Hello Africa.
We begin today’s big 5 with good news from Kenya.
Google Project Loon has secured all necessary regulatory approvals and has started installing ground infrastructure in Kenya. With this development, Loon and Kenyan telecommunications operators expect to begin conducting initial tests with balloons in the country in the first half of 2019.
WhatsApp has announced that it’s awarding $50,000 each to 20 researchers to investigate how misinformation spreads on its platform from 11 countries for a total of $1 million.
Chinese tech giant Huawei has unveiled plans to construct Public Cloud in South Africa to provide cloud services to all sub-Saharan African countries. Huawei Cloud South Africa region will start providing cloud services at the end of this year and it also indicates plans to launch more in new regions in Africa.
Also, in South Africa, MTN together with Ericsson have launched the first 5G customer trial deployment in the country. The trial will begin with the deployment of a 5G fixed-wireless access site at Netstar’s headquarters in Midrand.
Finally, Succour is coming for MTN Nigeria as they are close to reaching a $800 million agreement with Nigerian authorities over a claim that it illegally transferred $8.1 billion funds out of the country, according to Guardian.
That is all for the Big 5 today, see you tomorrow.