registrar of the month consecutively in the last four months.

These months comprise August when the initiative was introduced and September, October and November 2011 respectively.

Disclosing this, the chief operating officer, Nigeria Internet Registration Association, Mr. Ope Odusan congratulated Upperlink Nigeria Limited for making the Nigerian registrars proud.

He also said that Upperlink emerged the best registrar in the past four months by scoring the highest mark in registration of domain names under the dot ng (.ng) domain names.

According to him, Upperlink scored the highest mark in the aforementioned months with 2403 in the month of November, 627 in October, 419 in September and 230 registrations in August 2011 in that order.

He highlighted that the report of activities in the .ng Registry for the period: August 2011showed that Upperlink registered the highest number of domains with followed by Nairahost coming second with 64 domains; while Websoft was third place with 55 domains.

For the month of September this year, Odusan said that Upperlink registered the highest

number of domains with 419 registrations, yet Nairahost came second with 99 domains whereas Websoft was scored third with 79 domains, even as Skannet came 4th with the registration of 52 domain names.

NIRA, he said, acknowledges the activities of all active Registrars for the  overall improvement in the number of domains registered during the period.

“We look forward to even greater activity in the .ng Registry in the months ahead,” he said.

ITRealms Online recalls that Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NiRA) was founded on March 23, 2005 as a stakeholder-led organisation, charged with the management of the nation’s Country Code Top Level Domain (.ng ccTLD).

NiRA’s establishment was the end of a long period of inactivity and dispute on the appropriate management of this important National Resource. Coordinated by the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) and Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) as well as stakeholders within Nigeria’s Internet community participated in its formation.

The realisation of the .ng ccTLC came after nearly 12 years in, which the country code was hosted in the United States (USA) by an American Randy Bush.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D

‘Why Finacle deployment is successful in Nigeria’

The Vice President (VP) and Global Head, Client Services for Finacle at Infosys Technologies, Mr. Santa Rao, has adduced some reasons why Finacle banking solution has been successfully deployed in Nigeria.

He made this disclosure at a press conference to herald a jointly organised Computer Warehouse Group (CWG)-Infosys Summit on Tomorrow’s Banking Today: A Multichannel Paradigm in Lagos.

Mr. Rao who was accompanied at the press session by the Group Managing Director, CWG, Mr. Austin Group, attributed the outcome to a successful partnership with Computer Warehouse Group (CWG).

He therefore commended the management of CWG for its steadfastness in driving deployment of Finacle solution in Africa and Nigerian market particularly.

He reiterated that Infosys is working hard to ensure that it plays at the forefront of this mobile banking solution technology.

He buttressed his point by saying that after China and India follows Facebook as literally are the largest populated three ‘nations’ globally.

What this tells us, he pointed out, is that the way things are done is changing, hence, the cost of taking banking services is drastically reducing, therefore within some little time and competition continue to evolve this cost would continue to come down.

He expressed optimized that in Nigeria Infosys has seen that banking and financial institutions will continue to have a change for good by adapting to these technologies.

Also speaking, the Group Managing Director, CWG, Mr. Austin Okere, said they were excited to have chosen to partner with Infosys, adding that this step changed the future of Computer Warehouse Group and Nigerian banking sector.

“… Our vision changed when we met with Infosys. We have gone from banking solution and unto Finacle deployment,” he said.

In Nigeria, he said, Finacle has been deployed in nine banks and five non-banking institutions out of the 22 banks currently listed by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

“We have 9 banks and 5 non-banking institutions and this figure, 9 out of the 22 banks is not a bad business knowing that we are not the only one in the marketing,” Okere assured.

He explained that Computer Warehouse Group deploys Finacle with its customers rather than for them, this step, Okere said, is to ensure that they continued to give good services to the customers and giving them value for their money.

According to him, CWG trains about 20 employees of any institution deploying Finacle for 45 days at Infosys campus in India, to make way for cross-bred exposure comprising core Information Technology (IT) staff, treasury and marketers from those institutions.

Aside this, he said, there is customer-based customization as well as banks and country based customization respectively.

He maintained that banks in search of applications first look at Finacle, which gladdens his firm.

Okere, however, noted that key challenge to the deployment of solution application like Finacle in this market is the fact that of manpower deficiency, due to labour market movements and search for greener pastures.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D

Airtel unveils green site, spends N96.7bn on network expansion

Airtel Nigeria in collaboration with Ericsson has roll-out its first green site in Lekki, Lagos, even as mobile telecom operator has expended in excess of $600m, about N96,725,948,246.02 on network expansion.

Chief Operating Officer and Executive Director, Mr. Deepak Srivastava, disclosed this while conducting newsmen round the green site built by Ericsson in Lagos, at the weekend.

He said that the latest investment by Airtel as at December 1, 2011, would improve network capacity and quality of service.

According to him, Airtel Networks Limited, has invested over $600m in the past 12 months to expand the capacity and enhance the Quality of Service (QoS) on the network.

 

He recalled that Airtel Nigeria recently proclaimed a landmark deal with Ericsson to upgrade 250 diesel powered stations in the country to Green-sites, an initiative designed to enable the company harness solar energy to operate its base stations.

He said, the green-sites would contribute to a substantial reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and prevent network outages associated with inconsistent power supply.

Srivastava lamented the fact that non-availability of regular grid power supply to sites across the country is responsible for over 70 per cent of down time resulting in poor QoS, stressing that the green-site would go a long way in addressing this critical challenge.

Further, he revealed that the company was exploring other options including a partnership with the World Bank to address the nagging issue of power supply especially to the remote communities.

Airtel, he emphasized, has in the last six months installed dual generating sets in 200 sites and installed high back up batteries in 600 sites, while additional high capacity back up batteries and 500 new generating sets were to be deployed by March 2012.

He decried that in some other countries, operators are concerned with managing customer experience rather than keeping the sites up as is the case in Nigeria.

“… Where power outages, fibre cut and community issues have combined to undermine the integrity of the network quality,” he lamented.

Mr. Srivastava, went on to disclose that Airtel had in the last 12 months continued to make significant capital expenditure(CAPEX) investment towards improving network quality and has embarked on specific initiatives to expand its network coverage.

Airtel, he maintained, has invested heavily on site rollout, power improvement projects, fiber roll-out, microwave replacement, technical engineering, network capacity enhancement and adaptive multiple rate.

For him, Airtel has built over 500 additional sites in the last six months and intends to complete an additional 1,000 sites by March 2012.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D

Nokia presents winners’ prizes, more emerge

More winners at the weekend emerged at the on-going Nokia dual SIM phone reward promo, as previous winners were presented prizes.

At time of filing this report, overt 17 winners have emerged with most of them already receiving their prizes from Nokia.

Account Manager of Nokia, Mrs. Beatrice Olumhense said at the third draw and prize presentation held in Lagos at Nokia’s office, weekend, that more winners have emerged.

She also said that Nokia is giving out the sum of N50,000 each to 10 persons, N100,000 each to another four and N500,000 to one person in a weekly draw for five weeks promo.

The draw approved by the National Lottery Board and the Federal Government of Nigeria through the relevant agencies, Olumhense noted that mobile phone users have been expecting dual SIM phone from the company and when it finally launched her dual SIM phone range, people were out to show their loyalty by buying the products.

This, she said, made Nokia to appreciate customers for their loyalty over the years, emphasizing that the cost benefit of the phone is fantastic.

She assured customers of durability as it has always been with Nokia products in the past.

After collecting his cheque, one of the last week’s winners, Mr. Olaleye Olawale, pointed out that he now beliefs that the promo is real, expressing joy for emerging a winner.

He expressed gratitude to Nokia for giving back to the society, adding that the brand is what he has been using from time and has no reason to switch to another brand due to its durability, quality among others.

Meanwhile, over 17 winners have emerged in the on-going Nokia Dual SIM Promo, a special campaign aimed at rewarding Nokia’s customers and creating awareness about the company’s innovative and market leading dual SIM phones- Nokia C2-00, X1-01 and C2-03.

In the draw held in Lagos on Friday, Chibuzor Anthony a Nokia phone customer who resides at Onitsha, Anambra State, emerged winner of the week’s top prize of N500,000.00.

She further said that the promo which commenced on November 7 is expected to run till end of the 

year with the winner of the top prize expected to go home with two brand new cars.

Ms Olumhense said the Nokia recognizes the fact that many Nigerians are in love with the company’s product, adding that based on this, Nokia in turn designed the promo to reward and empower its customers.

She said that the promo will be held every week henceforth till the end of the year with winners expected to win any of several range of prizes starting from N50,000 to N500,000.

“All that a customer needs to do is to buy a Nokia C2-00, X1-01 or C2-03 dual SIM phone at any Nokia partner retailer, send his details to a short code and the person will stand a chance to win one of these weekly prizes,” she said.

Olumhense equally said a final grand prize draw for two cars will be held for all entries in the competition.

She stated that dual SIM phones have been specially designed for individuals who are looking for the essentials in a phone and a little more.

The dual phones, she noted, have the prime functionality of calls and SMS at their core, while offering users’ access to data services at a cost that are the best in the market place.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D