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Good morning!

1. Konga officially unveiled its grocery shopping service, Konga Daily, yesterday, and you can find some of Sim Shagaya’s comments and vision for the service in this thread.

+ Aah, and here’s a photo of Sim Shagaya nibbling on a carrot at the unveiling, which I found…oddly interesting.

2. MTN SA has finally pulled the plug on its video on demand service, MTN VU, which was launched in 2014 and formerly known as MTN FrontRow, after the platform failed to attract new users and hold on to its existing ones. This leaves ShowMax as the only major indigenous VoD service with a real stake in South Africa’s evolving VoD market, competing mainly against Netflix and, to some degree, Hong Kong’s PCCW’s ONTAPtv.

+ Apparently, in a desperate bid to save the platform, MTN  slashed prices and stopped charging data consumed while streaming on the platform. Alas…

+ MTN VU is the second VoD service in barely over a year to shut down in South Africa – Vidi, owned by Times Media Group, met a rocky end in 2016. A fascinating point to note is, Netflix officially launched in South Africa a month prior to Vidi’s demise, but then I’m really not trying to rouse any correlation =/= causality camps.

+ This news is coming a few days before Discover Digital, the operator of VU, plans to launch its new Netflix competitor, DEOD. Uh, good luck.

3. Still on South Africa, the leading advocate for the global software industry in the country, BSA, is offering a reward of up to R100,000 to those who report cases of software piracy, on their site. South African companies are estimated to have paid R3.6 million last year for using unlicensed software, with over 230  reports made, allegedly, to BSA. 33% of installed software in the country is not licensed, which roughly translates to $274 million, hence the need for compliance.

4. And over to MTN Nigeria, the company laid off around 280 employees on Friday, a move which affected about 15% of its workforce. An insider claims that they were all voluntary exits, based on a Voluntary Severance Scheme (VSS) packaged by MTN.


Innovators working on justice and legal issues worldwide can apply for up to 20,000 EUR in equity-free grant money as part of the HiiL Justice Accelerator’s Innovating Justice Challenge here. The Call for Applications, which opened March 1 and remains open until June 30, encourages two types of application: first, startups with an idea and team may apply for funding in the Call for Innovations; second, individuals without a team or idea can apply for the Call for Talent.


And here are some other interesting things…

+ Read Derin Adebayo’s enlightening debut article for Stears News on how fintech is changing banking in Nigeria here.

+ I loved this thread

by Editi Effiong on why the “Lagos-centric consumer economy” is a driving force behind the difficulties involved in scaling e-commerce in Nigeria.

+ Also, this thread by Osarumen on the ambiguity of Alat’s claims of being the first “digital bank” in Nigeria.

+ HiiL will be holding an information session tomorrow as part of the buildup to the Innovating Justice Challenge. Interested bodies and individuals should register here.
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+ Passion Incubator is partnering with Oracle Africa to deliver a workshop on cloud computing. Interested individuals can apply here.


Chatclass NG is offering a social media management course where participants will learn how to develop and execute social media strategies that deliver results. The program will feature thorough masterclasses to help you launch and grow a successful social media career. School’s already in session for April but you can register for May classes which begin on the 7th here.


Upcoming events

Lagos: HiiL Information Session, May 4th. Link

Lagos: KPMG Africa Cyber Security Conference 2017, May 4th. Link

Lagos: Nigerian Technical Cyber-Security Conference (NaijaSecCon ’17), May 4th.

Ibadan: IWD ’17 – Telling Our Story, May 6th. Link

London: CcHub Diaspora Challenge, May 6th. Link

Want to see your event in here? Add your event


That’s all, folks!

Thank you for your time.

Francis Bulus Author

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