Tele2 and Nokia to provide SA 5G core network Tele2 has partnered with Nokia to provide its domestic market with a standalone (SA) 5G core network prior to the country’s spectrum auction, which prohibits operators from using ZTE or Huawei infrastructure. Nokia’s triumph over Ericsson’s comes as the company undergoes a comprehensive restructuring in order to focus on key business areas and get back in the global 5G retail market. The operators stated that the contract also covers the installation of the SA 5G core and the facilities for the transmission of voice-over-5G in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. The deployment of the infrastructure is expected to start later in 2021. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/y5pxfu4l Telefónica has agreed to sell its tower portfolio The Spanish telecommunication giant Telefónica has come to the decision to sell its tower portfolio in Europe and Latin America to passive infrastructure specialist American Tower for €7.7…
The international telecommunications company, Colt Technology Services Group, has announced that it is releasing its Cloud Session Border Controller (SBC) in partnership with AudioCodes. This cloud-based voice solution provides Direct Routing as a Service to quickly enable PSTN calls for Microsoft Teams. The Colt Cloud SBC provides an important step towards speeding up and simplifying the implementation of PSTN calling in Teams. With Direct Routing as-a-service, provided by the cloud-based voice solution, users do not require on-premises hardware or hardware in a data center. According to the company, the new service provided more efficiency for both large and small businesses, as onboarding was completed in less than a week. Developed in collaboration with AudioCodes, a leading provider of smart voice networks, this new offering is an extension of Colt’s Intelligent Communications offering that was launched in 2019. The power of Microsoft 365 and Teams, along with Colt’s voice and…
It has been announced that Deutsche Telekom, a German telecommunications company, is looking to sell its Dutch subsidiary T-Mobile Netherlands for approximately €5-6 billion. The company is aiming to sell the Dutch mobile phone operator to private equity investors. In 2015, Deutsche Telekom was unsuccessful in trying to sell T-Mobile Netherlands in an attempt to reduce its debt and raise funds to help acquire spectrum for T-Mobile US. Six years ago, the company considered leaving the Dutch market and had seen interest from Liberty Global. Nonetheless, the potential sale did not go through and Liberty Global later merged the Ziggo cable unit with Vodafone Netherlands. Since then, the Dutch unit has grown. Instead of seeking another buyer, Deutsche Telekom decided to expand its operations in the country. In 2017, the company published a €190 million merger with Tele2’s local branch. At the time, Deutsche Telekom said it wanted to…
Robocalls are not only annoying, they are potentially dangerous and are progressively becoming an even bigger problem. Sadly, it does not look like the situation will improve in 2021, as there were 22.8 billion total robocalls recorded at the midway point of 2020. Robocalls are phone calls made by an automatic dialer that transmits pre-recorded messages. While this may not seem like an issue, it can be. Some robotic calls may be from legitimate sources, but they may also be scams designed to deceive or bully people to provide personal information.
UK mobile providers pressured to provide free data during lockdown After the UK decided to close schools again, UK telecoms providers were urged to stop charging for data so that underprivileged children could access remote learning facilities. It is concerning that children in such families lack the technological resources to attend schools from home, where a computer and an Internet connection is required. Although it may be hard to imagine, there are many families that do not have access to the necessary services, especially broadband. The company, Three UK, wasted no time in rushing to announce that it will provide unrestricted data access to disadvantaged children so they could continue their education. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/y46zylg2 T-Mobile reaches record connection gains in 2020 T-Mobile US announced that 2020 was the best year in their history for postpaid net additions, showing preliminary results that indicate a major win, despite the Covid-19…
The American telecommunications company Verizon, which offers wireless products and services, has announced that it will meet its $10 billion cost reduction target, which was first announced in 2017 by Lowell McAdam, the former CEO. Back in 2017, the company said it plans to introduce an aggressive cost-cutting technique called zero-based budgeting. The idea behind this strategy is that all business units should start each year with a clean sheet and justify the money they want to spend, in place of basing it on last year’s expenses. Since the announcement, Verizon has reduced its budget by a mixture of virtualization, early retirement offerings for its management team, and operational efficiencies through the One Fiber and Intelligent Edge Network initiatives. To achieve this goal, the company has been conserving billions of dollars annually in operational efficiency stemming from the foundation of their network to the efficient flow of…
T-Mobile, the third-largest carrier in the United States, that has recently completed a $26 billion merger with Sprint, announced that it had experienced a second data breach in December, 2020. The security breach may have revealed call-related information and phone numbers of some of its customers. According to the company, it recently discovered illegal access to some customer account information, including data that T-Mobile collects on its customers when considering the provision of mobile services. However, the company reported that the information affected by the violation did not include the customer’s account names, physical or email addresses, financial data, credit card information, social security numbers, tax IDs, passwords or PINs. The information accessed by hackers is known as Customer Proprietary Network Information (CPNI). This data can include call records, such as when the call was made, how long it lasted, the caller’s phone number and destination phone numbers,…
The European Commission (EC) has appointed Nokia, a Finnish international telecommunications, information technology and consumer electronics company, to supervise Hexa-X, a primary 6G research project aimed at boosting the continent’s progress in developing the technology. The two-and-a-half-year Hexa-X initiative was funded by Horizon 2020, the EU’s research, and innovation program, and will start on January 1, 2021. The project is aimed at connecting the physical, digital and human worlds, firmly embedded in future wireless technologies. The project is led by Nokia, which coordinates the efforts, with Ericsson being assigned as the technical manager. The partners in the consortium are from academia and industry, including service providers, network providers and European research institutes. The partners include Orange, TIM, Telefonica, Intel and Siemens. The Finnish service provider said in a statement that it expects 6G to become commercially operational by 2030, following a normal ten-year intergenerational cycle and taking…
With Christmas just around the corner, we want to share with you 12 articles to read for the 12 days of Christmas. The best gift you can give to yourself is personal growth and autodidacticism. We hope this collection of articles will help you in the journey of self-education about VoIP and the Telecom sector. Finding the best VoIP phone systems for your business is an important task, especially if you plan to compete with more experienced industry participants or to expand business internationally. When choosing a VoIP phone for your office, it is essential to select one that best fits your company. Now it is a great time to move from a traditional service provider to a VoIP solution, considering the new technologies and advances in VoIP business phone systems. Full article: https://voip.review/2020/11/23/how-to-set-up-voip-for-your-office/ Maintaining an edge over competition, staying on track with ever-shifting customer needs and seeing steady revenue…
The two companies, Deutsche Telekom Global Carrier and Orange International Carriers, have announced the successful completion of a Proof of Concept (PoC) project to improve IPX services using blockchain technology. According to the statement, they were able to validate that blockchain can be used by operators to expedite the automatic transaction of end-to-end network KPIs between providers. This provides operators with an opportunity to offer improved quality of service (QoS) and enhance network performance forecasting and incident management. The cooperation between the carriers for this initiative was announced back in June. IPX systems are fundamental components for enabling international and domestic roaming services. Also, full-service level agreements (SLAs) on critical IPX networks are essential for ensuring that mobile operators can provide the best network quality. The companies said the results of the study will be presented to the GSMA. Emmanuel Rochas, CEO of Orange International Carriers, said:…