South African ICT conference, ZANOG@iWeek2026, takes place from 21 to 23 April 2026 at the Irene Country Lodge in Pretoria, Gauteng.
The event coincides with the 30th anniversary of the Internet Service Providers’ Association (ISPA), formed in 1996 by a group of competing internet service providers to promote fair competition and industry self-regulation in South Africa’s emerging internet market.
ZANOG@iWeek2026 is co-hosted by ISPA and the South African Network Operators Group (ZANOG), following the most recent iWeek conference held in the Western Cape. The collaboration is expected to attract engineers, business leaders, policymakers, and technical specialists from across South Africa’s internet and communications sectors, as well as representatives from government and academia.
The 2026 event will be the 21st iWeek conference since its inception in 2000. Attendance remains free, consistent with iWeek’s long-standing aim of broad industry participation.
The theme for the first day of the conference is “Towards Universal Meaningful Connectivity”. Sessions will focus on challenges and progress related to internet access, affordability, and service quality. While approximately 80% of South Africans are active internet users, significant gaps remain in coverage, cost, and performance, particularly for underserved communities. Discussions are expected to address strategies for connecting the remaining 20% of the population and narrowing South Africa’s digital coverage gap.
The conference will also acknowledge a significant infrastructure milestone for INX-ZA, following 30 years of uninterrupted peering at South Africa’s internet exchange points (IXPs). The Johannesburg Internet Exchange (JINX) has maintained 100% uptime since 1996, as have subsequent exchanges, including CINX in Cape Town, DINX in Durban, and NBINX in Nelson Mandela Bay.
Confirmed sponsors for ZANOG@iWeek2026 include Telcables as Exabyte Sponsor and Flexoptix as Petabyte Sponsor, along with the ZA Registry Consortium (ZARC) and INX-ZA, organisations that play a central role in South Africa’s internet infrastructure.
Speaker line-ups and detailed session programmes will be announced closer to the event. Planned focus areas include networking, cybersecurity and resilience, internet governance and regulation, skills development, collaboration models, domains, and emerging technologies.
ZANOG’s mission is to strengthen Africa’s participation in the global internet ecosystem by promoting technical best practices for local and regional peering networks as infrastructure expands across the continent.
ISPA currently represents more than 245 members providing a wide range of internet-related services and is recognised as South Africa’s official industry body for ISPs. INX-ZA operates under ISPA’s auspices as a neutral, community-driven internet exchange ecosystem, enabling ISPs to exchange local traffic efficiently, reduce costs, improve performance, and increase network resilience by keeping traffic within the country.
Further information and updates are available on the ZANOG@iWeek2026 website. Sponsorship details are available at https://iweek.org.za/sponsorships.
