E-Business
ARCON’s New Law has Prevented N120bn Capital Flight Annually – Buchi Johnson

The new advertising regulation law, which transformed the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON) to Advertising Regulatory Council of Nigeria (ARCON) has been applauded by some practitioners in the country as one of the best initiatives by the government to the advertising industry in Nigeria.

Buchi Johnson, Chief Ideas Officer Lilvera Group
One of the leading practitioners in the industry and chief executive officer of Lilvera Group, Mr. Buchi Johnson in a recent chat with the media stated that the new law setting up ARCON has prevented a capital flight to the tune of N120 billion.
According to him, “The law provides that, with effect from January 1, 2023, advertisers must use a cumulative 75% of local content in all ads and marketing directed at the Nigerian market. This is exciting because the country has been losing about ₦120 billion annually due to capital flight in the sector where ads targeted at Nigerians were produced externally creating jobs in other economies but not in the targeted economy, Nigeria.”
Mr. Johnson said, this law is expected to create over 500,000 jobs annually. So, this will lead to more multinational brands using Nigerian talents, agencies, and producers in commercials targeted at the Nigerian market.
“On a personal note, I look forward to Lilvera playing a key part in ensuring that the quality that these multinational brands get from local agencies is at par if not even higher than the quality they would get elsewhere,” he said.
Speaking on Lilvera’s audacious moves to make a giant stride in the industry, the CEO of Lilvera mentioned that the agency has designed an effective tool to aid its execution and implementation of clients’ briefs. The tool is tagged 5Rs which simply represents responsiveness, relevance, receptivity, recognition and relationship.
On the potency of this tool, Mr. Johnson said “Our focus is to continue to deliver on the 5Rs that drive Integrated Marketing Communications such as Responsiveness: ensuring rapid and high-quality response to clients’ needs, Relevance: keeping our client communications highly targeted and relevant, and Receptivity: maintaining open communication lines with clients”.
He further stated that “Recognition is about prioritizing brand building and distinction to keep Lilvera the preferred brand for integrated marketing communication in the Nigerian market for multinational and local businesses and Relationship: we are nothing without the key relationships we have with our team, vendors, and clients so this is a vital area of focus for us in 2023 and beyond.”
Highlighting some landmark accomplishments of the agency, he said perfection eludes humankind yet we strive for it and will accept nothing less than the perfection that is within our reach at Lilvera. “So, we deploy every resource within our capacity to ensure the very best outcomes for our clients and our business.
“Our achievements in the last year are testament to the hard work and creativity of our team, the trust of our clients, and, of course, God’s grace and favour.
“We acknowledge Him as our helper and source for everything, even the inspiration that we receive to deliver a great experience to clients.”
He stated that “One area where we definitely need to keep growing is customer relationship management. We have built great client relationships in the past years of our business that we must continue to deepen, and we look forward to building new relationships that we will nurture, grow, and blossom.
Our clients are at the heart of our business so we will continue to focus on this area to ensure the very best experience for them as they continue to choose us for their integrated marketing communication projects,” he added.
The integrated marketing communications industry particularly, the agencies take pride in the awards they have won or the recognition given to them during the course of doing business for their clients. Johnson believes that Lilvera deserves every bit of the accolade showered on it and its minders.
According to him, “It does feel great to be recognised by notable organisations both locally and internationally. Some of the awards we received in 2022 are the Most Client Focused Marketing Agency of the Year – Africa by Global Business Awards; the Industry Influencer Award for Experiential Marketing at the Industry Summit Awards 3.0; and the African Prize for Leadership Excellence under the Experiential Marketing Personality Leadership Prize Category
“We are grateful for these awards and see them as propellers for our business because they challenge us to keep setting the pace, raising the bar, and bringing value to the industry. For us, the way we project ourselves is important to our productivity which is why we take first impressions seriously as this sets the tone of the relationship that follows.
Our team of highly trained professionals understand this too. So, we showcase our intelligence, professionalism, and confidence in how we handle businesses from the first meeting, earning your trust. As you know, trust is the new gold. Then, beyond that first meeting, our strong commitment to building value for our clients ensures that we maintain a high standard of excellence and professionalism in every aspect of the services we render.”
Buchi Johnson however said that his personal goal is to support and nurture startups around the world or globally by using or managing IMC to build profit.
Though the election has come and gone, Mr. Johnson who spoke about the impact of Central Bank of Nigeria cash swap policy and the general election on imc industry said that “We understand that the policy is designed to move the country forward in terms of managing inflation, reducing fraud, and stabilizing the economy. To this end, we support the move and enjoin the government to ensure a smooth transition to the new cashless society that we are building.”
Data plays some key roles in taking marketing decisions and according to Johnson, data is so vital to the IMC industry.
He said, “I see its impact being far reaching in how stakeholders plan and execute campaigns” adding that “Without the right data companies would be unable to take full advantage of the existing opportunities. Furthermore, IMC campaigns would struggle to deliver the most relevant content and offers across all channels to the right target audiences.”
Data plays an important role in IMC because it influences how businesses allocate budgets, how agencies target consumers, and the effectiveness of campaigns. Any player in this space that seeks to win in 2023 and beyond must pay attention to key insights presented by data trends, he enthused.
Predicting 2023 for the industry, CEO of Lilvera revealed that there will be post-pandemic growth and the new ARCON law will help retain at least 75% talents in the industry.
“I see exciting times ahead with the post-pandemic growth continuing as well as the new law requiring businesses to produce at least 75% of their marketing content locally.
“My advice to players in this space would be to position for growth, build capacity to deliver excellent services across the board, and maintain a high standard of quality in team management, service delivery, and customer relationship management,” he said.
E-Business
Kaspersky Transforms Threat Intelligence Reporting into an Interactive Content Hub

Easy interaction with exclusive Kaspersky reports, geo-filtering and actionable intelligence in a single click: expert insights on Advanced Persistent Threats (APT), Crimeware and Industrial Control Systems (ICS) threats are now available directly in Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Portal — with charts and visuals rendered inline.

In an era of increasingly sophisticated and frequent attacks, threat intelligence inevitably evolves into a business enabler that equips security teams with strategic advantage in their mission to back their company’s stability and growth.
Kaspersky, a recognised leader in threat intelligence, facilitates informed decision-making and proactive risk mitigation by introducing simplified access to actionable and relevant threat insights.
Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Reporting is a subscription-based service delivering over 200 in-depth analysis reports annually. These insights are compiled by Kaspersky’s Global Research and Analysis Team, Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team and Threat Research experts through the continuous tracking of more than 900 threat actors and campaigns.
Following the update, all reports previously representing a library of static PDF files (that is more than 2000 exclusive Kaspersky reports published to date) are now structured and can be examined directly in the Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Portal. For offline use, the standard PDF download format remains available as well.
The update also introduces deeper integration within each report, featuring direct links to indicators of compromise (IoCs), detection rules (including YARA), and MITRE ATT&CK® techniques. Users can now perform a single-click drill-down into specific threat actors, malware families and Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) across diverse geographies and industries.
Smart geo-filtering streamlines investigations by prioritising content explicitly mentioning a selected country, followed by broader regional intelligence, giving analysts a complete geographic view in a single query.
Enhanced Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Reporting supports the following use cases:
- Customised content discovery: apply geo, industry and software filters to instantly retrieve a list of relevant reports.
- Exclusive intelligence: access the most recent incident investigation reports, including those without public disclosure, to understand the nature of an attack and identify the actions required for mitigation.
- Actionable intelligence extraction: extract and apply threat data from the reports and apply it across specific infrastructure to detect traces of compromise.
- In-depth Threat Lookup and contextual analysis: investigate suspicious indicators identified within the network and quickly determine if a specific IoC is linked to a related threat report.
“Empowering cybersecurity teams in their mission-critical daily work to ensure business resilience in a complex threat landscape. This is the main driver behind our ongoing visual and functional improvement initiative.
While updating Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Portal, we focused on refining the customer experience by optimising processes of active investigation, proactive incident monitoring and detailed mitigation techniques,” comments Alexander Mazikin, Head of Threat Intelligence Product Line at Kaspersky.
E-Business
Weebly Websites to Shut Down for Nigeria, 66 Other Countries from September

Weebly, US-based free, beginner-friendly, drag-and-drop website builder and eCommerce service, will no longer be available for customers in 67 countries, including Nigeria, after September 2026, according to an email seen by Nigeria CommunicationsWeek.

Weebly said it is “winding down” services in different nations “due to changes in regulation and to simplify our global operations”.
The firm released a timeline of gradual changes, to help existing users access their data before the site shuts down.
Starting June 29, customers of 67 countries were no longer able to publish any new pages.
September 27, 2026: Weebly websites will be unpublished.
Before this date, users should download site content and data. Follow these steps:
Go to Account Settings, click on My Data, and select Download My Data.
This will help you migrate your content to another website provider, or retain it.
Concerned about privacy? Ask Weebly to delete your data, through the Erase Data and Forget Me option under the My Data tab on your account page.
December 26, 2026: Last date of accessing Weebly account.
Until this date, you will have access to the account, although sites will be unpublished.
This period helps users move their site, domains, and data to another service.
Domain names can be moved to another registrar only after 60 days from the registration date.
According to the Weebly website, users must make sure that they do not make changes to your registrant contact information (email, phone number, first/last name), as this will lead to a 60-day registrar lock and prevent you from transferring your domain name.
Note that domain name transfers work differently for country-specific domains; users must contact Weebly’s support team for assistance.
How to unlock, transfer domain name
From your Weebly Dashboard, go to websites, and click on Domains, then select Manage Domain.
Disable registrar lock, get EPP authorisation code, and copy the full code.
Disabling registrar lock will also disable privacy protection. It is important to set privacy protection once again with the new registrar.
Follow the instructions for the newly chosen registrar as the rest of the transfer process will be managed by them
Why is Weebly winding down?
While the firm attributed it to “a change in regulation,” online users have argued that Square, which acquired Weebly in 2018, is pushing its platform ‘Square Online’.
Square is originally a US-based payment processor, and the firm says it has since evolved into the “largest business tech platform”.
It calls Square Online a “free online store” but clarifies that those who do not sell online can also use it to build their websites.
In an earlier support update for the Weebly Website Builder, Square Online was consistently referred to as a better alternative, although at the time, it was said that Square “has no plans to discontinue the Weebly website builder”.
Which countries will Weebly no longer be available in? Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Armenia, Aruba, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Barbadoa, Belarus, Benin and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Others are: Cambodia, Cameroon, Chile, Colombia, Congo, Costa Rica, and Côte d’Ivoire.
Also affected are: Ecuador, Egypt, Ethiopia, French Polynesia, Gabon, Georgia, Ghana, Guinea, Iceland, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Laos, Malaysia, Mauritius, Moldova, Montenegro, Morocco, Nepal and New Caledonia.
The rest are: Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Palau, Paraguay, Peru, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Singapore, South Korea, Suriname, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
E-Business
NOTAP to Commercialise University Research, Expands Patent Drive

National Office for Technology Acquisition and Transfer (NOTAP), has commenced the process of patenting and commercialisation of research works by universities and other research institutions in the country.

Dr. Obiageli Amadiobi, director general of NOTAP
Dr. Obiageli Amadiobi, director general of NOTAP, stated this in Abuja, during an interaction with journalists on her achievements since assuming office.
Speaking on the theme, “Strengthening Indigenous Capacity: NOTAP’s Drive for Technology Transfer, Local Content Development, and Innovative activities,” Amadiobi said the agency had involved both the academia and industry so that researchers can work on topics brought forward for commercialisation purpose.
“My minister is very intentional about this– very intentional about commercialisation of research results, which we have already submitted to him. They are meaningful researches, which we need to commercialise.
“We have established 69 intellectual property technology transfer offices in 69 universities that we are still counting. We have informed the vice chancellors of Nigerian universities to set up such offices and we will come and educate them on intellectual property and technology transfers.
“As we are doing this, we are also taking record of all the researchers of these universities and research centres and documenting them in a compendium.
“So, we have compendiums from the universities to us and we put them in a database. If you will recall, recently, the ministry, our supervising ministry, which is the Federal Ministry of Innovation, Science, and Technology, launched a programme titled Energise Commercialisation. This entirely was for commercialisation of all R&Ds,” she said.
On research Institutions carrying out research on areas of industry needs, she said, “NOTAP is bridging the gap between research and development with industry needs, “it is on our programme called the NITDF, NOTAP Industry Technology Transfer Fellowship. By this programme, we engage the universities and the industries, in what we call the triple helix. We liaise with the universities and the industries to sponsor, the industries will sponsor a Ph.D candidate in a Nigerian university to conduct relevant researches.
“They will provide the topics that they want researches for and such students will research on that with the assistance of the industries, because they wear the shoes, so they know where it pinches them. But usually, there are Ph.D candidates already established. This year alone, we certified about 15 of them to enter into this programme and they have gone into the various universities.
“And we are still looking for people to update some of the projects; the research topics we already have. But we are not getting enough persons to do the researches. So, we are going to do further advertisement to see if other candidates will come up.
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