E-Business
Personalisation, Others to Drive Marketing Comms in 2017- Experts

Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) experts have projected that personalised marketing, performance and convergence through collection of consumer data will be key drivers of marketing communications in 2017 and beyond as brand owners seek to build on their equity and return of investment (ROI) despite the recession.
At a gathering of digital marketing agencies, brand owners, IT experts and media practitioners, tagged “An Evening of Innovation with Twinpine – Africa’s pioneer and premium mobile marketing company”, Oduntan Odubanjo, chief operating officer at Twinpine noted that globally, data will continue to transform mobile marketing, while the challenging economy will make more brand owners pay extra attention to performance and build on personalised communication to reach their target customers.
During his presentation titled: “Personalisation, Convergence and Performance: How Data is Transforming Mobile Marketing”, Odubanjo stated that the promise of data is to help brand personalised marketing messages, connect more with their customers and deliver seamless experiences.
“Data collection helps to understand the consumers’ demography, needs, and behavior thereby making it possible to personalise messages for them. This makes it possible to have better consumer experiences, improved satisfaction, and more loyalty.
“We are also seeing a convergence of media platforms as it has become more difficult to focus on one media channel, hence, the need for data has also become important” he said.
Commenting on the future of mobile marketing, Odubanjo, said “there will be more brands looking into their data offerings and strategy”. He projected that “local brands will begin to look more into collecting data about their customers and request for more targeting to ensure that their budgets are well spent.”
According to Elo Umeh, founder of Twinpine, Twinpine has done a lot of work on data in the last 5 years of its existence.
“We have generated data and are constantly doing more to deliver value around data for our clients. This is fueled by our belief that more can be done as the data space gets intelligent and smarter with the increasing use of smartphones.
“The use of apps and internet connectivity between the devices helps to generate lots of data which is very helpful in the data gathering process,” he said.
Predicting the year 2017, Umeh said that some brands will frame their narrative around cost-cutting while some brands will become more aggressive in their marketing by spending more to improve their market share.
“We think that it’s in adversity that you can try to do very interesting things. For example, Twinpine was launched in 2009 – in the middle of a global recession. When there is a boom, there is limited opportunity because there are lots of people in the market but when there is adversity there are limited people in the market and they benefit from it in the long run.”
During the panel session at the event, which consisted of Odutan Odubanjo, Oti Ukubeyinje, Media Director at Sponge Digital, Jumoke Okikiolu, head product Marketing at Samsung West Africa, John Iseghohi, Digital Marketing & Strategy at Etisalat and Tunde Kara, Managing Director Sales, Nigeria, the panelists agreed that in the coming year, a lot will happen in personalised marketing and convergence.
Brands need to think of how to infuse marketing into content in a way that consumers feel like they are actually having a personal communication with brands.
At the event, Twinpine unveiled its new ad formats (Native Ads, 3D Ads, Brand Cast, Call-to-Action Ads), Twinpine’s Mobile Intelligence Portal, Programmatic Platform and Adrenaline
E-Business
Huawei Unveils AI Computing System to Challenge Nvidia’s Flagship Product

China’s Huawei Technologies unveiled an AI computing system on Saturday that an industry expert said rivals Nvidia’s most advanced product, as the company aims to expand its footprint in the country’s booming AI sector.
The CloudMatrix 384 system made its public debut at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC), a three-day event in Shanghai, attracting a large crowd to Huawei’s booth with its showcase of cutting-edge AI innovations.
The system has attracted significant interest from the global AI community since Huawei (HWT.UL) first introduced it in April. Industry analysts see it as a direct challenger to Nvidia’s GB200 NVL72, the most advanced system-level offering currently available from the U.S. chipmaker.
In an April article, Dylan Patel, founder of semiconductor research firm SemiAnalysis, stated that Huawei now possesses AI system capabilities that could surpass those of Nvidia.
Huawei staff at its WAIC booth declined to comment when asked to introduce the CloudMatrix 384 system.
A spokesperson for Huawei did not respond to questions.
Huawei has become widely regarded as China’s most promising domestic supplier of chips essential for AI development, even though the company faces U.S. export restrictions.
Nvidia CEO, Jensen Huang told Bloomberg in May that Huawei had been “moving quite fast” and named the CloudMatrix as an example.
The CloudMatrix 384 system features 384 of Huawei’s latest 910C chips and, according to SemiAnalysis, surpasses Nvidia’s GB200 NVL72 in certain performance metrics, despite the latter using 72 B200 chips.
SemiAnalysis attributes this performance advantage to Huawei’s strong system design, which offsets the lower power of individual chips by leveraging a greater number of them and incorporating system-level innovations.
Huawei describes the system as utilizing a “supernode” architecture that enables ultra-high-speed interconnectivity between chips.
In June, Zhang Pingan, CEO, Huawei Cloud confirmed that the CloudMatrix 384 was already operational on Huawei’s cloud platform.
E-Business
Transcorp Hotels Delivers Stellar H1 Results, Declares Over ₦1Bn Dividend

Transcorp Hotels Plc has delivered a stellar performance in the first half of 2025, recording a 60% year-on-year surge in revenue to ₦47.57 billion, up from ₦29.72 billion in H1 2024. Gross profit climbed 71% to ₦36.21 billion, maintaining a strong 76% margin despite inflation and operational headwinds.
The hospitality giant, a subsidiary of Transnational Corporation Plc, also announced an interim dividend payout of ₦1.024 billion — offering ₦0.10 per 50 kobo ordinary share to shareholders.
In a bold move, the company unveiled Nigeria’s largest corporate venue — the 5,000-seat Transcorp Centre — staking its claim as the new leader in event hospitality. Chairman Emmanuel Nnorom described the results as proof of Transcorp Hotels’ transformative strategies and unwavering investor commitment. MD/CEO Uzo Oshogwe attributed the success to relentless execution and a resilient business model.
Transcorp Hotels, renowned for iconic assets like Transcorp Hilton Abuja and its digital platform Aura, says it isn’t just leading Nigeria’s hospitality sector — it’s redefining excellence across Africa.
E-Business
Microsoft Servers Hacked by Chinese Groups

Chinese “threat actors” have hacked Microsoft’s SharePoint document software servers and targeted the data of the businesses using it, the firm has said.
China state-backed Linen Typhoon and Violet Typhoon as well as China-based Storm-2603 were said to have “exploited vulnerabilities” in on-premises SharePoint servers, the kind used by firms, but not in its cloud-based service.
The US tech giant has released security updates in response and has advised all on-premises SharePoint server customers to install them.
“Investigations into other actors also using these exploits are still ongoing,” Microsoft said in a statement.
The firm said it had “high confidence” the hackers would continue to target systems which have not installed its security updates.
It added that it would update its website blog with more information as its investigation continues.
Microsoft said it had observed attacks in which hackers had sent a request to a SharePoint server “enabling the theft of the key material by threat actors”.
Charles Carmakal, chief technology officer at Mandiant Consulting firm, a division of Google Cloud, told reporter, it was “aware of several victims in several different sectors across a number of global geographies”.
Carmakal said it appeared that governments and businesses that use SharePoint on their sites were the primary target.
A number of adversaries who stole material encoded by cryptography were then able to regain ongoing access to the victims’ SharePoint data, he said.
“This was exploited in a very broad way, very opportunistically before a patch was made available. That’s why this is significant,” Carmakal said.
Carmakal said the “China-nexus actor” was deploying techniques similar to previous campaigns associated with Beijing.
Microsoft said Linen Typhoon had “focused on stealing intellectual property, primarily targeting organizations related to government, defence, strategic planning, and human rights” for 13 years.
It added that Violet Typhoon had been “dedicated to espionage”, primarily targeting former government and military staff, non-governmental organizations, think tanks, higher education, the media, the financial sector and the health sector in the US, Europe, and East Asia.
Meanwhile, Storm-2603 was “assessed with medium confidence to be a China-based threat actor”.
- General News3 days ago
FG Plans N50m STEEM Grant to Support Student Innovation in August
- E-Business3 days ago
Transcorp Hotels Delivers Stellar H1 Results, Declares Over ₦1Bn Dividend
- E-Financial3 days ago
Cardoso, CBN Boss Risks Arrest over Alleged N5.2 Trillion Unremitted Funds
- Telecom3 days ago
MTN Media Innovation Programme Fellows Gain Insight into Nigeria’s Connectivity Backbone
- E-Financial3 days ago
NIBBS: Banks Close 29.4m Accounts, Dormant Accounts Hit 33.39m
- General News3 days ago
Experts Champion Sustainability at Lagos Green Economy Forum
- Telecom3 days ago
Driving Digital Inclusion: Anambra’s Mobile Tech Hub Brings Free WiFi to the People
- Broadcasting3 days ago
NDPC Hides MultiChoice Privacy Violation Details Despite FOI Request- FIJ