On May 9, 2016, telecom firm Vodacom announced that it is giving up on M-Pesa in South Africa. According to qz.com, Vodacom’s M-Pesa business in South Africa will officially shut down on June 30, 2016. The subsidiary of the British group Vodafone has indeed failed to reproduce the Kenyan mobile money experience. Let us recall that in March 2016, the firm’s management was hesitating between...

Attacks on oil infrastructure have made Nigeria’s output slide close to a 22-year low to 1.69 million bopd, thereby putting intense pressure on the country's finances. The activities of militants in the Niger Delta region last week made Chevron shut down its Okan offshore facility, taking out 35,000 bpd while Shell’s workers at the Bonga oilfield in the south were evacuated due to...

  Studies have shown that Egypt has the 16th biggest gas reserves and the country is the 15th largest producer of gas in the world. According to the study prepared by Edison International’s Vice President, Nicola Monti (photo), Egypt is the second largest producer of gas in Africa and the first non-member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Country (OPEC) in Africa to produce...

Kosmos Energy in its operational update announced that its Teranga-1 exploration well offshore Senegal has made a significant gas discovery. The well was drilled to a total depth of 4,485 meters and came across 102 feet of net gas pay in good quality reservoir. Well results have shown that a productive inboard gas fairway stretches about 200 km from the Marsouin-1 well (Kosmos’ second...

Output from south-east Libyan oil fields to Marsa el-Hariga port is to be closed in four weeks if the obstruction at the port persist, a spokesman for Libya's National Oil Corporation (NOC) revealed. Mohamed el-Harari noted that output from the Messla and Sarir fields had been slashed by more than half of the previous levels, as a result of the failure by a parallel NOC created by Libya's...

American Developer Arrow Capital and the University of Ilorin in Nigeria have partnered to build a solar plant. With a capacity of 500 LW, construction of the infrastructure should start this month and be completed after six months. The plant will be providing 4 MW to the university where it will be located. Remaining output will be sold to the Kano and Lagos states, and other states...

ASX-listed Australian miner, Metals of Africa, will raise $AU 4.5 million ($3.3 million) to advance its graphite projects in Mozambique, mainly to finance feasibility studies, bulk sampling and metallurgic tests. The firm on Friday May 6, 2016, declared that a first part of total of $4 million will be raised through the placement of 72.7 million of shares, at 5.5 cents per share, to...

On May 15, 2016, Egypt’s National Telecom Regulatory Authority (NTRA) will launch process to award 4G mobile licences, Minister of Telecommunication and Information Technology, Yasser Al Qady, said on May 4, 2016, at a press conference. During a council meeting he held on the same day, he added that the decision was taken by the government. Egyptians have been waiting for 4G since 2014....

In Egypt, investment bank EFG wishes to invest in solar and wind projects totaling a capacity of about 500 MW. The operation falls under the group’s mid-term strategy to increase its portfolio of renewable energies assets to 1 GW, by 2018. Bakr Abdel-Wahab, EFG’s CEO told Reuters that the bank plans to bring up the value of its renewable energy assets from €730 million, where it is...

Between 2007 and 2015, Mauritius attracted most millionaires, a recent report from New World Wealth reveals. The number of millionaires residing in the country, outside main residence, soared by 160% over the nine past years, the report entitled “The Africa 2016 Wealth” Report stated. The significant growth is mainly due to Mauritius characteristics in terms of economic performances, tax...