The software giant, Microsoft last week announced the global availability of Windows 8.1,a feature-rich update to its popular Windows 8 operating system, enabling customers to create experiences that keep pace with their lives at work, at home or on the go.

Oladapo Oluwadora Glory, Aboluwarin Olaluwa David and Banjo Mofesola Paul of the Federal University of Technology FUTA , Akure have won ISPON software cup 2013, they were among the 70 students from the Nigerian higher educational institutions that competed in the 2013 Institute of Software Practitioners of Nigeria, ISPON national software conference and competition holding in Tinapa Business Resort, Calabar, Cross Rivers to win Software Innovation price.

Market leader in enterprise application software, SAP, has said that it is increasingly turning its focus to small businesses and technology innovators with cloud computing.

Experts at a one-day training organized for the Raw Materials Research and Development Council, RMRDC staff in Abuja last week said, the future of Nigerian economy will depend on technology research, innovation and development.

Etisalat Nigeria, last week gathered the top technology experts practising in Africa to sieve through heaps of nominations and applications in its 2013 Pan African Prize for Innovation Awards and select the undoubted winners.

Accelerated work on a Critical National Infrastructure Bill that covers issues critical to rapid broadband deployment is in progress, courtesy of the National Broadband Council. Issues central to broadband deployment which will need attention from various perspectives include damage to all infrastructure including telecoms, a spectrum audit, and a wholesale pricing audit that will lead to reduction in the cost of deploying telecommunications infrastructure. These, among others will be addressed by the Infrastructure bill, which when passed into law, will help achieve national broadband plans by 2017.

Vice President, Global Technology Policy, Cisco, Mr. Robert Pepper is advisory council member of the Alliance for Affordable Internet, A4AI at the just concluded Commonwealth Technology Organization, CTO in Abuja. He moderated a panel discussion with ministerial experts on affordable broadband. In this interview, he bares his mind on the purpose of A4AI, Cisco’s role in the project and how A4AI plans to boost broadband access and plan to crash the cost of broadband in Africa, among others.

Digital pay TV platform, GOtv, last week declared that Nigeria has been most friendly to its two years of operation in the country even as it declared year 2013, in particular, as a special one.

To further expand its operations in Nigeria, telecommunications equipment maker, ZTE is set to launch its smartphones in the Nigerian market.

Nigeria’s telecoms revolution and the over $25bn FDI it brought, among other things, last week, became strong credentials that lured African regulators to Lagos to discuss ways regulatory policies could give hope to African telecom consumers.