Three of Tanzania’s four mobile networks, Tigo, Airtel and Zantel have announced Africa’s first agreement to allow their customers in the country to send money to each other whether using Tigo Pesa, Airtel Money or EzyPesa on their mobile handsets.

The service is expected to begin this month.

This is the first agreement in Africa to adopt interoperable mobile money services, whereby one network allows another network’s customers to send money to its clients.

With this agreement, the potential number of customers able to send money by mobile to each other in Tanzania, regardless of network, will increase to over sixteen million.

Vodacom Tanzania is expected to conclude a similar agreement.

Tigo has over 6.2 million customers in Tanzania overall and 3.4 million users of its Tigo Pesa mobile money service.

In February 2014, Millicom launched a cross-border mobile money service with currency conversion between Tanzania and Rwanda.

India’s Department of Telecom has rejected a request by Vodafone for automatic renewal of seven of its expiring mobile operator licences.

The company will instead be required to buy one of the replacement unified licences, then bid in an open auction for the necessary radio spectrum.

The licences in question cover Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh East, Maharashtra and Gujarat. As with the company’s dispute in Kolkata and Delhi, it was awarded the licences in 1995, with an option to renew for an additional 10 years when they expired – subject to an agreed renewal fee.

The government has however been blocking renewals, seeking initially to simply re-auction the licences, and now to change them into a different form of licence.

The government argues that the telecom market has changed too dramatically since the licences were originally awarded and that to renew them for another 10 years overlooks the opportunity to include the changes into new licences.

An option by the government to guarantee renewal of the radio spectrum, which is the main risk in the current offer, does not appear to be favoured. At the moment, in theory, Vodafone could buy the unified licences, but then be outbid by someone in the radio spectrum auction – rendering its operations worthless.

Vodafone has appealed the dispute in Kolkata and Delhi, and may do so again with the latest licence renewals.

Ericsson has appointed three new heads of regions, with Rafiah Ibrahim, currently Head of Marketing Broadcast Services, being appointed Head of Ericsson’s Region Middle East. She replaces Anders Lindblad, who was last month announced as the head of the newly formed business unit Cloud & IP, effective July 1, 2014.

Sam Saba, currently Head of Customer Unit Indonesia, is appointed Head of Ericsson’s Region South East Asia and Oceania.

Charlotta Sund is appointed Head of Ericsson’s Region Northern Europe and Central Asia.

Sund’s appointment is effective June 1, 2014, while Ibrahim’s and Saba’s appointments will be effective July 1, 2014.

Bharti Airtel is said to be close to a deal that would see its sell its tower assets in Africa for as much as US$3 billion. The funds are expected to be used to help bring the company’s debt down to more manageable levels.

Up to US$2 billion of the sale proceeds will be used to retire debt, with the rest being used for network upgrades.

Paying down the debt could boost pre-tax profits by around US$100 million. Airtel would still be left with debts of around US$8.4 billion.

Four companies, Helios Towers Africa, IHS, American Tower and Eaton Towers are said to have been shortlisted for the deal, which would include the tower assets in most of the 17 African countries that Airtel operates in.

Airtel owns around 15,000 towers on the continent.

Airtel Kenya has welcomed the regulator’s recent decision to license three MVNOs, saying that it welcomes the competition in the market.

Three companies – Zioncell, Tangaza Pesa and Fincell (a subsidiary of Equity Bank) – have all been granted licences to act as virtual operators.

All three companies have signed agreements to use Airtel’s network infrastructure rather than that offered by rivals.

The three MVNOs have also been granted mobile money licences, which are almost essential if they are to compete in the market dominated by Safaricom.