NEWS Archives | Page 5 of 12

Deutsche Telekom (DT) has announced that it is investing an undisclosed amount in the blockchain payment platform Celo. The company also purchased an unspecified amount of Celo digital tokens to be used on the platform. Deutsche Telekom will be the first telecommunications company to join the Celo Alliance for Prosperity. Celo is an open-source blockchain ecosystem that focuses on making decentralized financial (DeFi) systems and tools accessible via the smartphone. The Celo ecosystem includes a decentralized, proof-of-stake blockchain technology package, a native asset (CELO), two stablecoins (cUSD and cEUR) and the Celo Foundation Alliance of Prosperity. The company was launched in 2017 and has maintained a low profile in the crypto market. However, this has changed in recent months, in part due to the recent $20 million funding raised by blue venture capital firms, including Andreessen Horowitz. This move by DT represents their initial foray into and testing…

Telecom News

Millicom exits the African market

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 20, 2021

Millicom, a Luxembourg-based international telecommunications and media company, has announced it has signed agreements to sell its operations in Tanzania and its stake in the AirtelTigo joint venture in Ghana. The concluding deals will complete Millicom’s prolonged plan to leave the African market and focus on its operations in Latin America. Millicom has been operating in the Tanzanian market since 1994 and took ownership of the local operations in 2006. For a while, the company tried to make their shares public, but in the end decided to sell the business in its entirety. The company agreed to sell its Tanzanian business for an undisclosed amount to a consortium led by Axian. In the meantime, the company signed an agreement with its joint venture partner Bharti Airtel on Friday to pass on its AirtelTigo shares to the Ghanaian government for $25 million. Looking at Millicom’s operations in Africa…

Telecom News

A quick roundup of the news in Telecoms | Week #15

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 16, 2021

Vodafone launches standalone 5G services in Germany Vodafone has announced the launch of its standalone 5G services in Germany. Vodafone Germany, working with Ericsson, Qualcomm, and Oppo, has upgraded around 1000 mobile sites in the 3.5 GHz range, switching them to an independent 5G core network that no longer relies on 4G. Vodafone claims that “latency times of 10 to 15 milliseconds are possible – that’s as fast as the human nervous system.” This initiative will deliver the SA 5G experience to 170 cities and municipalities, including major cities such as Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Munich and Düsseldorf. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/5dvhudhr Nokia to supply China Mobile with software-defined networking technology Nokia gained a major cloud win when China Mobile chose the vendor to supply software-defined network (SDN) technology for its public cloud service expansion. As part of the transaction, Nokia will provide its Nuage Networks Virtualized Cloud Services, that include…

Telecom News

NEC and Red Hat partner to deliver 5G solutions

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 15, 2021

Red Hat, a provider of open source solutions, has announced a partnership with NEC Corporation to deliver 5G solutions built on Red Hat OpenShift, the industry’s leading enterprise Kubernetes platform. With this partnership, NEC will be able to deliver its next-generation suite of core capabilities to the OpenShift platform. The NEC 5G core network solutions operating on Red Hat OpenShift will allow organizations to leverage 5G in many applications, including the 5G core, 5G radio access networks (RANs), edge computing, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and more, creating new income opportunities. This cloud-native network function (CNF) infrastructure will offer service providers a common telecommunications cloud infrastructure for a variety of use cases, helping to reduce management and operational costs. Service providers will also be able to reap the benefits of using an open, horizontal platform that can reduce total cost of ownership (TCO) by 30%, according to an ACG…

Telecom News

Vodia announces interoperability with SIPTRUNK

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 13, 2021

Vodia Networks (“Vodia”), maker of cutting-edge software-based telephone systems, is pleased to announce it has successfully completed interoperability with SIPTRUNK, a BCM One company. SIPTRUNK, based in the Atlanta metropolitan area, is a premier SIP trunking provider for resellers, agents, dealers, and IT consultants selling SIP trunks. The successful interoperability of Vodia’s award-winning cloud PBX software with SIPTRUNK SIP trunks provides SIPTRUNK partners a seamless integration with Vodia’s certified, award-winning VoIP telephone system with SIP Endpoints compatible with MS Teams and all the built-in telephony options required to work from anywhere. Please register for a demo account here http://demo.siptrunk.com/. SIPTRUNK was founded by telecommunications experts with more than 50 years’ combined SIP trunking experience. The company provides a best-in-class services platform to companies looking to build a SIP trunking practice and a recurring revenue stream selling SIP trunking services. “SIPTRUNK is dedicated to providing resellers with a…

Telecom News

A quick roundup of the news in Telecoms | Week #14

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 9, 2021

Spain approves entry for MWC participants The organizers of the Mobile World Congress 2021, which will take place in Barcelona this summer, have received much-needed good news from the Spanish government. Spain currently bans “non-essential” travel to and from non-EU/Schengen countries. But the GCMA, which manages the MWC, has announced that people who have registered for the event will be classified as “highly skilled workers” and therefore will be excused from this restriction. The GSMA intends to provide the Spanish authorities with details of all registrants and registrants will also be provided with a confirmation of participation. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/35z7nub5 Lumen signs a deal with T-Mobile US Lumen Technologies has taken a major step in expanding its latest edge computing service with a new deal with T-Mobile US. This agreement will allow Lumen to receive access to the operator’s 5G network to reach more of the company’s customers. The…

Telecom News

Black Lotus Labs uncovers watering hole cyber attacks

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 8, 2021

Black Lotus Labs, a division specializing in threat intelligence at Lumen Technologies that focuses on identifying malware and cyber security threats, has announced the discovery of a group of compromised websites that have been used in watering hole attacks in the past. All visitors who browse one of the sites would be unknowingly infected and vulnerable to the attacker stealing a copy of their Windows authentication credentials that could be used to impersonate them. The activity was only recently brought to light and was discovered on several Ukrainian and one Canadian website. These attacks target websites by inserting a malicious function into the website’s code, which is then executed by the victim’s machine. This type of attack has been used for many years, including the high-level compromise that was traced to the San Francisco International Airport website in April 2020. When analyzing the attacks in Ukraine and Canada,…

Telecom News

DIDWW enables custom billing cycles for efficient DID number management

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 6, 2021

The global telecommunication services provider, DIDWW, is committed to continuous improvement and is always pushing the boundaries to enhance the customer experience. The company has announced an expanded feature set for its cloud communications platform, which now includes a “billing cycle” capability. This highly useful feature allows customers to set the specific number of billing cycles before their DID subscription expires, making inventory administration convenient and easier to plan ahead. By taking advantage of this new feature, customers will be able to manage their DID numbers in a more efficient and productive manner by customizing and automating the ordering process to fit any use-case. The DIDWW self-service portal offers an easy way to order, configure and manage virtual numbers in real-time. The latest update to this platform is a perfect example of how to simplify the DID management process and enhance business productivity. The company continues to add innovations to the user…

Telecom News

A quick roundup of the news in Telecoms | Week #13

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 2, 2021

MessageBird acquires 2 companies The cloud messaging platform, MessageBird, has announced the acquisition of two companies that will increase its customer engagement portfolio. The goal of MessageBird is to improve communications between companies and their customers. Their multi-channel technology aims to give customers the opportunity to communicate with the business in a way they like, rather than limiting the business to the currently-preferred method. Buying 24sessions and Hull provides MessageBird with even more possibilities. The company believes that consumers prefer to use messaging rather than voice calls and are proposing that businesses use this method of communication to cater to customers. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/9nedkjns ETSI published TR 103 639 for timeslicing The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), known for its universally accepted standards such as UMTS, 4G and TETRA, has published TR 103 639. The technical report describes a system and metrics for timeslice measurement methodologies for assessing the…

Telecom News

Cisco announces expanded SASE architecture

By Aiste Kryzanovske April 1, 2021

Enterprise networking and security leader Cisco, has unveiled a new, expanded Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) offering. This is a step for Cisco towards radically simplifying security and networking by helping network operations (NetOps) and security operations (SecOps) teams securely connect users to applications. Cisco delivers the capacity to purchase all of the key components of a SASE product in a one-stop offering, making it easy to transition to a single subscription service in the future. Cisco provides all key elements of the SASE architecture, including best-in-class networking, remote access, cloud security, zero trust network access, and observability. Cisco aims to incorporate these components into a single subscription service and provide seamless, secure access to any application on any network or cloud, wherever end users are located. According to Cisco, the reason for combining all SASE components into one package is that it allows companies a shorter time-to-market.…