Open Access Fabric (OAfabric), Africa-led interconnection platform is now live and operational in both Nigeria (OADC Lagos) and the DRC (OADC Texaf – Kinshasa), providing businesses with the ability to overcome many of the structural barriers that have long held back digital transformation across the region.

Open Access Data Centres (OADC), Africa’s truly open-access and carrier-neutral data centre operator, said for too long, organisations have faced real constraints, including:

• Limited access to international and local content
• High internet transit costs
• Latency and inconsistent network performance
• Gaps in local infrastructure such as colocation space, power and cooling
• Costly compute environments, bandwidth and cloud services
• Security, data sovereignty and regulatory complexity

OAfabric’s next-generation, open-access and collaborative digital platform is purpose-built to solve these challenges. Instead of just adding more infrastructure, it transforms how businesses, cloud platforms and content providers interconnect. It simplifies and accelerates digital exchange by removing the complexity, delays and fragmentation that have long hindered growth.

For example, if you struggle to deliver consistent user experiences due to unreliable or expensive international routes, OAfabric will enable direct, low-latency on-ramp peering with global and local cloud and content providers, helping to reduce transit costs and improve performance.

If regulatory challenges or data sovereignty concerns are restricting cloud adoption in your sector, OAfabric offers compliant interconnection pathways that keep your data local, secure and under your control.

If the lack of local digital ecosystems is restricting your ability to scale or launch services, OAfabric offers a solution. It creates open, carrier-neutral environments where networks, content providers, cloud platforms and enterprises can interconnect quickly and affordably, making market expansion faster and more efficient.

“We designed OAfabric around the real challenges African businesses face,” said Dr Ayotunde Coker, Chief Executive Officer of OADC. “It is about solving problems – reducing the cost to compute, improving performance, unlocking access to cloud and content, and creating an environment where companies can scale with confidence while accelerating time to market.”

OAfabric empowers businesses to overcome long-standing digital limitations, replacing complexity with simplicity, cost with value and fragmentation with integration.

Whether you are a telco seeking more resilient regional interconnection, an enterprise facing latency and performance challenges, or a cloud platform in need of trusted, scalable access into African markets, OAfabric makes what was once difficult, expensive or out of reach now possible.

“OAfabric is not just infrastructure; it represents a shift in what is possible for Africa’s digital economy,” added Dr Coker. “By removing barriers and enabling seamless, high-performance peering between key ecosystems, including local and global Internet Exchange Points (IXPs), content providers, cloud platforms and enterprises, it provides the frictionless interconnection needed to access digital services more efficiently.”

Looking ahead, OAfabric will deliver enhanced access to cloud ecosystems and international content. Expansion into new African markets is also planned to extend the platform’s reach and boost digital growth across the continent.

The network upgrade recently borne by telecommunications giant Globacom has been met with praise from subscribers across Nigeria, who report significant improvement in voice call quality, data speed, and overall service reliability

Mr. Godwin Oghardandukun Oteoritse from Ogbomosho noted that the availability of Gloworld outlet in the city has made accessing services easier. “Voice calls are now better while data speed is faster”, he said. Olarije Balogun, another Ogbomosho resident, also confirmed the network’s stability and faster data.

Similarly, Esther Atanze from Asokoro added that she has noticed drastic improvement in the network’s performance. She commended Glo’s management for responding effectively to subscriber’s needs. Mary John from Kubwa also pointed out that Glo has always been her main line.

“Recently, I noticed that the network has greatly improved; I no longer have complaints from my friends and family when we call one another. And even browsing has become very smooth. I make video calls and it goes smoothly too. Keep up the good job, Glo,” she said.

In Lagos island, Mr Sani Sunday remains a delighted customer. He characterize the services as both steady and reliable for both calls and internet use. “I use Glo every day on my phone — it works very well for calls,” he said, rating the network’s stability 10 out of 10. He also lauded the improvement in internet performance, noting that Glo has become his preferred network for browsing.

Likewise, Mr Leke Okufuna, a United states-based entrepreneur who owns a farm in Omi Adio, near Ibadan, said he recently purchased four Glo lines to power a closed-circuit television system .”I tried other networks but found that Glo has the strongest data coverage in the area. I plan to buy one terabyte of data to power my cctv for the year because I’m pleased with the Glo network,” he explained.

Victoria Island resident, Mr. James Aondofa, says his decade- long relationship with Globacom continues to make staying connected easy and reliable, which he says continues to exceed expectations.

Having used the Glo network for over a decade, Mr. Aondofa recently completed a SIM swap (welcome back) process, which, according to him, significantly improved his experience. “Since I did a welcome back on my line, I’ve enjoyed lower call rates, and that has made me love making calls even more,” he said.

While addressing the network’s stability, Mr. Aondofa applauded Glo’s performance. “For calls, it’s perfect. For browsing, it has been excellent — I really enjoy it,” he remarked.

He further recognised Glo’s wide coverage and dependable service, stating, “Glo is truly everywhere. I’ve used almost every network in Nigeria, but after being let down by others, I moved all my internet services to Glo. It’s been excellent since then.”

In Port Harcourt, Rivers state, Paul Ije from Abuloma described the improvement as remarkable. “The Glo network has really improved. The signal strength is noticeably stronger, allowing me to stay connected without frustrating interruptions. Call quality has also improved significantly, with clearer conversations and far fewer dropped calls. Additionally, the internet speed is better than ever, making browsing, streaming, and downloading smooth and quick”.

The story is the same in Benin, Edo state, where Emmanuel Omondiale from Airport Road, Patrick Osayimwewho resides at 2nd Ugbor, GRA, and Umelo Iyobosa from Sapele road all confirmed that Glo network has received a significant boast, resulting in greater satisfaction with both voice and data services.

Stephanie Ifeatu, a resident of Costain area, Lagos Mainland, depends on Glo for her everyday communication needs. Describing her experience, she said delightfully, “I’ve enjoyed using the network for both calls and browsing,”

Sharing his experience in Mpape, Abuja, Biodun Ibrahim,  praised the upgrade, saying, “Lately, I realized there has been a great improvement on the network. Now, it is super good, data is fast and voice is perfect. I advise Nigerians to start using Glo network because it is the best today in terms of quality of experience on the network”.

These positive feedbacks reflect the success of Glo’s on going investment in infrastructure aimed at enhancing customer experience nationwide.

Google today announced the launch of AI Mode in Search for users in Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa, introducing a new era of AI-powered search that is more intuitive, comprehensive, and helpful. AI Mode helps users tackle complex, multi-part questions with more intuitive responses, multimodal inputs, and deeper ways to explore topics.

AI Mode transforms how people interact with Search by allowing them to ask nuanced and exploratory questions that would previously require multiple searches. Powered by a custom version of Google’s latest Gemini 2.5 model, AI Mode brings advanced reasoning and context understanding to Search.

“We’re incredibly excited to bring AI Mode to our users in the region,” said Alex Okosi, Managing Director, Google Africa. “We know that people in this region are curious and have complex questions about everything from planning a trip to understanding a new concept. With AI Mode, Google is reimagining the Search experience. Users will not only find the information they need more easily but will also be empowered to explore a wider range of content from across the web.”

AI Mode is especially useful for longer, more detailed queries. A key feature of AI Mode is its advanced reasoning, which uses a query fan-out technique to break down a user’s question into subtopics and simultaneously search a multitude of queries on their behalf. This allows for a deeper dive into the web, uncovering hyper-relevant content. Furthermore, AI Mode is designed to be truly multimodal, allowing users to interact in the most natural way for them, whether through text, voice, or even images.

Simply tapping the microphone icon or uploading a photo allows users to ask questions using their voice or camera. A core principle of AI Mode is to help users find the best of the web. The AI-powered response includes prominent links to web sources, expanding the types of questions people can ask and opening up new opportunities for content discovery.

Google remains committed to supporting the open web and ensuring that its AI-powered features are rooted in its core quality and ranking systems. With AI Mode, web links are prominently displayed, ensuring users can easily click through to discover more. Data from AI Overviews shows that AI-powered results lead users to visit a greater diversity of websites and spend more time engaging with them. While AI Mode aims to provide a reliable AI-powered response, in cases where confidence is not high, the system will default to a set of traditional web search results.

AI Mode will begin rolling out today and will appear as a tab on the Search results page and within the Google app for Android and iOS.