Cape Town once again proved why it remains one of the most vibrant centers of Africa’s digital landscape. Over a full week — from the MEF Meet-Up to the MEF Leadership Forum Cape Town and MEF’s participation at AfricaTech Festival — the industry came together to share insights, address challenges, and accelerate collective progress. Photos and videos from the week capture a region that is dynamic, ambitious, and ready for its next leap.
The week began with the MEF Meet-Up, bringing together mobile operators, CPaaS providers, tech companies, regulators, fintech leaders, and innovators from across the continent. The energy and engagement of the evening set the tone for the days ahead.
The MEF Leadership Forum continued this momentum, opening with remarks from MEF Board Member Waheed Adam and later joined by Eddie Andrews, Deputy Mayor of Cape Town, reaffirming the city’s strong commitment to digital transformation and collaboration.
MEF’s introduction highlighted strategic priorities such as anti-fraud programs, identity and verification, API innovation, super apps, and expanded member engagement across Africa. This was followed by a meaningful reflection on WASPA’s 21-year legacy in South Africa — one of the continent’s strongest examples of effective self-regulation.
The Forum then explored the future of messaging in Africa: the sustained growth of A2P traffic, the momentum behind RCS, the need for clean, high-quality routes, and the urgency of combating fraud such as AIT, grey routes, and SIM farms to protect both enterprise trust and operator revenue.
One of the standout sessions of the day was the LANCK Telecom panel, “Empowering Africa’s Telecoms to Thrive Beyond Challenges.” The discussion examined the pressure points and emerging opportunities facing operators across the continent, with a focus on intelligent routing, real-time analytics, and stronger traffic visibility as essential tools for combating fraud and reinforcing economic resilience across voice, messaging and VAS.
Following the LANCK Telecom discussion, the Forum broadened its focus to a full ecosystem perspective, highlighting how technology, telecom infrastructure, content solutions, advertising models, enterprise expansion, and strategic partnerships must evolve together to support Africa’s accelerating digital economy.
This led into two dedicated sessions:
- Content Evolution and Cultural Localisation in Africa
The first session explored the evolution and localisation of digital content in Africa, stressing the importance of adapting content not only linguistically but culturally — in tone, storytelling, identity, values, and relevance to each market.
Speakers from MTN, Content for Mobile, and Mobile Arts shared practical insights on how African audiences increasingly expect content that reflects their own culture, humour, language, and daily reality. These insights underscored that true local relevance remains a key driver of user engagement and long-term retention.
- Digital Virgo’s Experience with Super Apps in Africa
The second session provided an in-depth look at Digital Virgo’s hands-on experience deploying and scaling Super Apps across Africa. The discussion covered distribution models, user adoption, monetisation structures, and the role of Super Apps as gateways for payments, content, communication, and digital services in mobile-first markets.
Together, these discussions highlighted how much progress has been made in recent years — and how the continued synergy between operators, platforms, content providers, technology partners, and ecosystem stakeholders will fuel further growth. This trajectory will be explored in even greater depth at MEF’s 2026 gathering.
Further sessions at the Forum examined the rapid rise of mobile commerce, omnichannel engagement, and evolving consumer behaviour across Africa’s high-growth markets. The conversation around super apps underlined the next phase of digital service delivery — driving interoperability, trust, and ecosystem-wide cooperation.
At AfricaTech Festival, MEF Advisor Matt Ekram moderated a high-profile panel on the transformative role of fibre in Africa’s digital economy. The discussion emphasized fibre as the foundational infrastructure enabling 5G deployment, cloud adoption, fintech expansion, and digital public services. Leaders from Openserve, the City of Cape Town, ATCON, and TESPOK explored opportunities and challenges, noting how municipalities — especially Cape Town — are advancing fibre-led digital transformation.
As the week came to a close, one message stood out clearly: Africa’s digital ecosystem is progressing rapidly, driven by a strong community of leaders committed to shared growth. MEF extends its appreciation to WASPA for its long-term collaboration and presence throughout the week, and a special thank you to MEF Board Member Waheed Adam for his leadership and support in making the Cape Town events a success. MEF also acknowledges and thanks our sponsors, partners, members, and global community for their commitment to supporting regional engagement and member value worldwide.
Looking ahead to 2026, MEF will continue to expand its engagement across Africa through additional regional forums, deeper anti-fraud and API initiatives, strengthened collaboration with national associations such as ATCON and TESPOK, and greater global visibility for African innovation. Cape Town has set the stage — and MEF is excited to support the continent’s next chapter of digital transformation.
