Africa: Connected Video's Niclas Ekdahl Sees Increasing Levels of VOD Use and Pitches a Showmax Half Price Mobile Offer in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa

It may seem a strange thing to say but Showmax is still finding its feet. Multichoice may be the powerful incumbent in the pay TV sector but it has to work out how to be a… Read more »

Nigeria: Arewa24's New Streaming Service Targets 8 Million Plus Hausa-Speaking Diaspora - Just Us$4.99 a Month

Northern Nigerian Hausa-language channel Arewa24 is launching Arewa24On Demand, a new global subscription video-on-demand and OTT streaming service. Russell Southwood spoke to… Read more »

Nigeria: Nigeria's No 1 YouTube Channel Founder Mark Angel Talks About How He and His Comedy Channel Came to Success

YouTube in Africa is creating a whole new generation of talent that doesn't have to go through the usual gatekeepers on TV and radio. Russell Southwood spoke to Mark Angel who runs… Read more »

Africa: African Free-to-Use, Music Streaming Platform Mdundo Celebrates Its Seventh Birthday

African music streaming platforms proliferated ten years ago but many of them have closed over the intervening decade. Despite the hype, success in music streaming in Africa is a… Read more »

Africa: Kenya's Ludique Works Launches First Major Pan-Continental Esports Event Outside South Africa in October

Africa's online games sector is slowly picking up momentum with the first pan-continental eSports event taking place in Nairobi in October this year. Russell Southwood spoke to… Read more »

Africa: Digital Media, Content and Services - Why They Matter and What Is Africa Doing to Encourage Them?

Africa's digital content and services sector is growing in most African leading markets. But money is tight and it's hard to make it mass market rather than a privilege reserved… Read more »

Nigeria: Nigeria's Online Music Platform Spinlet Has Generated U.S.$1.2 Million in Revenues, Transitioning to Offering Streaming-As-a-Service to Non-Entertainment Companies Like Banks and Mobile Operators

Having been promoted as the iTunes of Africa, Nigerian music platform Spinlet ran into the realities of being early into a market where paying for music was still barely accepted.… Read more »

Cameroon: Wouri TV Works With Local Producers to Create Its Own Vod Content - Version Two of the Platform Will Offer Downloads and Mobile Money Payment

Caneroon is one of the less well known film and TV content producing countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. Three year old start-up Wouri TV wants to change all that by raising the… Read more »

Africa: Children's Animation Company Afrika Toon Gets Huge YouTube Following

African film and TV companies are still trying to figure out how online changes what they do. This week Russell Southwood talks to Abel Kouame who is the co-founder of Afrika Toon… Read more »

Africa: A 'LinkedIn for Africa' Aims At Students and Lower Income Groups

The large global online platforms like Google Search, Facebook and Instagram are so well established that they are hard to challenge out of Africa. LinkedIn is the global jobs and… Read more »

Africa: Afriquency Launches African Music Playlists On Apple Music, Spotify, Deezer and YouTube

With tens of millions of songs on global music streaming platforms, playlists have become a key tool in getting music heard by new audiences. Afriquency has just launched a series… Read more »

Africa: Bookbeak Believes Everyone Is a Storyteller

South African reading platform BookBeak has created an African reading platform with a news angle. It's both about crowd-sourced stories and writing from more experienced… Read more »

Africa: New Report Provides Most Detailed Overview of Africa's Digital Content

It's taken four years to bring together but now it's finally out. The latest report from Balancing Act provides one of the most detailed descriptions of the areas covered by this… Read more »

Africa: Vodacom Video Play Hits 800,000 Active Subscribers in Seven Months and Will Expand Into Lesotho, Tanzania, Mozambique and DRC

Africa's mobile operators have struggled with Video-on-Demand platforms and faced a number of obstacles including the shortcomings of their own networks. But at last things seem to… Read more »

Ethiopia: Diaspora Digital Music Service Arifzefen Prepares to Launch Back Home

Ethiopia is one of Africa's larger digital markets with lots of unrealized potential. Recent political changes mean that may slowly begin to change. Russell Southwood spoke to… Read more »

Africa: 2019 Must Be the Year Africa's Mobile Operators Adop

Digital content and services have been slow to take off, even in Africa's largest digital markets. The cost of data and the fear of running out of it still haunt's Africa's young… Read more »

Africa: Umoyastream Pilots a Pan-African Gospel Streaming Platform at Taxi Tanks Using Localized Wi-Fi + Hard Drive Delivery

Streaming in Africa is a tough mountain to climb but Thabo Dabengwa knows that as he set up his new company after being made redundant from Kagiso Media. Russell Southwood spoke to… Read more »

Africa: Umoyastream Pilots Pan-African Gospel Streaming Platform at Taxi Ranks

Streaming in Africa is a tough mountain to climb but Thabo Dabengwa knows that as he set up his new company after being made redundant from Kagiso Media. Russell Southwood spoke to… Read more »

Kenya: Odanga Madung, Odipo Dev On Its Charting of Celebrity Engagement in Kenya and What It Costs to Buy Celebrity Influencers

There are now many African online celebrities and offline celebrities who've built a following. Digital savvy ad agencies are now buying access to their followers to get people to… Read more »

Nigeria: Music Streaming Services Continue to Grow Despite Coson Chaos, Regulatory Barriers and Etisalat Crash

Nigeria's music steaming services have really being going through it recently: the near bankruptcy and coming ownership change at 9mobile; restrictive regulations from NCC; and… Read more »

Kenya: Viusasa Wants to Be the One-Stop Shop for Local Content

George Waititu is the CEO, Content Aggregation which has launched Kenya's Viusasa. It wants to become the local content contender able to take on the other more Pan-African… Read more »

Africa: Angola's Leading Online News Site Club K Tracks Corruption and Human Rights Abuses

Africa's diaspora produced news websites allow people in tightly controlled and/or corrupt states to know what's actually happening in their country. Russell Southwood spoke to… Read more »

Africa: Promoting Africa's Games Developers Internationally At Gamescon and Paris Games Week

The African gamers community is growing in numbers but the challenges of producing games for the continent are considerable. However, slowly things are beginning to fall into… Read more »

Africa: Ringier's News and Info Platform Pulse Gets 170 Million Video Views Per Month With Short-Form Content

Since 2011 Swiss media firm Ringier has steadily built up its African businesses covering classified platforms and media. Their growth has been significant and demonstrate that… Read more »

Africa: Worldreader Increases It Active Readers in Africa and Wants to Get Its APP On 40 Million Handsets Through Opera

Free book reading platform Worldreader has over the last three years increased its active readers in Sub-Saharan Africa and has ambitious plans to keep increasing the numbers.… Read more »