Business/Technologies updates

Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) Head Office Nigeria has been named among the “top 20 improvers” in the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business rankings for 2019. Renowned Indian-American experts on strategy, globalisation, and entrepreneurship, Anil Gupta, disclosed this in Lagos on Tuesday. The World Bank is expected to release the full report later this month. But Mr Gupta said a preliminary report showed Nigeria was ranked along with China and India among countries that recorded significant improvements in their systems towards ease of doing business. Mr Gupta was one of the special guest speakers at the Platform, a biennial economic summit organised by the Covenant Christian Centre, Lagos to commemorate Nigeria's 59th Independence anniversary celebrations. He said the areas the World Bank report pointed out in which Nigeria has shown the most improvement in the last one year include creating new electronic platforms for taxes and corporate affairs for starting ...

The World Bank has appointed Mr Shubham Chaudhuri as the new Country Director for Nigeria, succeeding Mr Rachid Benmessaoud who completed his term recently. A statement issued by the World Bank’s Senior Communications Officer, Nigeria, on Wednesday in Abuja, said Chaudhuri assumed office on Tuesday. It said that Chaudhuri, a U.S. national who grew up in India, joined the World Bank in 2004 and has held several leadership positions at the Bank, with his most recent position being Country Director for Afghanistan. Chaudhuri said it was an honour to be in Nigeria and have the opportunity to help government partners, at the Federal and state levels, realise Nigeria’s full and considerable potential. This, he said, the bank was doing by transforming the economy, catalysing private investment and job creation, investing in Nigeria’s children and creating opportunities for Nigeria’s youth and women. “The World Bank Group has a long-standing partnership with Nigeria and I look for...

Key industry experts in the energy sector have called for digitalisation of Nigeria’s energy sector, saying it would further boost the economy. They held that technology plays a significant role in increasing the access to clean and sustainable energy resources thereby building Nigerian economy. L-R: Deep Karani, Exhibition Director, Power Nigeria; Gareth Rapley, Group Exhibition Director, Informa Markets; Engr. Adeoye Fadeyibi, Managing Director, Eko Electricity Distribution Company and Mr. Jitenda Sachdeva, Group President, SkipperSeil at the ribbon cutting of the 2019 Power Nigeria Exhibition & Conference held at Landmark Centre, Lagos. Among the stakeholders who made this summation were leaders from the Eko Electricity Distribution Company, EKEDC, Cummins, PowerPro, Green Power Utility, Kartel Energy. Speaking at the 2019 Power Nigeria Exhibition and Conference, in Lagos, they all agreed that technology is revolutionisiing the energy sector. Power Nigeria is the large...

Smartphone manufacturer, OPPO, recently launched a new OPPO series, OPPP A9 2020 and OPPO A5 2020 to offer Nigerians high quality and affordable smart phones. The new series are the latest offering for the mid-level smart phone market segment. Aside its high quality and affordability, OPPO said the A series possess superb photography, gorgeous design and a long-lasting battery. It also revealed that the A series were created with teens, youngsters, in mind but this doesn’t mean that adults who are interested can’t purchase it. Marketing Manager of the company, Nengi Akinolo, said: “We named these two handsets the two handsets the OPPO A Series 2020 in celebration of the beginning of the new decade, also to commemorate the success of A series over the past 10 years while welcoming a whole new generation of mobile users.” “The new name also reflects our vision for the coming 10 years. It highlights the brand’s latest technologies, stunning design, superb photography, powerful...

Tech Leaders Consider Legal Action Against Illegal Arrests of Software Engineers.   Monday 30 September 2019. Lagos, Nigeria​. Nigeria's technology leaders have launched #StopRobbingUs​, a campaign to put an end to the common practice where Nigerian police stop young people with laptops and unlawfully arrest, attack or, in extreme circumstances, kidnap them, forcing them to withdraw funds from their bank accounts in order to regain their freedom. Working alongside ​Enough is Enough​ Nigeria [EiE], a network of individuals and organisations that promote good governance and public accountability in Nigeria, the ​#StopRobbingUs​ movement is now considering a Class Action Lawsuit on police brutality. Led by ‘Bosun Tijani of ​CcHUB​, Jason Njoku of ​IROKO​, Iyin “E” Aboyeji of ​Future.Africa​ and Oluyomi Ojo of ​Printivo​, amongst others, the campaign is calling for the Federal Government of Nigeria to intervene in the continued practice of illegally arresting and extorting youn...

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) granted UPS’ Flight Forward drone subsidiary a Part 135 Standard certification on Friday. The company said the certificate allows it to expand its delivery service in campus settings such as hospitals and universities, but added that residential deliveries are years away. The certification allows UPS pilots to fly drones beyond their line of sight and opens the door for the delivery company to expand Flight Forward. The fledgling unit is immediately doubling the number of drone flights it does for its flagship customer, Raleigh, North Carolina’s WakeMed Health & Hospitals. “We’ll easily get to 20-plus flights per day, per drone,” said Scott Price, UPS’ chief strategy and transformation officer. “It’s a business, it’s not a prototype or a test,” Price said of Flight Forward, which is paid to ferry blood and tissue samples to WakeMed’s central laboratory from points around its main hospital campus. UPS said its latest certificatio...

Nigeria Stock Exchange, Lagos Weak domestic patronage has continued to spur increased price volatility and apathy on the equity sector of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE). This is just as all eyes are now focused on the new economic advisory team of the Federal Government to provide a workable roadmap that would stimulate consumption and production, as well as drive economic growth. The market developments caused the All-Share Index (ASI) and capitalisation to depreciate by 0.09 per cent to close the week at 27,675.04 points and N13.472 trillion respectively. However, all other indices finished higher with the exception of NSE All-Share, NSE CG, NSE Premium, NSE Banking, NSE AFR Bank Value, NSE AFR Div Yield, NSE MERI Growth and NSE Industrial Goods Indices, which depreciated by 0.09 per cent, 0.01 per cent , 0.99 per cent , 1.64 per cent, 1.94 per cent, 1.25 per cent, 1.15 per cent and 1.83 per cent respectively. A breakdown of trading last week showed that the market r...