INWIT, an Italian infrastructure business, has announced the deployment of its first wooden mobile telecommunications tower, made entirely of sustainable materials, as part of a two-year environmental strategy. The tower is located northeast of Milan, next to a large park and a major motorway. The mobile tower’s construction is composed of glued laminated wood, entirely sustainable and circular material, an alternative to steel. The tower is 40 meters tall and has four walkways to position the antennas and radio connections of the hosting operators. The tower is located next to the Est delle Cave Park and will provide cellular network coverage in the region, as well as emergency telephone services, which are especially important for highway traffic on Milan’s A51 Tangenziale Est ring road, close to the tower. INWIT hopes to leverage the project to assist in restoring the park by applying the finest environmental and landscape…
Telefónica and NEC Corporation announced an agreement to undertake pre-commercial Open Radio Access Network (Open RAN) tests in Telefonica’s four key worldwide markets: Spain, Germany, the United Kingdom and Brazil. This is a step toward Telefonica’s goal of achieving a 50% expansion of their current radio network based on Open RAN by 2025. According to a joint press release, Telefonica will perform open RAN trials in Spain, Germany, the United Kingdom and Brazil, with the objective of offering commercial alternatives to at least 800 locations across the four countries beginning in 2022. Under the terms of the agreement, NEC will serve as the primary system integrator for the implementation and testing of multi-vendor Open RAN solutions with the Telefonica group’s operational businesses. Telefónica and NEC will also cooperate with the newly formed Telefónica Technology and Automation Lab in Madrid to validate and implement cutting-edge Open RAN technologies and…
Singapore based Epsilon Telecommunications, a global connectivity provider simplifying the connectivity for companies, applications and information worldwide as well as in the cloud, has been acquired for $145 million by KT Corporation, South Korea’s largest telecommunication operator. Epsilon has 260 points of presence in 41 locations across 20 countries, including the Chinese mainland. Furthermore, the firm has data centers in London, New York and Singapore. The firm offers cloud, ethernet, SD-WAN, colocation and voice services, as well as its own network-as-a-service platform called Infiny. “The acquisition of Epsilon by KT is a great milestone on our company’s journey and recognition of the hard work of our teams across the globe,” said Michel Robert, Chief Executive Officer at Epsilon Telecommunications. “The acquisition is a logical next step for both businesses and a fantastic opportunity for customers, partners and internal teams.” KT purchased the company in collaboration with the…
Deutsche Telekom and Softbank in a share-swap deal In a significant shake-up that reinforces the German group’s transatlantic emphasis, Deutsche Telekom has reached a $7 billion share-swap agreement with SoftBank Group to raise its stake in T-Mobile US. In addition, Deutsche Telekom has sold its Dutch subsidiary. As a consequence of the two transactions, Deutsche Telekom’s share in T-Mobile US will increase to 48.4 percent, moving it closer to its aim of gaining direct control of the $170 billion US telecoms operator. In exchange, SoftBank will receive cash and a 4.5 percent interest in Deutsche Telekom, creating a direct shareholding link. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/32tvyn46 NEC expands its partnership with AWS NEC has stated that it will broaden its relationship with AWS to include 5G and digital governance. NEC aims to create an “end-to-end 5G offering” by integrating their cloud-native open 5G core with AWS’ cloud and edge services. According…
SK Telecom, South Korea’s leading mobile carrier, recently launched a new subscription service and also purchased a 20% stake in Korea Content Platform (KCP), a US-based joint venture of Korean terrestrial broadcasters. In addition, the company began monitoring marine pollution with Hoseo University and the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute. On Sunday, SK Telecom announced that it had finalized the acquisition of a 20% shareholding in KCP for $25.8 million in order to expand the content portfolio and audience base of its over-the-top (OTT) platform Wavve. According to industry experts, the presence of KCP in the United States will aid in the creation of synergy with Wavve. In addition, the company has introduced a suite of subscription services, named ‘T Universe’, for its clients, which appear to be a collection of ecommerce services. While there will be several subscription packages available, the main one is called Universe Pass,…
On July 30, 2021, Ariane 5, a European heavy-lift space launch vehicle developed and operated by Arianespace for the European Space Agency, successfully launched its first flight in nearly a year. The aim of the mission is to deploy a pair of geostationary communications satellites for commercial operators in Brazil and France. One of the satellites, called the Star One D2, will be operated by Embratel, a Brazilian telecommunications company. The Star One D2 will give Embratel the ability to expand its broadband coverage to new regions in Central and South America, supply Internet access to those in under-serviced areas, and increase X-band payload for government use in the Atlantic region. The second satellite, named Eutelsat Quantum, which was developed as part of an ESA partnership with satellite operator Eutelsat and major manufacturer Airbus, has an active antenna, a first for the European commercial telecommunications industry. This revolutionary…
Nokia launches iSIM Secure Connect Nokia has released new software to help operators cope with the provisioning of cellular IoT devices and subscription management. The software, called iSIM Secure Connect, relies on embedded SIM (eSIM) and integrated SIM (iSIM) technologies combined with reliable digital identification, allowing telecom service providers to quickly and securely authenticate and manage cellular IoT devices. The software is vendor agnostic and can be installed in a variety of network and cloud environments, providing a myriad of IoT use cases and business models. Read more at: https://tinyurl.com/42kf2tu8 Lumen strikes a deal with Microsoft Lumen Technologies has announced that it has entered a long-term partnership with Microsoft to take advantage of the Azure cloud platform. The duo plans to integrate Microsoft’s Azure stack with Lumen’s bare metal edge computing service, allowing customers to run Azure-based applications wherever the edge network can reach. Lumen will also use the cloud…
Orange, a French multinational telecommunications corporation, has extended its 5G test program in the 26 GHz band. This initiative was launched in 2019 to focus on testing the capabilities of frequencies for industrial use cases in France. A consortium consisting of Orange, Nokia, the railway company SNCF and the academic facility Institut Mines – Telecom (MIT), has been given a grant from the French government to trial 4.0 industrial applications over 5G using the 26 GHz spectrum. The grant will allow the consortium to develop an existing pilot that Orange performed for eighteen months at the Rennes train station in France, while working with the French state-owned railway company SNCF and Nokia. As part of the project, Orange will provide network services and Nokia will provide technological connectivity offerings, including private networks, while MIT will focus on data hosting using edge computing. This project puts emphasis on…
It is imperative for every business to develop a marketing strategy that enables organizations to build long-term relationships with their customers. Developing and executing such a marketing strategy is not an easy task, especially in the ever-changing telecommunications industry. There are a myriad of ways to create and design a marketing campaign, and even more ways to manage your entire marketing strategy. To help you wade through the complex world of telecom marketing, we have searched far and wide to gather the top telecom professionals’ marketing ideas that will hopefully inspire everyone in their marketing path.Yaniv Masjedi, CMO of Nextiva, says being your own biggest competitor is the greatest motivation. “Being in such a competitive industry is a roller coaster, and at the same time, we like to see ourselves as our own biggest competitor. We aren’t striving to be like the other companies in our space because Nextiva…
In recent years, 5G technology has been deployed around the world at a staggering pace, and the rollout is predicted to continue in the upcoming years. Despite the fact that 5G technology is still in its early stages, the telecom industry is already envisioning and trying to define what the next generation of mobile technology, 6G, will look like. The 5G Infrastructure Association (5GIA) has published a white paper with the title “European Vision for the 6G Network Ecosystem”, which covers key areas of 6G research from technical, societal, policy and business perspectives. As stated in this white paper, 6G will participate in making headway towards achieving more united digital, physical and personal worlds. The key features of the next-gen technology include intelligent connected management and control functions, programmability, integrated sensing and communication, energy footprint reduction, reliable infrastructure, scalability and affordability. 5GIA says that 6G will usher…