Facebook is turning its attention to users in emerging markets, and Africa in particular. The company has retooled its Android app to bring a multitude of speed and performance improvements to those with low-end devices and modest internet connections. Earlier this year, the company ran a series of fact-finding missions to Africa in order to test how the app behaved under native conditions — that means lower quality devices and basic mobile networks. The fruit of that initiative is this Android app update, which the company says includes performance gains across the board, including: Up to 50 percent reduction in initial start time; Up to 50 percent reduction in data used; and Up to 90 percent reduction of instances of images loading slowly or failing to load at all.
