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e-Commerce Firms Must Look Beyond e-Transaction Bill- Supermart.ng

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Raphael Afaedor and Gbolahan Fagbure, o-founders, Supermart.ng
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Following the rise in the electronic commercial activities in Nigeria and its contributions to the growth of the economy, stakeholders have long been agitating for policies and regulatory frameworks that can aid orderly conduct of electronic transactions in a manner that is fair especially to the customers.

It was against this background that the Electronic Transaction Bill was presented to the last National Assembly.

The bill is currently raising concerns among e-commerce businesses who anxiously await its passage into an Act.

However, reacting to this development, Oluwatayo Alofun, media officer of Supermart.ng, has said that while the bill is a welcome development that will be instrumental in bringing order to e-commerce in Nigeria, there is need for e-commerce firms to look beyond seeing regulations as the compelling factor for rendering quality services to consumers.

Citing the example of Supermart.ng, he said, “at Supermart.ng, “We already promised our customers to deliver groceries to them in as early as three hours of order.

“We understand that a customer’s time is very precious to him so we make it a goal to deliver on that promise against any logistics challenge.

“This has not being easy but we owe it to make life easier for households in Lagos by saving them three to six hours through our delivery system”.

The Electronic Transaction Bill is expected to regulate the e-commerce sector and protect consumers.

To this end, some of the key issues highlighted in the bill are non-disclosure of full information on products and services, deceptive advertisement, improper description of products, delivery of defective products, poor informal dispute settlement procedures, double payments and poor customer service.

Speaking on highlights of the bill, Alofun said “when you look at the key issues highlighted in the bill, they all go down to conscious efforts on our part as e-commerce business operators to put our customers interest first in our dealing, this is what Supermart.ng has been doing since inception-putting customers first. Take customer service as an instance, when we employ delivery men, they are professionally trained to be able to talk to customers, they are equipped with smart phones to be able to provide up to date information to customers and as well as update the Supermart.ng system. We leave nothing to chance in our customer service process which makes it almost impossible for us to fail on our promises”

Alofun however expressed hope in the possibility of the Bill to improve the state of e-commerce business in Nigeria and to boost consumer’s confidence in the electronic transaction system. He therefore urges the executive arm of the government to consider the Bill for assent into an Act.

 

Oracle Sparks CRM Evolution with New Cloud Solutions

By peter ugwu

Oracle has unveiled significant new functionality within Oracle Service Cloud and Oracle Social Cloud that helps organizations deliver better customer experience and drive more informed business decisions.

The new social customer service capabilities enable brands to increase social engagement and business insights via a new community self-service solution, enhanced social service and incident routing, and extended social listening and analytics capabilities to private data sources.

Today more than one in three customers prefer to contact brands through social channels rather than by phone or email (Nielsen), and the distinction between social and traditional channels is eroding.

To deliver the best possible customer experience across this expanding range of traditional and digital channels, customer care organizations need to provide a positive and unified experience where and when customers want, whether they are on Twitter, Facebook, customer communities or other social networks.

Through a unified and modern customer experience across channels, organizations establish a competitive advantage.

The latest release of Oracle Service Cloud includes Community Self-Service, a new approach to web self service that brings community functionality directly into the core multi-channel web experience.

Oracle Service Cloud now enables organizations to deliver a seamless experience between web service and community interactions, leveraging the power of customer knowledge to improve service operations.

This helps organizations streamline the customer journey and lets customers quickly find an answer, while also driving efficiencies by reducing the overall requests to the contact center.

Gartner’s research indicates that investment in Peer-to-Peer Communities drives support costs down and boosts profits.

In fact, in a December 2014 research note, nine CRM Projects to Do Right Now for Customer Service, “Gartner clients who are successful in this space are still seeing on average a 20% reduction in the creation of support tickets following the introduction of peer-to-peer communities,” wrote, Michael Maoz, vice president, Distinguished Analyst, Gartner, “Clients are seeing other business benefits as well. By enabling community-based support, clients have been able to recognize new sales opportunities and increase existing customer satisfaction, resulting in increased revenue in several of these cases.”

Oracle is also introducing new workflow and automation capabilities between Oracle Social Cloud and Oracle Service Cloud that empower organizations to leverage the power of social insights and engagements.

Business users can now attach contextual attributes and notes generated from posts or incidents identified by Oracle Social Cloud directly to the Oracle Service Cloud. By providing more customer information and context, organizations can improve service quality, drive efficiencies and improve resolution time as social posts are shared with the appropriate agents quickly.

The improved connectivity between Oracle Social Cloud and Oracle Service Cloud includes extended social listening and analytics to enterprise private-data sources such as the new Community Self-Service capability, survey data, chat and call logs.

Organizations can now listen and analyze unstructured data and gain insights with terms, themes, sentiment and customer metrics, and can view private and public data side by side in the Oracle Social Cloud Relationship Management dashboard.

“In today’s hyper-competitive business environment, understanding the voice of the customer is essential to providing exceptional experiences, whether on public social networks, across communities, or within high-touch contact centers,” said David Vap, group vice president, product development, Oracle. “The updates to the Oracle Service Cloud and Oracle Social Cloud help businesses listen, identify and track social conversations, enabling them to quickly and efficiently respond to customers looking for answers, which helps foster a loyal group of brand ambassadors.”

The latest enhancements to Oracle Social Cloud and Oracle Service Cloud extend Oracle’s commitment to help organizations leverage social channels to enhance the customer experience and build on the recent introduction of Oracle’s Twitter-enriched social customer service solution.

For more information, attend Stephen Fioretti’s session Accelerating Success with Modern Service in the Cloud at 3:10 p.m. eastern in A204 on Tuesday, September 18 at CRM Evolution in New York and visit Booth 300.

 


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Nigeria CommunicationsWeek believes that technology makes life more exciting and helps improve the lives of people around Nigeria and indeed the world. So since 2007, we have devoted our energy to independent reportage of technology and how they affect lives.

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Chianugo, Nigerian $150m suit Against Google, GoDaddy.com Stalled due Judge’s Absence

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Federal High Court in Abuja, on Tuesday adjourned the $150 million dollars suit filed by Chianugo Peter, a Nigerian, against Google LLC and GoDaddy.com LLC over shutdown of his YouTubeAudio.com domain name until April 22 for hearing.

Chianugo, Nigerian $150m suit Against Google, GoDaddy.com Stalled due Judge's Absence

The case, which was before Justice Obiora Egwuatu, could not proceed due to the absence of the judge in today’s proceedings.

Although Emmanuel Ekpenyong, Peter’s lawyer, and Mark Mordi, who is counsel to Google LLC, were in court, Justice Egwuatu was said to be in another official assignment.

The matter was consequently fixed for April 22 for hearing.

Peter had filed the suit over allegations bordering on the shutdown of his YouTubeAudio.com domain name after eight years of promotional and marketing efforts in breach of the contract.

Peter, through his lawyer, named GoDaddy.Com LLC and Google LLC as the 1st and 2nd defendants in the suit filed on April 14, 2023 and marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/238/2023.

In his earlier originating summons filed by Ekpenyong of the law firm of Fred-Young & Evans LP, the Nigerian sought a $150 million in compensation from Google LLC and GoDaddy.com LLC for the alleged cyberspace contract breach.

The plaintiff alleged that the defendants shut down his domain and business name: YouTubeAudio.com and transferred the rights over the name to Google LLC, an American multinational technology company.

Google LLC, in its initial statement of defence dated Nov. 9, 2023, and filed Nov. 10, 2023, by its lawyer, Mr Mordi, SAN, of the law firm of Aluko & Oyebode, urged the court to dismiss Peter’s suit as being unmeritorious and lacking in merits.

Justice Egwuatu had, in April 2024, gave Chianugo Peter the go-ahead to amend his originating processes after his lawyer moved the application for same and it was not opposed by the defence counsel.

In his amended statement of claim dated April 29, 2024, Peter sought ten reliefs.

He sought a declaration that GoDaddy.com was wrong to shut down the YouTubeAudio.com domain name on Dec. 7, 2022 and that Google was wrong to remove “YTAudio” with its website youtubeaudio.com from its Google PlayStore on Dec. 25, 2023 without adequate compensation to him.

He said this is notwithstanding that YouTubeAudio.com domain and business name is different and distinct from YouTube trademarks.

Chianugo Peter wants the court to declare that he is entitled to compensation from the defendants for the loss of the YouTubeAudio.com brand and goodwill which has accrued on the brand and domain name for eight years of promotional and marketing works from July 2, 2015 to Dec. 7, 2022.

He sought an order directing the defendants to pay the sum of $50 million to him for promotional and marketing works on the YouTube Audio business name and YouTube Audio.com domain name for eight years from July 2, 2015 to Dec. 7, 2022.

He sought a $100 million in damages for loss of anticipated profits associated with the brand equity and goodwill of YouTube Audio and YouTube Audio.com domain name.

Peter also sought from the defendants, the sum of 50 million naira to enable him to carry out fresh registrations of its new name and secure an alternative domain name to host its application to attract users.

The Nigerian sought an order directing the defendants to pay the sum of 10 million naira to him for prosecution of the suit.

Alternatively, Peter prayed the court for an order for GoDaddy.com to reinstate and hoist the YouTubeAudio.com domain name which was shut down on Dec. 7, 2022 and for Goggle to also reinstate YouTubeAudio.com on its Google PlayStore platform which was unilaterally removed on Dec. 25, 2023.

Chianugo Peter submitted that he acquired rights over YouTubeAudio.com domain name from Go Daddy.com LLC who conducted a search before confirming that he could make use of the name.

The plaintiff averred that he promoted the domain and business name from 2014 to 2022 and even wrote to Google to introduce YouTubeAudio’s services and to partner with it in 2014 and 2021 but received no response from it on both occasions.

He said in February 2021, he applied for and YouTubeAudio.com was registered on Google Adsense platform for displaying advertisement on the website.

Besides, Peter said in August 2021, the domain and business name was registered on Google Playstore.

According to him, the plaintiff consistently paid GoDaddy.com LLC for registration and use of the domain name from 2015 to 2022.

But Google LLC, in its amended statement of defence and counterclaim dated and filed May 31, 2024, averred that its registration of the YOUTUBE trademarks at the Trademarks Registry gives it the exclusive night to the use of the said trademarks.

It submitted that it has incurred expenses in the sum of 24,040 64 dollars in dealing with Peter’s “deliberate infringement of the counterclaimant’s YOUTUBE trademarks.”

The company, therefore, sought a declaration that Peter’s registration and use of the YouTubeAudio business name with BN 2395035 at the CAC is an infringement of its YOUTUBE registered trademarks.

It prayed the court for an order directing Peter to pay the company the total sum of $24,040.64 being the expenses incurred in dealing with his infringement of the YOUTUBE registered trademarks.

It equally sought an order directing the plaintiff to pay the company the cost of defending the suit.

In his amended reply to Google’s amended statement of defence dated 12th July 2024, Peter responded that it is not in doubt that Google LLC owns YouTube trademarks, however, YouTubeAudio is distinct and different from YouTube trademarks.

Chianugo Peter submitted that Google LLC, being a foremost search engine in the world, knew that he had earlier written to it, that he was making use of the YouTubeAudio domain name for the past eight years without any objection or caveat by either GoDaddy.com or Google.

“Hence, Google LLC is estopped from claiming any right over the YouTubeAudio domain name,” he said.

GoDaddy.com LLC had neither filed any process nor represented in court.


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LG Nigeria Begins Nationwide Search for Oldest Working TV, Rewards Loyalty with AI QNED Upgrade

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LG Electronics has announced the launch of a nationwide campaign aimed at celebrating decades of customer loyalty and technological heritage by searching for the oldest still-functioning LG television sets across the country.

The initiative, themed “The Oldest LG TV”, seeks to honour long-time customers whose LG screens have stood the test of time, while introducing them to the future of home entertainment through LG’s advanced AI QNED TVs.

For generations, LG televisions have been more than an electronic device in Nigerian homes, they have been silent witnesses to family milestones, cultural moments and shared memories.

This campaign bridges nostalgia with innovation, acknowledging the emotional connection Nigerians have built with the brand while showcasing LG’s leadership in AI-powered display technology.

The campaign features a storytelling -driven narrative that highlights community, heritage and the evolution of viewing experiences. Participants are invited to share the stories behind their long-serving LG TVs, transforming everyday screens into symbols of trust, resilience and innovation.

In creative twist, the campaign also introduces LG’s AI-enabled televisions as responsive companions that understand viewer preferences, recommend content and enhance picture quality in real time. This shift from nostalgia to futuristic interactivity underscores LG’s continued commitment to delivering smarter, more personalized entertainment solutions.

To participate, simply visit https://lgsearchcampaign.vercel.app/ upload a photo or video of your old LG TV and share the story behind it – how long you’ve had it and the memories it holds.

The winner walks away with a brand-new LG AI QNED TV, effectively trading legacy for luxury.

At its core, this campaign reminds us that technology is not only about pixels and processors, but about people. It’s about the laughter in the living rooms, the silence during tense match moments and the comfort of family routines.

By celebrating the oldest TVs still standing strong, LG is celebrating the people who kept the on, families who trusted the brand through changing times and evolving technologies. In doing so, LG isn’t just upgrading television, it’s upgrading memories into the future.

According to Mr. Choongbae Seok, General Manager, Media Entertainment Solutions, LG Electronics Nigeria, “The journey from our classic CRT Televisions to today’s AI QNED technology reflects how far both our customers and our innovation have come. Those early sets were built to last, and many are still functioning today, a testament to durability and consumer trust. This initiative allows us to honour that legacy while introducing a new era of intelligent viewing, where the screen does more than show content; it adapts, learns and enhances every moment”.

LG Display 2026 TV Models at InnoFest

LG Electronics (LG), a leader in AI-powered solutions for the home, outlined plans to accelerate growth in emerging markets at LG InnoFest 2026 MEA. The event, held in Abu Dhabi, provided a forum to share LG’s strategic direction and market outlook with regional partners. At the exhibition, LG displayed its premium 2026 AI TV lineup focusing heavily on advanced processing power, smarter picture and sound technologies. The flagship OLED evo G6 and 100-inch Micro RGB evo TVs are powered by the new Alpha 11 AI processor Gen 3 enabling faster and more intelligent performance. The OLED evo W6 Wallpaper TV, an ultra-slim television designed to sit flush against the wall like artwork uses true wireless connectivity, reducing cable clutter and creating a cleaner, minimal setup.


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African Leaders Highlight Africa’s AI Ambitions

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African leaders used the AU Summit in Addis Ababa over the weekend to sharpen the continent’s technology agenda, with Ethiopia positioning artificial intelligence (AI), digital infrastructure and connectivity as pillars of Africa’s economic future.

Opening the 39th African Union Summit, Ethiopian prime minister Abiy Ahmed outlined an ambitious vision to place Africa at the forefront of the global AI race, anchored by Ethiopia’s plan to launch what he described as Africa’s first AI-focused university.

“In 2020, Ethiopia established Africa’s first Artificial Intelligence Institute. Building on this foundation, we are preparing to launch an AI university anchored in the philosophy of Medemer, purposeful collaboration, to unite human values with machine intelligence and position Africa as a global leader in the age of intelligence,” Abiy told delegates. “

He framed AI not as a standalone sector, but as a cross-cutting enabler for governance, industry and social development. “Every river we manage, every city we design, and every digital platform we deploy must generate resilience, opportunity and dignity,” Abiy said. He further linked digital transformation to Agenda 2063’s long-term prosperity goals.

Beyond AI, the high-powered AU summit discussions highlighted digital identity, cross-border connectivity and telecom expansion as critical building blocks for an integrated African market. Ethiopia’s Digital Ethiopia 2030 roadmap, including its Faida digital ID ecosystem, was cited as a model for secure, interconnected public services.

Abiy pointed to aviation and telecom infrastructure as key accelerators for economic development across the continent. “Through Ethiopian Airlines, we connect people and markets. Ethio Telecom is expanding partnerships across Africa to bridge the digital divide,” he said.

The Ethiopian leader added that large-scale infrastructure projects are designed to anchor Africa deeper into global value chains.

The broader summit tech agenda also touched on regulatory harmonisation, digital trade and data governance, with leaders emphasizing that continental cooperation is essential to avoid fragmented digital markets.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres underscored the need for inclusive innovation, telling delegates that Africa’s digital rise must be “people-centered and opportunity-driven,” while African Union Commission Chair Mahmoud Ali Youssouf stressed coordinated policy frameworks to accelerate adoption.

“AI capability, digital infrastructure and unified regulation are no longer optional ambitions, but strategic imperatives shaping the continent’s competitiveness in the intelligence era,” he said.

 


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