News
Airtel pushes telecoms as economic pillar, seals IMBIL MVNO Deal in Nigeria – Technology Times
Published
3 months agoon
By
Preport
Airtel Africa has called on governments across the continent to elevate telecoms from a supporting industry to a central pillar of economic policy as its Nigerian subsidiary deepens market expansion through a new commercial partnership with IMBIL Telecom Solutions Ltd to accelerate Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) growth.
The dual developments, policy advocacy at the continental level and market expansion at the national level, underscore a coordinated push by industry stakeholders to reposition telecoms as both a driver of digital inclusion and a catalyst for economic transformation.
At the policy front, Airtel Africa is urging governments to rethink their approach to connectivity, arguing that telecommunications infrastructure must be treated with the same urgency and priority as other critical national assets.


Despite significant progress in network expansion, Mukadi highlighted a persistent and widening usage gap across Africa. While mobile networks now cover approximately 95% of the continent’s population, nearly 75% of Africans remain offline. This paradox, he noted, points to structural barriers that go beyond infrastructure deployment.
Airtel links telecoms policy reform to economic growth
Speaking at the inaugural edition of the États Généraux du Secteur des Postes et Télécommunications in Kinshasa, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Daddy Bujitu Mukadi, Airtel Africa’s Chief Regulatory Officer and GSMA Africa Group Policy Chair, describes telecoms as foundational to Africa’s economic future.
The event, which was attended by President Félix Tshisekedi of Congo, provided a high-level platform for re-evaluating the role of digital infrastructure in national development strategies across the continent.
According to Mukadi, telecommunications should no longer be seen as a secondary enabler of economic activity but rather as the “infrastructure of infrastructures,” with digital technology functioning as the lifeblood of modern economies. His position reflects a growing consensus within the industry that connectivity is now as critical as power, transportation, and financial systems in driving productivity, innovation, and inclusion.
“Telecoms can no longer be treated as a mere support sector,” Mukadi said. “It must be seen as foundational, with digital technology as the blood.”
Despite significant progress in network expansion, Mukadi highlighted a persistent and widening usage gap across Africa. While mobile networks now cover approximately 95% of the continent’s population, nearly 75% of Africans remain offline. This paradox, he noted, points to structural barriers that go beyond infrastructure deployment.
Top among these barriers is device affordability. According to Airtel Africa’s assessment, the high cost of entry-level smartphones continues to exclude millions from participating in the digital economy, even where network coverage exists.
To address this, Mukadi proposed a targeted fiscal intervention: a two-to-three-year exemption on import duties and taxes for entry-level smartphones priced between $40 and $150. He also called for a three-year removal of import duties on telecommunications equipment to reduce the cost of network expansion and improve service reach.
“These measures could reduce handset prices by up to 50% and help bridge the continent’s usage gap,” he said, noting that the proposals have already received backing from six of Africa’s largest mobile operators during industry discussions at Mobile World Congress Kigali 2025.
The policy recommendations reflect a broader industry push for regulatory alignment and government partnership, particularly in addressing the cost structures that continue to limit both access and adoption. By lowering barriers to entry for consumers and operators alike, telecoms companies argue that governments can unlock new waves of digital participation, with downstream effects on education, healthcare, financial inclusion, and entrepreneurship.
While Airtel Africa’s advocacy sets the tone at the continental level, its Nigerian operations are simultaneously advancing market-level innovation through a strategic commercial agreement with IMBIL Telecom, a pioneer Mobile Virtual Network Enabler (MVNE) in Nigeria.


The collaboration has already yielded measurable outcomes. IMBIL Telecom disclosed that it has successfully onboarded five MVNOs onto its platform, with several additional operators currently in advanced stages of technical and commercial integration. These operators are expected to commence services in the coming months, signaling a gradual but steady expansion of Nigeria’s telecom value chain.
Airtel Nigeria-IMBIL Telecom deal onboards five MVNOs in Nigeria
Announced in Lagos, the partnership represents a significant milestone in the evolution of Nigeria’s telecoms market, particularly in the emerging MVNO segment. Under the agreement, IMBIL Telecom will leverage Airtel Nigeria’s network infrastructure to support the rollout and scaling of MVNO services, effectively lowering entry barriers for new telecom service providers.
The collaboration has already yielded measurable outcomes. IMBIL Telecom disclosed that it has successfully onboarded five MVNOs onto its platform, with several additional operators currently in advanced stages of technical and commercial integration. These operators are expected to commence services in the coming months, signaling a gradual but steady expansion of Nigeria’s telecom value chain.
Speaking on the development, Akeem Ogunkoya, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of IMBIL Telecom, described the agreement as a foundational step in enabling a more competitive and inclusive telecoms market.
“As the pioneer MVNE in the Nigerian telecom market, our mission is to lower the barrier to entry for aspiring telecom operators,” Ogunkoya said in a company statement. “Our partnership with Airtel Nigeria provides a solid foundation for MVNOs to thrive by leveraging world-class infrastructure and scalable technology.”
He added that the onboarding of five MVNOs demonstrates both market readiness and the effectiveness of the MVNE model in supporting new entrants. “We are encouraged by the strong pipeline of operators preparing to enter the market,” he said.
The MVNE framework plays a critical role in this ecosystem by providing the technical backbone required for MVNO operations. IMBIL Telecom’s platform offers end-to-end capabilities, including core network services, subscriber provisioning, billing systems, regulatory compliance support, and value-added services. This allows MVNOs to focus on customer acquisition, branding, and service differentiation, rather than heavy capital investment in infrastructure.
Industry analysts view this model as a key driver of innovation and competition, particularly in markets like Nigeria where telecoms penetration is high but service differentiation remains limited. By enabling niche operators to target specific customer segments, such as underserved communities, enterprise clients, or digital-first consumers, MVNOs can introduce new pricing models, service bundles, and customer experiences.
The partnership also aligns with regulatory efforts by the Nigerian Communications Commission to liberalise the telecoms market and promote competition. The NCC’s MVNO licensing framework, introduced to deepen market participation, has created new opportunities for both local and international players to enter Nigeria’s telecoms space without the need to build extensive infrastructure.
Ogunkoya acknowledged the role of the regulator in enabling this progress, noting that “the Nigerian Communications Commission has created a forward-looking regulatory environment that supports MVNO growth, innovation, and fair competition.”
Beyond market expansion, the Airtel–IMBIL collaboration reflects a shared objective to deepen digital inclusion across Nigeria. By expanding service offerings and improving accessibility, the partnership is expected to contribute to broader national goals around connectivity, financial inclusion, and digital transformation.
This dual-track strategy, policy advocacy and market execution, illustrates how telecoms operators are positioning themselves at the intersection of infrastructure, innovation, and economic development. On one hand, Airtel Africa is engaging governments to reshape policy frameworks in favour of affordability and access. On the other, its Nigerian subsidiary is actively enabling new business models that can extend the reach and impact of telecom services.
The convergence of these efforts is particularly significant at a time when digital economies across Africa are gaining momentum. As governments seek to diversify revenue sources, improve service delivery, and enhance competitiveness, telecommunications infrastructure is increasingly seen as a foundational layer for achieving these objectives.
However, the success of this vision will depend on sustained collaboration between public and private sector stakeholders. Industry leaders argue that without supportive policies, particularly around taxation, spectrum management, and infrastructure protection, the full potential of telecom-driven growth may remain constrained.
Mukadi’s call for tax exemptions on devices and equipment is therefore not just a cost-reduction measure but a strategic intervention aimed at accelerating digital adoption at scale. Similarly, initiatives like the Airtel–IMBIL partnership demonstrate how private sector innovation can complement policy reforms by translating strategic intent into tangible market outcomes.
For Nigeria, the emergence of MVNOs represents a new phase in telecoms market development. While the country has one of the largest telecoms markets in Africa, the introduction of MVNOs is expected to enhance service diversity, improve customer experience, and stimulate competitive pricing.
Stay ahead with real-time reports, breaking news, and exclusive insights delivered directly to your phone. Don’t settle for outdated information. Join TECHNOLOGYTIMES NEWS on WhatsApp for 24/7 updates.
Join Our Whatsapp Channel
You may like
-
Historic Wheelchair Basketball Debut Ends In Heartbreak As Scotland Crush Nigeria, But Commonwealth Games Dream Lives On
-
Airtel Money processes $245bn as Nigeria tops mobile money growth – Technology Times
-
Nigeria Steps Up Smart Meter Deployment with Installer Training Programme
-
US Issues Strong Warning to Nigeria Over Killing of Plateau Cleric’s Family
News
Monday.com is the latest tech company to blame AI for layoffs — here are 20 others
Published
27 minutes agoon
July 26, 2026By
Preport
Monday.com, the Tel Aviv-based work management software company known for its colorful, customizable project-tracking boards, this week became the latest tech company to cite AI as a factor in job cuts. On Wednesday, the company said in an SEC filing that it will lay off about 20% of its workforce, or just over 600 employees, as part of a “restructuring plan” tied to its “ongoing transformation of its product, marketing, and go-to-market strategy” in support of “a leaner, more focused operating model” as it continues investing in its “AI-driven growth strategy.”
Co-founder Eran Zinman told employees in a LinkedIn memo that the move “was not made to reduce costs or replace people with AI,” positioning it instead as adapting the organization to a new AI-first vision the company laid out roughly a year ago when it rebranded around a platform-wide AI push. Monday.com, which has two offices in the U.S., expects $45 million to $55 million in net restructuring charges but still projects up to 20% year-over-year revenue growth for 2026.
So far, according to new Financial Times analysis, U.S. tech companies have slashed nearly 140,000 jobs since the start of this year, with Amazon, Oracle, Meta, and Microsoft alone accounting for almost 50,000 of those cuts as they funnel hundreds of billions of dollars into AI data center buildouts. Interestingly, the FT also found that companies citing AI as a factor in job cuts have underperformed the Nasdaq by almost 10% in the 30 trading days following their announcements, suggesting the market doesn’t entirely buy the stories that the companies are telling.
Still, the picture isn’t uniformly bleak. The FT notes that AI-focused companies like Anthropic and OpenAI are hiring rapidly, absorbing some of the talent shed elsewhere in the industry. And within some of the very companies making cuts, headcount is shifting rather than disappearing entirely. Meta, for instance, earlier this year moved roughly 7,000 employees into new AI-focused roles even as it laid off 8,000 others, and IBM says it’s tripling entry-level hiring for AI and hybrid-cloud roles alongside recent cuts.
Below is a running look — in reverse chronological order — at the bigger tech companies that have announced significant layoffs this year with AI as a stated factor.
Microsoft — July 9, 2026. Microsoft cut about 4,800 roles, or 2.1% of its global workforce, most of them in its Xbox gaming unit, resetting the business only three years after acquiring Activision Blizzard for $75 billion, per the FT. Separately, it offered buyouts structured as voluntary separations, without disclosing how many employees these would impact. The company said the role eliminations were “not being replaced by AI” but acknowledged “AI is changing how work gets done.” CFO Amy Hood said total headcount declined year-over-year in fiscal Q3, and was expected to keep declining as the company focuses on “building high-performing teams that operate with pace and agility” amid rising AI investment.
Oracle — June 22, 2026. Oracle disclosed in late June that it had reduced its workforce by 21,000 employees over the past 12 months, a decline of 13%, which means more cuts than was previously known, including because of AI. “The adoption and deployment of AI technologies across our operations have resulted, and may continue to result, in reductions to our workforce,” the company said in an annual financial regulatory filing.
GitLab — June 3, 2026. GitLab laid off roughly 350 workers, about 14% of its staff, to fund AI infrastructure investment and handle surging traffic from AI workflows. CEO Bill Staples said agentic workloads are “pushing competitors to the brink” and that the company had begun a “generational rebuild” of its core infrastructure to support what he called 100x growth requirements. GitLab is exiting 22 countries, flattening management layers, and partnering with an unspecified AI lab to rebuild its platform for agent-scale workloads. The company reported first-quarter revenue of $264 million, up 23% year-over-year, and expects to incur $30 to $35 million in restructuring costs.
Google — ongoing through May. Alphabet’s Google has quietly cut employees across its Cloud division, including its Threat Intelligence Group and Mandiant-linked cybersecurity staff, even as Cloud revenue grew 63% to exceed $20 billion for the first time and its backlog nearly doubled to over $460 billion. Over the past year, Google has cut more than a third of the managers overseeing small teams — 35% fewer managers with fewer direct reports. Unlike most companies on this list, Google has never announced a single overall number — the cuts have come through a rolling performance review process, a voluntary buyout program, and structural reorganizations, with outside estimates putting the 2026 total at between 1,500 and 3,000+ engineers.
Intuit — May 20, 2026. Intuit announced plans to eliminate roughly 3,000 jobs — about 17% of its total workforce — in a restructuring centered on reducing complexity and reallocating resources toward AI. CEO Sasan Goodarzi reportedly told staff the company is reducing complexity and simplifying the structure so it can deliver better products.
Meta — May 20-21, 2026. Meta laid off about 8,000 employees, roughly 10% of its workforce, while moving about 7,000 employees into new AI-focused roles (that they reportedly hate). CEO Mark Zuckerberg told staff the cuts were necessary because “success isn’t a given” in AI.
Cisco — May 14, 2026. Cisco announced it’s cutting nearly 4,000 jobs, about 5% of its workforce, despite reporting better-than-expected profit and revenue. CFO Mark Patterson said: “This was really not a savings-driven restructure… this is more [about] realigning … resources around silicon, optics, security and AI.”
Cloudflare — May 7-8, 2026. Cloudflare cut about 20% of its workforce (1,100 people), reporting quarterly revenue of $639.8 million, up 34% year-over-year and the highest single quarter in company history. CEO Matthew Prince wrote that “the vast majority of those we laid off last week were measurers” — middle management, finance, legal, internal auditing, and revenue recognition.
General Motors — May 12, 2026. GM eliminated 500 to 600 jobs, largely in IT roles in Austin, Texas, and Warren, Michigan, saying it was reevaluating its workforce needs amid uncertain market conditions. A person familiar with the cuts told CNBC that AI played a role in the decision but that it wasn’t the only reason. GM’s statement said it was “transforming its Information Technology organization to better position the company for the future.” Despite the cuts, the company still had roughly 80 open IT positions, including roles in AI, motorsports, and autonomous vehicles.
Coinbase — May 5, 2026. The crypto exchange said it was cutting about 700 employees, or 14% of its staff, as part of a restructuring aimed at addressing market volatility and increasing AI efficiency. The company flattened its organizational structure to five layers below the CEO and COO, and said it would experiment with “one-person teams” combining engineering, design, and product roles. CEO Brian Armstrong wrote that AI had changed the pace of work dramatically — “engineers use AI to ship in days what used to take a team weeks” — and that the company needed to “leverage AI across every facet of our jobs.”
PayPal — May 5, 2026. PayPal announced plans to cut around 20% of its workforce over the next two to three years — north of 4,500 jobs — as part of a turnaround strategy centered on AI adoption and organizational simplification. CEO Enrique Lores told investors the company would “aggressively adopt AI” in its development processes and formed a new “AI transformation and simplification” team reporting directly to him, tasked with redesigning the company’s processes “function by function.” Lores framed the cuts as removing organizational layers, and said AI would extend well beyond coding into customer service, support operations, and risk management.
Microsoft — April-May 2026. Microsoft offered buyouts structured as voluntary separations, without disclosing how many employees these would impact. CFO Amy Hood said total headcount declined year-over-year in fiscal Q3, and is expected to keep declining as the company focuses on “building high-performing teams that operate with pace and agility” amid rising AI investment.
Snap — April 16, 2026. Snap cut roughly 16% of its global workforce — about 1,000 full-time employees — and closed more than 300 open roles, with CEO Evan Spiegel citing AI advancements as a key driver. “Rapid advancements in artificial intelligence enable our teams to reduce repetitive work, increase velocity, and better support our community, partners, and advertisers,” Spiegel wrote in a memo filed with the SEC. The company said it had already seen small squads using AI tools to drive progress across Snapchat+, ad platform performance, and infrastructure efficiency.
IBM — rolling through 2026. Between Q4 2025 cuts and April 2026 Red Hat engineering reductions, estimates range from 3,000 to 9,000 U.S. positions eliminated, bringing IBM’s cumulative total since September 2024 above 15,000. Bloomberg reported IBM plans to triple its U.S. entry-level hiring for AI and hybrid-cloud roles, even as roughly 200 HR positions were replaced by AI agents. An IBM spokesperson described the Q4 2025 round as a routine rebalancing affecting “a low single-digit percentage” of its global workforce.
Atlassian — March 11, 2026. Atlassian cut about 1,600 jobs (10% of its workforce) to “rebalance” toward AI and enterprise sales, even as shares rose nearly 2% on the news. CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes said: “Our approach is not ‘AI replaces people.’ But it would be disingenuous to pretend AI doesn’t change the mix of skills we need or the number of roles required in certain areas. It does.”
Dell — January 30 (though disclosed in March 2026). Dell’s total workforce fell about 10% in fiscal 2026 — roughly 11,000 jobs — to about 97,000 employees from 108,000 a year earlier, with $569 million spent on severance. The cuts came as Dell projected its AI-optimized server revenue could double in fiscal 2027.
Oracle — March 5-31, 2026. As noted above, Oracle began telling employees it would be cutting thousands of jobs via terminal emails. The cuts came even as Oracle posted $3.7 billion in quarterly net income, up 27% year-over-year, with remaining performance obligations up 325% to $553 billion — savings redirected toward AI data centers. The cuts that would later total 21,000 over 12 months, as Oracle disclosed in its June 22 annual filing.
Block — February 26-27, 2026. Jack Dorsey’s Block cut 4,000 jobs — nearly half its workforce, down to under 6,000 from over 10,000. Dorsey wrote on X: “We’re already seeing that the intelligence tools we’re creating and using, paired with smaller and flatter teams, are enabling a new way of working which fundamentally changes what it means to build and run a company.” He added: “I think most companies are late. Within the next year, I believe the majority of companies will reach the same conclusion and make similar structural changes.”
Salesforce — February 10, 2026. Salesforce laid off fewer than 1,000 employees across marketing, product management, data analytics, and its Agentforce AI unit. The company told Fortune, “Because of the benefits and efficiencies of Agentforce, we’ve seen the number of support cases we handle decline and we no longer need to actively backfill support engineer roles.” This followed an earlier cut of about 4,000 customer-support roles, shrinking that team from roughly 9,000 to 5,000, with CEO Marc Benioff saying the company needed “less heads” because AI agents handle the work.
Amazon — January 28, 2026. Amazon cut 16,000 corporate jobs, following 14,000 cuts in October 2025 — about 9% of its corporate workforce in three months. The company said it was part of “strengthen[ing] our organization by reducing layers, increasing ownership, and removing bureaucracy.” CEO Andy Jassy had said in June 2025 that, “As we roll out more generative AI and agents, it should change the way our work is done. We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today… in the next few years, we expect that this will reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company.”
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.
News
2027: Ex-Oyo LG chair, Oladeji dumps APC for APM
Published
6 hours agoon
July 25, 2026By
Preport
A former Chairman of Aare Latosa Local Council Development Area (LCDA) in Oyo State, Hon. Adekunle Oladeji, has dumped the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Oladeji, who left the APC, has joined the Allied Peoples Movement (APM).
DAILY POST gathered that Oladeji served as chairman of the LCDA during the tenure of the immediate past governor of the state, Senator Abiola Ajimobi.
The LCDA is one of the LCDAs under Ibadan North Local Government Area.
Our correspondent gathered that Oladeji’s father, Alhaji B.A.O. Oladeji, served as Oyo South Senatorial District Chairman of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), one of the political parties that merged to form the APC between 2014 and 2015.
His father remains a major stakeholder in the APC in the state.
DAILY POST gathered that while the father remains a key figure in the APC, the son has moved to the APM.
It was learnt that the younger Oladeji has publicly declared his support for the APM governorship candidate, Mr. Bimbo Adekanmbi, and Governor Seyi Makinde, who is the party’s presidential candidate.
Oladeji, when contacted, confirmed the development to DAILY POST on Saturday.
Speaking, he noted that he had dumped the APC and joined the APM ahead of the 2027 elections.
In a short message sent to DAILY POST, Oladeji said the news of his defection to the APM was true.
“Yes. It is confirmed,” he said.
Trending
-
Business1 day ago
Lingzhi Global Champions Coffee Culture at Jos Awareness Campaign
-
News4 days ago
2027: Atiku, Obi, others should back Tinubu, opposition dead – Abubakar, Fasola
-
News4 days ago
EFCC Clears NIS Comptroller General Kemi Nandap in Visa Fraud Investigation
-
News4 days ago
Oluremi Tinubu Pledges to Wear Akwete Fabric if Tinubu Wins Second Term, Announces ₦2bn Grant for Weavers

