Pan-Africa’s daily ICT news site, Biztechafrica.com marks its second anniversary this month, with several milestones under its belt.

With on the ground representation in major growth areas (and more coming), a fast-growing loyal readership of over 1r0,000 key players and new products coming to market all the time, Biztechafrica.com is staying true to its original mission: to inform and showcase Africa’s ICT sector.

Our loyal readers commend us on our 365-days-a-year updates; featured businesses report making deals as a result; and foreign entities are using the site as a means to track African ICT development and source partners in regions that were previously part of ‘darkest Africa’.

With little more than a common goal to use the power of the internet to develop the sector, the founding team, located in key markets across Africa, has interacted on virtual platforms to train, collaborate and share the news since inception. Indeed, many of the founding team members have never met in person.

“We have complete faith in our virtual platforms,” says Managing Editor TJ James. “Thanks to the internet, we have team meetings and updates. Indeed, we even share in each-other’s personal tragedies and high points as any news team would if they interacted face-to-face.”

“The team is passionate about its quest to develop Africa’s ICT sector. We knew there was a gap in the market for a player with this close to its heart. We knew word would spread, and we were right. We now have a strong base of very loyal readers and we see our reader base growing week on week.”

Publisher Tamer El-Assi says: “Having worked in the ICT media sector for many years, I have seen how ICT has the power to transform lives. We want to see this power working for people across the entire continent.”

We’re very excited to launch a new development on the site – a much-needed talk forum facility. Now, the voice of Africa’s ICT sector allows ICT stakeholders and players across the continent to discuss their challenges, opinions and news in one place.

BizTechAfrica.com is meeting the continent’s need for a one-stop hub for ICT news – featuring both what is relevant to ICT players across Africa and updating the rest of the world about ICT developments in Africa.

With our new BizTalk forum, you can now interact informally with ICT professionals just like yourself – from all across Africa. We invite you to share your views and make your voice heard. Consult fellow ICT businesspeople and professionals about how they addressed the challenges you are facing in your region.

After all, if we communicate, collaborate and share information effectively, Africa’s ICT innovators will help power the continent into a digital future.

Start interacting now! Sign in to our forum to get the conversation started.

We are delighted to welcome our newest correspondent, Michael Malakata from Lusaka, Zambia, to the team.  With a background including working for IDG News Service (USA), The London Evening Post (UK), Entrepreneur Magazine and Telecommunications Africa Magazine (UK), Michael is well-placed to update our readers on the latest ICT business news from Zambia.

He’s contact details can be found here.

As Biztechafrica grows, we are ever cognizant of what our readers are most interested in. Our tracking tools and readers’ comments are a constant guide to what  Africa ’s ICT community wants to know more about.

With this in mind, we have dedicated a portal purely to development issues, as we see a great deal of interest in all news relating to the role of ICTs in socio-economic development. Here, we will cover news on m-health, smart education initiatives, ICT in government and ICT at work in agriculture, among others.

Below, are Biztechafrica’s best-read stories ever:

Google takes free trade online

Broadband still out of reach

Register now for Wezesha laptops

SA small business forum slams empowerment charter

Rwanda trade fair underway and online

John Churu

Biztachafrica is delighted to welcome a new correspondent to the team – John Churu of Botswana.John Churu is an educationist, veteran journalist, and author and opinion leader resident in Botswana. John has written for the Botswana Sunday Tribune and Mmegi newspapers, the second which is the only Botswana based daily private newspaper. John was the founding Editor for Botswana’s leading monthly business publication, The Business Diary. He has also worked as a media consultant for several media houses in Botswana through his own news agency called Anthill News Agency. He is currently the Editor in chief and co-owner of The Economic & Investment Monitor Magazine in Botswana and is a member of the Editor’s Forums.

We have gone live with our first client press office! Biztechafrica can now give our supporters their own dedicated space on the site, where they can showcase their products and services, and tell Africa more about themselves. Our first press office clients is Sage ERP, a respected solutions firm which has been operating in Africa for over 25 years. The company started small – much like many of us operating in African ICT. It has a fascinating history, which you can read here: http://www.sageerp.co.za/About-us.asp. Sage ERP has a range of solutions to make running your business easier. See information about them here http://www.biztechafrica.com/press/sage-erp

If you want to know more about a press office for your company, mail sales@biztechafrica.com

Biztechafrica.com weekly cartoon strip, TiTi-co, is home-grown and highlights the ups and downs of doing ICT business in Africa. It focuses on the uniquely African problems we encounter in day-to-day business. Poor infrastructure, power problems, slow bandwidth, uninformed computer users – we have all had to deal with them.

This cartoon strip pokes gentle fun at the problems we have to get around every day, when we are doing ICT business in Africa.

Watch the Biztechafrica.com here for the TiTi-co cartoons, and let us know what you think. And if you have amusing ideas for upcoming TiTo-co strips please send them to news@biztechafrica.com – you could see your idea in a full-colour cartoon!

Win a Mi-fone

BitechAfrica and Mi-Fone are giving away two Mi-Fone handsets to readers.

The Mi-Fone Mi-Q502 handsets are part of Mi-Fone’s range of cellphones specially designed for the African market. The Mi-Q502 phone features a Qwerty keyboards with dual Sim capability and background noise suppression IC embedded, for crystal-clear conversion.

Click here to know more details about how you can be winner…

Participate and win handsets. Let us know your comments.

Biztechafrica.com launches new breaking news section to make the news reach our readers as quickly as  possible.

Now you can see a scrolling news bar just below the menu which will feature breaking news about the ICT sector in pan-African region. This will let our readers know about the latest happening in ICT and enhance their reading experience – inline with our objective.

Let us know your comments about this and how can this be enhanced further.

Biztechafrica welcomes its newest contributor, Lukas Ajanaku, to the team. Lukas will cover ICT news from Nigeria. Watch www.biztechafrica.com for his first contributions.