by Tech Talk | Mar 1, 2023 | Articles
According to the Department of Higher Education and Training, literacy is and always will be a topic of conversation in South Africa, where 3,7-million people are illiterate.
The reasons for these illiteracy rates are vast and range from the legacy of Apartheid to the cost of books and other materials needed for better reading and comprehension. And this only speaks to literacy when it comes to reading and writing. There are additional literacy areas that need more attention, too, such as financial literacy, data literacy, digital literacy and so much more.
The effects of illiteracy across all sectors can affect many aspects of life. This includes an inability to participate in civic processes or the economy, earn a living and drive economic growth. There are no quick fixes for tackling literacy problems in South Africa, but there are digital and technological tools that can help.
“Access to quality reading materials and literacy tools is a struggle in countries such as South Africa where books and resources are often very expensive,” notes Lea-Anne Moses, Executive Director of the Fundza Literacy Trust, the only organisation in South Africa that tackles teen and adult literacy. “However, about 20-million to 22-million people in South Africa use a smartphone, with many more having internet access through shared devices. It is, therefore, imperative that more literacy tools become easily accessible via mobile devices.”
The role of online reading tools
“Improving literacy and reading comprehension across South Africa is imperative to grow generations of educated, engaged and empowered citizens,” shares Moses. “Ensuring that young people have access to reading tools and resources is key to facilitating such improvement.”
Online reading tools such as fundza.mobi play an important role in creating easy access to quality reading materials. Through its mobi-site, young people now have access to a library of local stories written by themselves and their peers about them and for them.
Moses advises that an environment in which teenagers can develop an appetite for reading is equally important as the reading tools themselves. “If young people are given the encouragement to read for pleasure and the space to do just that, it will go a long way to help in the development of critical thinking and analytical thinking, improve their concentration and memory, strengthen their own writing ability, and even gain a better understanding of the world around them.”
The importance of digital literacy
In a world where almost, everything relies on some sort of digital touchpoint, digital literacy has become incredibly important, and big tech companies such as Google have been doing their part. The company has a digital safety and citizenship curriculum for children that aims to help children use the internet safely and with caution.
Additionally, in South Africa, digital literacy is also important in vernacular languages. The digital divide is widened at a technological level due to the absence of written content in African languages. This translates into poor datasets for machine learning and translation, making it harder to provide local-language versions of popular and useful apps.
“This makes it increasingly difficult for those who don’t speak English to upskill themselves in the digital world or be more involved in technological innovation in South Africa,” says Moses. “Digital tools in home languages need to be made available to South Africans from a young age in order for them to thrive later in life.”
Zoho, a company that works with micro, small and medium enterprises to create digital literacy and provide critical skill development, echoes this sentiment, and believes that children need to be adequately equipped from early on in order to meet the demand of digital skills in South Africa.
“We need to future-proof children so that they are equipped to apply for jobs that require digital and development skills,” says Andrew Bourne, regional manager: Africa at Zoho Corporation. “And we can help do this by ensuring that educators have the skills to encourage children to become more digitally literate.”
“With low-code platforms, for example, citizen developers can create complex and powerful business applications without requiring costly and lengthy training. Most low-code application development can be managed with users who only have moderate technical knowledge.”
Why data literacy matters
Data is at the forefront of the world today. Everything we do includes either consuming data or sharing our data and information for various reasons. Data literacy is, therefore, an important part of learning in today’s world.
To make learning about data literacy that much easier, ALT Advisory, data privacy advocates, and Fundza have teamed up on a story called “Stolen Dreams”, by South African author Zimkhitha Mlanzeli. The story speaks about data protection through a compelling human-interest story. Bongi, the main protagonist, is a young woman who dreams of getting into university. These plans are halted when she becomes a victim of identity theft. The story unfolds as Bongi, and her friends investigate a shady businessperson who she suspects of stealing her personal information.
The goal of this project is to help equip young people with the tools and knowledge they need to protect their data in a digital world.
Moses concludes: “Literacy across all aspects of life is becoming more important and it’s great to see how technology companies and platforms are doing their part to improve literacy levels in South Africa. With South Africans often having easier access to a phone than a book, these digital tools and apps will only become more useful in our plight to address the literacy challenges that we face as a country.”
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by Tech Talk | Mar 1, 2023 | Articles
Rectron has expanded its existing partnership with Microsoft to distribute Microsoft 365, Windows and server software into the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region.
Rectron and Microsoft’s partnership has spanned almost two decades, and this is another example of how the two tech organisations are looking to enhance the customer journey for seamless product access.
“Extending our partnership with Microsoft to SADC is a key pillar of our strategy to expand Rectron’s presence in the region,” says Marilyn Shamba, product manager at Rectron. “Together, we hope to grow our reach as a key distributor of Microsoft products.”
Under this partnership expansion, Rectron is now a one-stop shop for resellers in SADC for Microsoft products and services, which includes Microsoft 365 as a Fully Packaged Product (FFP) and an Electronic Software Delivery (ESD). Windows is also available as an original equipment manufacturer (OEM), FFP and ESD, while server licences are available as OEM licensing.
“Our experience as a trusted Microsoft distributor means we have established programmes offering resellers financial benefits when they buy devices together with Microsoft software. Our dedicated marketing team has a wealth of knowledge and collection of marketing materials on hand for resellers that promote the value of buying genuine software and having the correct software licences.”
As it stands, this new expansion complements the existing partnership with the South African market which already services Lesotho and the Kingdom of Eswatini. In addition to distributing Microsoft products, Rectron has a strong portfolio of notebook brands including Acer, Asus, Gigabyte, Lenovo, MSI and RCT.
“Our performance in the last few years as a Microsoft distributor is a testament to our capabilities and we look forward to a fruitful journey together. The region is in the capable hands of an already well-oiled machine. Here’s to new beginnings and endless possibilities,” says Shamba.
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by Tech Talk | Mar 1, 2023 | Articles
The Portfolio Committee on Water and Sanitation says it is hopeful that the reconfiguration of water boards will ensure efficiency and the achievement of targets, which will translate into the delivery of water to people.
“We are hopeful that the reconfiguration will assist in better economies of scale for water boards, enable better cross subsidisation and increased financial sustainability as well as enhance market capitalisation for infrastructure projects,” Committee Chairperson Robert Mashego said.
While commending the progress reported on the reconfiguration of water boards, the committee said it remains concerned that there are still challenges that deny people access to water, and called for solutions to challenges across water value chain.
“We must caution against cosmetic changes that don’t bring about tangible results and access to water for the people,” Mashego said.
The committee called for impoved relationships with municipalities to promote the payment of services essentially because the financial sustainability of the water boards remains critical for their existence.
The committee was concerned that the water boards are owed R16.1 billion as of 31 December 2022 due to non-payment by municipalities’ clients and that negatively impacts the board’s ability to raise funds for capital projects.
“The committee remains concerned that five water boards, including Amatola, Bloem, Lepelle, Mhlathuze and Rand Water, are performing below the 80% of planned targets which also directly impacts on their ability to deliver services.
“The committee has urged the water boards to find solutions to the challenges they face to ensure that they have the required capacity to meet their mandate of the delivery of water to the people,” Mashego said.
The realignment, which is at various stages, is expected to be completed by March 2023.
The committee has also called for close collaboration between the water boards and municipalities to improve the operations of the municipalities’ Waste Water Treatment plants to ensure improved quality of discharged water.
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by Tech Talk | Mar 1, 2023 | Articles
Global money laundering and terrorist financing watchdog, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), has placed South Africa on its so-called grey list.
This adds South Africa to a group of jurisdiction under increased FATF monitoring, meaning the country has committed to swiftly resolve the identified strategic deficiencies within agreed timeframes. It has important implications for South African companies doing business with international counterparties.
Prior to this announcement, PwC commented that South Africa had made considerable progress towards resolving the deficiencies in its legal framework and implementation processes since it was informed in October 2021 of the risk that it could be greylisted.
Kerin Wood, PwC South Africa forensic services: risk and regulation partner, says that South African authorities should be commended for the efforts they made around regulatory reform that aimed to avert being grey listed . “The speed at which they facilitated this is noteworthy,” she adds.
However, FATF has decided that the response has been insufficient, and will now work with authorities to address the lingering deficiencies. This means that South African companies will need to respond quickly to mitigate the risks stemming from this development.
The impact of being grey listed
For example, grey listing could increase the cost of raising finance and trading with global counterparties. Businesses and non-governmental organisations will face additional requirements around sources of funding which are likely to increase costs and result in delayed transactional execution, and local banks are likely to be required to implement increased customer screening requirements.
For private companies in South Africa, Wood says that responding to the grey listing will require context-specific solutions depending on the broader impact it will have on their plans around aspects such as strategic expansions, capital raising and any general increased cost of doing business.
Where local companies have been pulled into the scope of the regulatory requirements, these entities will have to assess the specific impacts and ensure that they take steps to enhance their current control environments and frameworks to address their new regulatory expectations.
“South African companies operating as financial intermediaries across jurisdictions may be asked to understand independent risk assessments to enable their counterparties to gain assurance that their controls/frameworks are aligned with global standards and to prevent such counterparties from exiting these relationships,” Wood explains.
“It is challenging to estimate the potential impact of grey listing on the overall economy,” she says. “South Africa is a bit of an anomaly compared to previously grey listed countries: it has a more globally integrated financial system, with a more open economy and with greater foreign investor participation than other grey listed countries’ economies.
” In other jurisdictions, we have seen diverse impacts on businesses, including foreign investments suspended or deferred as well as increased transactional, administration, compliance and auditing costs associated with enhanced levels of monitoring.”
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by Tech Talk | Mar 1, 2023 | Articles
AMD has announced it will be expanding support of its growing 5G partner ecosystem spanning from core to radio access networks (RAN) applications, delivering additional new test capabilities and unveiling new 5G products.
The AMD wireless telecom partner ecosystem has more than doubled in the past year, bolstered by the integration of the AMD and Xilinx product lines as well as the creation of its new Telco Solutions testing lab in collaboration with VIAVI.
Telco solutions testing lab
The formation of the Telco Solutions testing lab is vital for operators and telco solution providers to test, validate and scale computing resources to deliver on the ever-increasing demands from RAN and edge-to-core.
The testing lab supports validation of end-to-end solutions, including both hardware to software to leverage the performance and power efficiencies of the latest AMD processors, Adaptive SoCs, SmartNICs, FPGAs and DPUs.
In support of this mission, the VIAVI end-to-end testing suite was selected to provide the network test solution to analyze, develop and validate the impact of real-life conditions across an entire telco network.
The Telco Solutions testing lab will enable traffic simulation and generation across core, CU/DU, edge and RAN using both current and future AMD technologies to allow full functional and performance testing that meets current and future generation ecosystem requirements.
Based in Santa Clara, the Telco Solutions testing lab will bring in its first 5G ecosystem partners beginning Q2 of 2023.
Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC devices for emerging 4G/5G growth markets
The strong adoption of 4G/5G AMD Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC and MPSoC radio technology has enabled new integrated remote radio unit designs and opened new business opportunities for AMD and its partner ecosystem.
AMD is now expanding its Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC digital front-end (DFE) portfolio with two additions to the family: the Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC ZU63DR and Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC ZU64DR devices.
These new RFSoCs will enable the expansion and deployment of 4G/5G radios into markets around the globe where lower cost, power and spectrum-efficient radios are required to address increased wireless connectivity.
“AMD has made incredible progress in the radio market and is proud to be showcasing at MWC Barcelona our collaboration with over 15 radio system ecosystem partners designing O-RAN-based remote radio units for open interfaces using AMD Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoCs and MPSoCs,” says Salil Raje, senior vice-president and GM: Adaptive and Embedded Computing Group at AMD.
“With our focus toward increasing 5G deployments around the world, the new AMD Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoCs are especially cost-effective and energy-efficient, making them ideal for emerging global markets including rural and outdoor deployments.”
The Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC ZU63DR specifically targets four transmit and four receive (4T4R) and dual band entry-level O-RAN radio unit (O-RU) applications. The Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC ZU64DR is targeted for eight transmit and eight receive (8T8R) O-RU applications using the 3rd Generation Partner Project (3GPP) split-8 option which supports alternative and legacy radio unit architectures.
Both RFSoC devices leverage the deep DFE integration available in the flagship Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC ZU67DR device and are expected to be in full production in Q2 of 2023. AMD will showcase its Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC DFE family at the upcoming Mobile World Congress (MWC) Barcelona 2023.
AMD ecosystem momentum with Nokia
As part of the growing AMD telco ecosystem, AMD and Nokia are jointly announcing an expanded collaboration using 4th Gen AMD EPYC processor-based servers to deliver Nokia Cloud RAN solutions to help communications service providers achieve their most stringent energy efficiency goals.
AMD and Nokia recognize the challenges faced by operators dealing with spiraling energy costs and the growing importance of meeting carbon reduction targets at the core as well as the network edge.
“As part of our ambition to provide the best Cloud RAN solutions, we are excited to extend our collaboration with AMD. We are looking to take advantage of the 4th Gen AMD EPYC processor’s capabilities to further enhance Nokia’s Cloud RAN solutions,” says Pasi Toivanen, head of partner cloud RAN solutions at Nokia.
“Communication service providers across 5G Core and Cloud RAN increasingly demand new levels of performance and energy efficiency within their 5G networks. Our work with AMD recognizes the challenges faced by the telecommunications industry and helps to deliver on our partners’ and customers’ most ambitious energy efficiency targets.”
5G at MWC Barcelona 2023
At MWC 2023, AMD is showcasing the latest 4th Gen AMD EPYC processor-powered systems in conjunction with technology partners including: Amdocs, Groundhog, Juniper and Nokia. 5G ecosystem partners showcasing radio solutions with AMD include: Abside, Astrome, AW2S, CellXica, Comba, Fujitsu, Mavenir, NEC, Solid, Tejas, Ulak, Viettel, VVDN and Zlink.
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by Tech Talk | Feb 27, 2023 | Articles
Telecommunications equipment maker Ericsson will lay off 8 500 employees globally as part of its plan to cut costs, a memo sent to employees said.
While technology companies such as Microsoft, Meta Platforms and Google have laid off thousands of employees citing economic conditions, Ericsson’s move would be the largest layoff to hit the telecoms industry.
“The way headcount reductions will be managed will differ depending on local country practice,” CEO Börje Ekholm wrote in the memo.
“In several countries the headcount reductions have already been communicated this week,” he said.
On Monday, the company, which employs more than 105 000 worldwide, announced plans to cut about 1 400 jobs in Sweden.
While Ericsson did not disclose which country would be most affected, analysts had predicted that North America would likely be most affected and growing markets such as India the least.
The company said in December it would cut costs by US$880-million by the end of 2023 as demand slows in some markets, including North America.
“It is our obligation to take this cost out to remain competitive,” Ekholm said in the memo. “Our biggest enemy right now may be complacency.”
Many telecoms companies had beefed up their inventories during the height of the pandemic which is now leading to slowing orders for telecom equipment makers.
Verizon, one of the largest telecoms companies, plans to spend between $18.25-billion and $19.25-billion this year, down from a capital expenditure budget of $23-billion last year.
Nordic rival Nokia has not announced any plans to lay off employees. — Reuters
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