Telefonica Deutschland Holding AG, the leading mobile operator in the German market, has announced an agreement to sell about 10,100 telecom sites to the group’s majority-owned tower infrastructure arm Telxius Telecom for EUR 1.5 billion. The acquisition deal includes 10,000 rooftop sites and up to 80 tower sites, as well as an obligation to build 2,400 new sites (BTS). This move will ensure the company’s exceptional future growth in Germany, Europe’s largest telecom market, where a robust deployment by operators is expected to improve mobile broadband coverage and secure the future deployment of 5G. Markus Haas, CEO of Telefonica Deutschland, said, “This is one of the largest and most important transactions in the history of Telefonica Deutschland. It represents an important milestone in focusing our business activities. We are pursuing a clear course based on our growth strategy. Within this strategy, we are focusing on further improving the quality of the O2 network for our…
Contributed by Maor Efrati, CTO at monogoto Working from home: A lot has been said about increased productivity and family time as positively impacted during the COVID-19 quarantine. I am discovering that it’s also good for writing and for analyzing the many conversations that I and my monogoto.io partner Itamar Kunik have regarding cellular, WiFi, and the future of connectivity. @monogoto we are building an OTT cellular network. We are providing a connectivity service to any company that desires to have cellular connectivity as part of the offering or product. Simplifying the backend and network with strong API’s while keeping all the bells and whistles that a cellular network can support over a traditional last mile (RJ45 and WiFi). It will be interesting to see what plays out regarding WiFi vs Cellular as the last-mile provider. Some think cellular technology is the perfect solution for all wireless networks, while others hope…
Spanish telecom operator MasMovil agrees $3.3 billion private equity bid KKR, Cinven and Providence have made their Public Acquisition Offer for Spanish telecoms operator MasMovil. The three venture capital funds have proposed to pay EUR 22.5 per share of the telco, which is valued at almost EUR 3 billion. According to the statement, KKR, Cinven and Providence will pay a 20 percent premium on the current MasMovil share price. Meinrad Spenger, MasMovil Chief Executive, said that they have signed an agreement with the bidders on a deal which would be “beneficial for the shareholders and other stakeholders in the company.” Furthermore, the bidders noted that they would maintain continuity in MasMovil’s strategy, staff and executive team. Read more at https://tinyurl.com/y754vsc9 Google Cloud signs major UK government deal The technology giant Google Cloud has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Crown Commercial Service (CCS) to make its cloud solutions…
US telecoms will not charge late fees during COVID-19 pandemic Major US telecommunications companies such as AT&T, Comcast, Cox, and Verizon have expanded their policies to not charge late payments and cancel service for customers and small businesses affected by the COVID-19 pandemic until June 30. Furthermore, Comcast said that apart from extending the commitment through June 30 and providing its Wi-Fi hotspots to everyone, it would also extend the pause in its data plans to give all customers unlimited data at no extra charge. With tens of millions of Americans working from home, internet providers and the FCC say the internet is performing well. Read more at https://tinyurl.com/yd8wbxuv Google is making Meet free for everyone The tech giant has announced that Google Meet, its premium video conferencing product, will be free for everyone and will be fully accessible over the coming weeks. Previously, the Meet service was available only…
The Global mobile Suppliers Association (GSA), a non-profit industry organization representing mobile industry suppliers worldwide, has expanded its membership by welcoming nine new companies from the global 4G and 5G mobile ecosystem. The GSA said that it has so far accepted Approve-IT as a new ordinary member together with eight new associate members, including the French telecom regulator ARCEP and the Singaporean regulator IMDA. In March 2020, the association also extended its Executive Committee by adding ZTE as an executive member along with Ericsson, Huawei, Intel, Nokia, Qualcomm and Samsung. Joe Barrett, the President of the GSA, said, “The global mobile industry is not only highly competitive, it’s also highly collaborative. 5G doesn’t belong to one company or country; there is a whole ecosystem of regulators, vendors and operators who are working together to drive global harmonization of spectrum, innovation in networks and devices, and new use cases for 5G…
BEREC says COVID-19 won’t break the internet The Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC) has announced that the increase in Internet usage across the continent is more or less stabilizing and that networks have been able to withstand the pressure. BEREC said that national regulatory authorities (NRAs) have reported “a stabilization in the overall traffic, but some NRAs still observe an increase of the overall traffic.” Some operators have expanded their network’s capacity to cope with the steady growth of traffic. According to the organization, “operators, which did not take any such measure, are still closely monitoring their network’s capacity to check if an upgrade is necessary.” Read more at https://tinyurl.com/rxmg53l Vodafone slashes costs of core network functions across Europe using VMware’s telco cloud The UK-based telecoms operator Vodafone has completed the deployment of a single digital network architecture across all of its 21 European business markets, using…
Work from home: Can the telecoms industry take the strain? Many businesses opt for remote working due to the ongoing coronavirus crisis, and this has led to a dramatic increase in the use of online services. The additional pressure is proving problematic for the telecoms industry in Spain, which has reported a 40 percent increase in data consumption and a 50 percent increase in mobile phone usage. Movistar (Telefonica), Orange, Vodafone, Masmovil, and Euskaltel have issued a joint statement in anticipation of the national lockdown, urging customers to take “intelligent and responsible use of the network and the resources it provides us.” Meanwhile, BT, the UK’s largest telecom provider, said that its network can handle it. Read more at https://tinyurl.com/sm8bms7 Vodafone unveils five-point plan to combat COVID-19 Vodafone has put forward a five-point plan to maintain network services and assist governments across Europe in controlling the outbreak of coronavirus. The five…
The next-generation wireless technology for digital cellular networks is steadily gaining traction, with significant implementations under way. All of the major carriers are rolling out their 5G networks, targeting large cities that crave super speeds, virtually lag-free connections, extended coverage and other great benefits that are made available by this advanced technology. 5G has already been launched in many different locations around the world, but it is still considered to be in its initial stages. All of the US carriers have now launched some form of 5G cellular network. But what exactly is 5G, how fast is it compared with 4G, what will it bring to VoIP applications, and what are the benefits and drawbacks of this innovative technology? Let’s take a look at 5G in more detail. What is 5G? 5G stands for fifth-generation cellular wireless and is the next generation of telecom networks that entered the…
British officials recommend role for China’s Huawei in 5G network UK officials have proposed allowing Chinese tech giant Huawei to play a limited role in the UK’s future 5G network, resisting calls from the US for a complete ban over fears of Chinese spying. Huawei will be kept out of the sensitive, data-heavy “core” parts of 5G infrastructure, but will be allowed to deploy its equipment in other parts of the network, according to sources speaking to Reuters. This recommendation comes ahead of a meeting of Britain’s National Security Council next week to decide how to deploy Huawei equipment. In addition, this proposal would satisfy Britain’s two largest telecoms operators, BT and Vodafone, which already use Huawei equipment and are against a total ban. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/szmovzy CityFibre buys FibreNation from debt-laden TalkTalk for £200 million Britain’s TalkTalk Telecom Group has agreed to sell its FibreNation full-fibre network business…
Samsung Electronics has completed an agreement to acquire network services provider TeleWorld Solutions (TWS). Headquartered in Chantilly, Virginia, TWS provides network design, testing and optimization services to mobile service and cable operators, equipment OEMs and other companies in the United States. This acquisition is expected to help Samsung address the need for end-to-end support in delivering network solutions aimed at upgrading the 5G and 4G LTE networks, and providing connectivity service advancements in the US. Paul Kyungwhoon Cheun, Executive Vice President and Head of Networks Business at Samsung Electronics, said, “The acquisition of TWS will enable us to meet mobile carriers’ growing needs for improving their 4G and 5G networks, and eventually create new opportunities to enhance our service capabilities to our customers. Samsung will continue to drive innovation in communications technology, while providing optimization services for network deployments that accelerate US 5G network expansion.” Under the agreement,…