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E-Business

Western Digital Expands Flash Portfolio for Scaling Data-Centric Architectures

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Building on a unique and diverse product portfolio across HDD and flash, Western Digital today announced a suite of new NVMe SSDs for enabling next-generation, data-centric architectures for data centers, industrial IoT, automotive and client applications.

The new family includes the Ultrastar DC ZN540 ZNS NVMe SSD for designing a more efficient data center storage tier with competitive TCO; the Western Digital® IX SN530 Industrial SSD for the extreme environments of industrial and automotive applications; and the 2TB WD Blue SN550 NVMe SSD for speeding up PC performance.

Leveraging Western Digital’s unique vertical integration capabilities – from designing and manufacturing its NAND flash to developing its own in-house SSD controllers and firmware – the new products underscore the company’s continued strength and commitment in driving storage innovation for new system architectures, applications and use cases for global customers across cloud, OEM, enterprise, channel and retail end-user markets.

Enabling Efficient Data Center Architectures – The amount of data created over the next three years will be more than the data created over the past 30 years, according to IDC.

Billions of connected systems will generate a myriad of contextualized data sets from smart video to consumer and sensor data, which must be captured, transformed and analyzed to bring value to industries, businesses and people. Legacy architectures cannot keep up with today’s data-intensive environments.

The challenge is how to efficiently and cost-effectively build the data infrastructure that will keep up with data demands of the zettabyte-scale era. Storage is critical and fundamental to creating these new architectures and extracting value from data.

Zoned Storage is the new storage architecture for the next-generation enterprise data center. In addition to championing the Zoned Storage Initiative and ZoneStorage.io, and contributing to the NVMe Working Group ZNS specification and the Linux® open-source community to further ecosystem development, Western Digital today announced that it is now sampling the new Ultrastar DC ZN540 ZNS NVMe SSD to select customers.

The Ultrastar DC ZN540 ZNS SSD includes a vertically integrated, dual-port, high-availability NVMe controller with capacities up to 8TB in a standard U.2 form-factor.

Leveraging ZNS, an industry standard specification, the new DC ZN540 is a new generation of SSD ideally suited for multi-tenancy environments and other data-centric applications such as event stream processing.

Compared to conventional SSDs, the drive delivers up to 4x performance and 2.5x QoS improvements, as well as better efficiency, utilization, and scale while lowering TCO for public and private cloud infrastructure.

Western Digital is committed to the development of a comprehensive Zoned Storage ecosystem and application support, which includes managing the synergies of high-capacity SMR HDDs and ZNS SSDs under a standardized unified Zoned Storage framework.

Empowering Data-Intensive Industrial IoT and Automotive Designs – Western Digital’s new IX SN530 is an industrial-grade NVMe SSD designed for the extreme temperature, performance, high-endurance and reliability requirements found in automotive and industrial applications.

Ideal for factory automation, transportation, medical, robotics, drones, defense, retail and other rugged edge environments, the IX SN530 NVMe SSD features a broad operating temperature range from -40°C to +85°C, and delivers a 20G operating vibration specification.

With read performance of up to 2,400 MB/s, it is the high-performance solution for OEMs designing new applications or transitioning from SATA SSDs. It is available in compact M.2 2230 or M.2 2280 form factors with capacity points from 85GB to 2TB. The IX SN530 TLC family is now sampling. SLC versions will be available in January 2021.

Bringing 2TB Capacity and Speed to Content Creators – The award-winning WD Blue portfolio now offers its popular WD Blue SN550 NVMe SSD in a 2TB drive, bringing a higher-capacity NVMe solution to content creators, including graphic designers, animators, videographers, architects and software developers.

Whether creating digital art, using CAD software or in post-production, the WD Blue SN550 NVMe SSD delivers over four times the speed of Western Digital’s fastest SATA drives.

The WD Blue SN550 2TB is available now for purchase at select Western Digital retailers, e-tailers, resellers, system integrators and at the WD store for $249.99 MSRP.

“Companies across every major industry and every vertical market are using flash technology to transform their businesses. The future of storage is application centric, and optimized for those businesses.” said Robert Soderbery, executive vice president and general manager, Western Digital’s Flash business.

“Today we are launching new SSD products for cloud, enterprise storage, industrial and client computing applications. These new SSDs are critical building blocks for our digital world, enabled by new architectures, giving a variety of customers more options than ever to ensure their data is fast, secure and protected.”


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E-Business

Nigeria Strengthens Cybersecurity, Launches National Cleanup Plan

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Nigerian government, through the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) and the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), has announced a strategic collaboration to strengthen cybersecurity and clean up the nation’s cyberspace.

Nigeria Strengthens Cybersecurity, Launches National Cleanup Plan

Recognizing that cybercrime knows no borders, Nigeria also reaffirmed its commitment to fostering stronger global partnerships within the cybersecurity ecosystem.

This announcement was made during a press conference before the inaugural National Cybersecurity Conference, which is scheduled to take place in Abuja from July 9th to 11th, 2025.

Sa’ad Abubakar, national cybersecurity coordinator from the Office of National Security Advisor, said fighting cybercrime must take the whole of society and the whole of the government approach.

According to him, “Apart from the deterrent approach whereby government agencies such as Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) arrest individuals, take them to court and prosecute them, the youth can be nurtured into better citizens who can showcase their capacity in better ways and be useful to the country.”

Similarly, Kashifu Abdullahi, director-general, NITDA,  also stressed the need for collaborative efforts in fighting cybercrimes.

According to him “Then, in addition to that, we also want to build a stronger global collaboration with the global cyber security ecosystem, because when you look at cybercrime in general, it doesn’t respect the borders.

“Someone can commit a crime from Ghana using a Nigerian ID in the US. So you can look at him physically in a different jurisdiction, pretending to be in another jurisdiction, committing the crime in another jurisdiction.

“So without that kind of synergy and working together, it will be difficult to address these challenges. The third one is challenge. The third one is getting an alternative to cybercrime for our kids in Nigeria. We have this as a major challenge.”

Inuwa further highlighted the upcoming conference’s importance, noting that it would tackle key issues through workshops, discussions on emerging threats, cross-border cybersecurity collaboration strategies, and training programmes.

He also announced that the National Cybersecurity Conference 2025 would feature the Cybersecurity Excellence Awards, recognising top contributions in the field.

The DG extended an invitation to global partners to collaborate with Nigeria in building a safer digital future.

The press conference was attended by notable figures, including Ahmad Sa’ad Abubakar, National Coordinator of, the National Cybersecurity Coordination Centre (NCCC); Hanniel Jafar, Representative of the President, of Cyber Security Experts Association of Nigeria (CSEAN); Ankit Shukla, Managing Director, QNA Marketing Management LLC and members of the press and other stakeholders.


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AXIAN Telecom Invests in Jumia Post-MTN Era

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XIAN Telecom has acquired an 8% stake in pan-African e-commerce company Jumia Technologies, citing the platform’s fintech and logistics strengths as key drivers of its backing.

This marks the first major telecom investment in Jumia since MTN Group’s exit in 2020.

AXIAN, a fast-growing telecom and digital services provider with operations across Africa, disclosed the purchase in a Schedule 13D filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

While the financial terms were not disclosed, AXIAN Telecom CEO, Hassan Jaber, described the move as a strategic alignment with Jumia’s growth trajectory and digital ecosystem.

“Jumia’s achievements in digital retail and fintech, particularly through JumiaPay and its logistics network, make it a very attractive investment for us. We believe in Jumia’s potential to promote financial and economic inclusion, which aligns with our core values,” said Jaber.

Once dubbed the “Amazon of Africa,” Jumia became the first African-founded tech company to list on the New York Stock Exchange in 2019.

But years of underperformance, leadership changes, and competitive pressures dented investor confidence.

In October 2020, South Africa’s MTN Group offloaded its 18.9% stake for $138 million, well below the $698 million value it once held post-IPO.

Since then, Jumia has undergone a significant transformation. Under CEO Francis Dufay, appointed in 2022, the company exited low-performing markets like South Africa and Tunisia, cut costs, and doubled down on core markets – Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt, and Morocco.

The firm is now focused on high-growth verticals, including everyday essentials and digital financial services.

Jumia’s regional CEO for East Africa, Vinod Goel, recently revealed plans to scale up international brand offerings and open its logistics network to third-party businesses.

Jaber underscored that AXIAN Telecom’s investment signals renewed confidence in Jumia’s long-term potential.

The telecom firm’s CEO said the company views Jumia as a key player in advancing Africa’s digital economy, aligning with AXIAN’s mission through its fintech and digital infrastructure brands such as Yas and Mixx by Yas.

 


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NIMC Plans to Register 95 Percent Nigerians by December

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Abisoye Coker-Odusote, director general, National Identity management commission (NIMC) has said that the commission is set to register 95 percent of Nigerians into the National Identity Database before December 2025.

NIMC Plans to Register 95 Percent Nigerians by December

Abisoye Coker-Odusote,, DG, NIMC

She made this statement at a press briefing to highlight the commissions goal aligns with President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda, particularly on digital governance and inclusive development.

The mass enrollment drive will be powered by a combination of improved infrastructure, expanded registration centres, and robust public sensitization campaigns.

As of May 2025, NIMC reports over 120 million Nigerians have been enrolled, and about 100 million more would be captured by December.


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