At Home

The Gauteng Department of Education has launched an upgraded communication project, which sees approximately 2 600 principals, district cluster and circuit leaders, human resource management officials, and curriculum officials receive a Samsung tablet and BlackBerry smartphone. Every official will have a personal e-mail address and will also be able to access data to facilitate effective communication. – ITWeb

Big four bank Absa has expanded its mobile banking platform by allowing South African cellphone users on the bank’s rewards programme to redeem cash via Absa.mobi. According to the bank, this is a first for SA and means Absa rewards customers can now instantly redeem cash rewards on cellphone banking, as well as view their cash balance. – ITWeb

HE Interactive Telematics Teaching Programme, run by the Western Cape Education Department, will soon be piloted in primary schools in the province, following the success of the programme as shown by a recent analysis. “I am excited that in 2014 we will be piloting this service in our primary schools,” says WC minister for education Donald Grant. – ITWeb

Anne Shongwe, Afroes

A South African mobile applications company took third prize at the 5th Global Forum on Innovation and Entrepreneurship, in East London, recently. Afroes, which walked away with $8 000 in prize money, creates African mobile applications and tools for social development agencies and corporate enterprises. The start-up company was founded by Anne Shongwe and is hosted by mLab, in Pretoria, at the Innovation Hub. – ITWeb

Sony has officially unveiled the Xperia Tablet Z, which is set to hit SA at the beginning of July this year. “The Xperia Tablet Z will be in SA at the beginning of July this year, and will be the slimmest, lightest and fastest tablet in the market that is water-, dust-and shatter-resistant,” said Mark Fenzel, sales director, Middle East and Africa, Sony. – ITWeb

Alexandra Zagury, BlackBerry SA

BlackBerry has opened its third local apps lab. The company announced its Johannesburg workshop, based at the JoziHub mobile and ICT co-creation hub in Milpark. Alexandra Zagury, MD for SA and southern Africa at BlackBerry, said: “The aim of the BlackBerry apps labs is to help accelerate mobile application development in SA and create new opportunities in the mobile space.” – ITWeb

The Gauteng Department of Infrastructure Development has announced the 2013/14 fiscal year will see the initial phases of a large-scale roll-out of rooftop solar panels to be installed on government buildings across the province. This was announced by MEC Qedani Mahlangu during the tabling of the department’s budget vote. – ITWeb

Into Africa

More than a quarter of Nigeria’s rural population lacks access to modern communication facilities, according to a report by Google. The report: “Impact of the Internet in Africa” was commissioned by the search engine and conducted by global development and globalisation firm, Dalberg. It represents the result of studies on the impact of the Internet in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria and Senegal. – ITWeb Africa

Data services company Jamii Telecommunications plans to roll-out fibre-to-the home (FTTH) services to 5 000 homes in the Kenyan city, Mombasa. According to company chairman and CEO, Joshua Chepkwony, the introduction of the high-speed FTTH or ‘Faiba’ project is intended to help kick-start small businesses in the area. “The fibre infrastructure will enable people in Mombasa to do business in a competitive manner globally.” – ITWeb Africa

German-headquartered business software firm SAP has said it is targeting Nigerian cities and even states with its offerings. SAP said its offerings are helping to bring modern billing, business management as well as improved communications and cash flow management solutions to local government in the country. SAP has sold its software to cities like Port Harcourt, Kano, Lagos and Abuja. – ITWeb Africa

A low-power cellular base station that weighs just five kilograms and consumes 50 watts is being rolled out in Zambia. The device, dubbed the ‘CompactRAN’, connects up to 1 000 people, said its maker, US headquartered firm Vanu. Features of the CompactRAN include a GSM or Edge network operating in the 850MHz, 900MHz, 1 800MHz or 1 900MHz frequency band. – ITWeb

Africa

OVER 800 backers on Web site Kickstarter have raised more than $125 000 to help manufacture a Kenyan device that keeps people connected online, even if the lights go out or 3G signals drop. BRCK, dubbed “backup generator of the Internet”, features an ability to plug a SIM card into it, or the option to connect it to wired or wireless Ethernet connections. – ITWeb Africa

Abroad

Google’s Motorola Mobility said it has reached an out-of-court settlement with video recorder pioneer TiVo that could avert a trial to resolve their patent dispute. Motorola accused TiVo of infringing its patents for digital video recorders in February 2011, and TiVo filed a counterclaim in March last year. “We are pleased that all parties involved have reached an agreement to resolve pending litigation,” Motorola spokesman William Moss said. – Reuters

Finnish start-up company Valkee has raised 7.4 million euros ($9.8 million) from a venture capital fund and other investors to help it to boost sales of its light-therapy products, designed to relieve seasonal affective disorder and jetlag. Seasonal affective disorder, or the winter blues, is a problem for many in Finland and other countries with long periods of darkness. – Reuters

Major tech companies including Apple, Google and Facebook said they do not provide any government agency with “direct access” to their servers, contradicting a Washington Post report that they have granted such access under a classified data collection programme. Google said, despite previous reports that it had forged a “back door” for the government, it had never provided any such access to user data. – Reuters

Facebook is eliminating various types of advertisements on its Web site in an effort to simplify a system that it acknowledged was confusing marketers. “What we realised is that even though every ad product is really good on its own, the whole is less than the sum of its parts. It should really be simpler,” Fidji Simo, a Facebook product manager for ads, said. – Reuters

Apple will start a programme this month to allow users to trade in their older iPhones for the newest model, Bloomberg cited people familiar with the plan as saying. This is a first for the company as it prepares to introduce a new version of the smartphone. It has teamed up with Brightstar, a mobile phone distributor that runs similar trade-in programmes for carriers like AT&T and T-Mobile, to handle exchanges. – Reuters