the year
Cell C boss Alan Knott-Craig was named Industry Personality of the Year in last night’s AfricaCom Awards, which celebrate excellence in the African telecommunications market.
The AfricaCom Awards, which celebrate and reward excellence in the African Telecommunications Market, last night saw Alan Knott-Craig, CEO of Cell C, honoured with one of its highest prizes. Several South African agencies and developers were also included a mong the awards.
Now in its 5th year, the Africa Com Awards 2012 received more entries than ever before. The 2012 winners were:
Best Network Improvement
Helios Towers Africa Shared Telecoms Infrastructure
Most Innovative Service
Orange Group Deezer
Best Quality User Experience
Sicap Mobile Money ATM
Best Cost Efficiency Initiative
ZTE Solution for Airtel
Rural Telecoms Award
Viettel Movitel Rural Network
Best Backhaul Solution for Africa
Comtech EF Data Mobile Backhaul Solution
Best Marketing Campaign
Prezence Digital #Mandelastory
Best Smart-Device for Africa
Etisalat Misr Smart Device
Best Pan African Initiative
WIOCC Seamless, High-Capacity International Connectivity Ring around Africa
The 2012 Mobile Data and Social Media Award
Bozza Mobile The Bozza.mobi App
Industry Personality of the Year
Alan Knott-Craig Cell C
Changing Lives Award
Safaricom DAKTARI-1525
Africa Apps Awards
Best Smart Phone App
Prezence Digital Ster-Kinekor mobile app
Best Feature Phone App
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Orange African Social Venture Prize
Following the successful first edition in 2011, the Orange African Social Venture Prize has been awarded to three entrepreneurs or start-ups offering solutions that use ICT in innovative ways to meet the needs of people living in Africa.
The panel of judges, consisting of Orange specialists, the media and institutions that promote development, chose the three prize-winners from among almost 450 candidate projects covering a variety of fields such as healthcare, agriculture, education, energy, industry and commerce illustrating the high potential of telecommunications for development in Africa.
The winning projects are:
– Vivus Limited, a start-up from C√¥te d’Ivoire that allows agricultural or farm produce traders to optimize their stocks, and thereby avoid waste, by using a SMS-based system providing information on ongoing deals.
– Takachar provides a system that has already been launched in Kenya to improve waste management by using telecoms technologies to track waste collection in real time.
– The e-commerce business Niokobok enables Senegalese people living abroad to send basic necessities to their families back home avoiding the extra cost of transferring money.
Etisalat Prize for Innovation
The ‚’Etisalat Nigeria Prize for Innovation’ seeks to promote the utilisation of mobile broadbansd in Africa. The inaugural ‚’Etisalat Prize for Innovation is aimed at encouraging and celebrating valuable innovation in the African market and will awarded in two categories: the first prize of $25, 000 for the most innovative product or service launched in the last 12months and a second prize of $10,000 for the most innovative idea.
Etisalat believes innovation should go beyond improvements in existing products and services and instead have real valuable social or economic impact to customers.
Winner of first prize of $25, 000 is Mobile Maths Practice
Winner of second prize of $10,000 iConnect Project
Speaking on the success of the competition which witnessed an impressive array of entries for the two award categories, Chief Executive Officer, Etisalat Nigeria, Steven Evans, explained that the competition was instituted to provide the opportunity for innovative and relevant mobile broadband products/services and ideas.
He said, ‚”We are delighted at the creativity shown by all the entries and this is a clear indication of the importance of broadband in Africa.Innovative broadband projects, products and services have improved the way we live and work and so we launched this award because we realise the importance of broadband in the industry. Innovation is core to our business strategy at Etisalat Nigeria and we see ourselves as a young and innovative business setting the pace for others in the Nigerian telecommunications industry‚”.
Mobile Maths Practice a mobile application to help students around the globe prepare for maths exams. The invention relates to wireless communications and methods and systems in which a wireless service provider may offer wireless data messages to mobile subscribers.
iConnect Project supplies mobile broadband internet connection vehicles to schools in a variety of geo-locations. The vehicles are refurbished shipping containers connected to a truck head and are fully mobile and are therefore scheduled into a school’s timetable which enables sharing and full connectivity.
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