NEC XON has played a pivotal role in Emtel’s recent recognition as OOKLA’s Mauritius Speedtest Awards Winner for mobile network speed during Q2-Q3 2023. The collaboration between NEC XON and Emtel has been spearheaded by Jurie Cordier, Key Account Executive at NEC XON, and Emtel CEO Kresh Goomany. “This project has enabled Emtel to clinch the Ookla Speedtest Award with an impressive mobile speeds never witnessed on the island . This accolade is a testament to its successful deployment of 5G technology across Mauritius with strategic partner, NEC XON,” says Cordier.

Emtel’s 5G network already covers 80% of the Mauritian population, with plans to extend coverage in 2024. CEO Kresh Goomany remarks: “With the widest 5G network coverage in Mauritius — and most probably the widest 5G network in Africa considering the population and the area that we cover — we are proud to be the first company to launch 5G across such a significant portion of the island.” Emtel users can now experience ultra fast speeds coupled with ultra-low latency on the Emtel 5G mobile network, significantly enhancing the mobile data browsing experience for customers.

The Information and Communication Technologies Authority (ICTA) of Mauritius granted 5G licenses to the country’s three MNOs — My.t mobile, Emtel, and CHiLi Mauritius — in July 2021, facilitating the deployment of commercial services. In this highly competitive market, Emtel stands out with a 5G network deployment covering 80% of the population, offering low latency that proves essential in the current hybrid work models adopted by businesses.

NEC XON’s role in this success includes vital cell site upgrades to enable 5G deployment. Juniper Networks equipment, forming the core of the network, plays a crucial role in delivering reliable network performance. NEC XON has been a strategic partner of Emtel since 2011, fostering a consultative relationship that goes beyond the traditional vendor-customer dynamic.

“Since 2011, we have served as a strategic partner throughout Emtel’s journey. We have already upgraded them to a 100-gig backbone, and the future holds a 400-gig backbone upgrade,” says Anthony Laing, GM Networking at NEC XON.

In addition to the 5G deployment, Emtel recently launched its METISS fibre cable, further solidifying its position as a bandwidth capacity leader in the region. The upgraded infrastructure not only benefits businesses through enhanced video-conferencing and streaming but also offers improved Internet of Things applications, positively impacting the community at large.

This partnership between NEC XON and Emtel exemplifies a collaborative approach, emphasising a consultative relationship that transcends the conventional vendor-customer dynamic. As technology continues to evolve, NEC XON remains committed to supporting Emtel in its pursuit of innovation and excellence in the telecommunications landscape.

 

About NEC XON

NEC XON is a leading African integrator of ICT solutions and part of NEC, a Japanese global company. NEC XON has operated in Africa since 1963 and delivers communications, energy, safety, security, and digital solutions. It co-creates social value through innovation to help overcome serious societal challenges. The organisation operates in 54 African countries and has a footprint in 16 of them. Regional headquarters are located in South, East, and West Africa. NEC XON is a level 1-certified broad-based black economic empowerment (B-BBEE) business. Discover more at www.nec.xon.co.za.

 

Issued by: Michelle Oelschig, Scarlet Letter 

Contact details: 083-636-1766, michelle@scarletletter.co.za 

 

Viewpoint

At the 2024 MWC held in Barcelona, Liu Kang, President of ICT Marketing & Solution Sales at Huawei, shared his insights into the new opportunities that 5G & BEYOND will bring, and how we can make the most of them

Liu Kang notes how each change in technology innovation has changed our economic development for the better. During the industrial revolution, it took about 100 years for the steam engine to deliver 30% additional growth to the world’s economy. This same economic growth pattern has taken just 20 years to reach in the digital economy era. With 5G, 5.5G and AI this is expected to take just 5 years!

The upgrade from 5G to 5.5G is estimated to increase network capabilities tenfold, with download speeds that will reach 10 Gbps and uplink speeds of 1Gbps, being able to support over 100 billion IoT (internet of things) connections. This sort of network upgrade will allow for a vast range of industry applications, such as The industry’s private line business will extend to private line + ICT services, industrial internet applications will expand from supporting production to core production, and IoT applications will grow from low-speed to encompassing low, medium, and high-speed full-scene services. These developments will create new business opportunities within the industry, says Liu Kang.

Furthermore, upgrading from 5G to 5.5G will allow the 50% of 5G operators who have already released FWA services, to upgrade to FWA Square, which will encompass the following scenarios:

FWA Pro. – aimed at high-end homes, enables the Gbps speed and end-to-end deterministic experience assurance.
FWA Lite. – aimed at oriented to low-end and mid-range requirements, further explores the user space, migrates existing 4G users
FWA Biz – aimed at enterprise use cases, which will utilise low-latency & high-reliability to benefit SMEs.

Liu Kang continues that with speeds of 50 Mbps guaranteed, 5G private lines have been widely used for fast and low-cost deployment. But with 5.5G, these speeds are set to increase to 300 Mbps (guaranteed) and 20ms latency with over 99.999% reliability, which could bring an incredible amount of possibilities for the industry, including significant advancements in telemedicine.

In industry, 5G is used already in many areas, such as mining, where more than 20 operators provide 5G services for more than 400 mines. With 5.5G, these situations can be upgraded with 5.5G smart mine solutions, streamlining the industry, making it safer, and increasing efficiency and profits.

Finally, Liu Kang notes that in 2023, there were 350 million connected vehicles on the road worldwide, with 45% of new vehicles sold reaching s L2+ intelligent level. Here, the smart collaboration of vehicles is paramount for driver safety, “necessitating a highly reliable network with a low latency of 20ms@99%. 5.5G can satisfy this network requirement, E2E technology has been verified in Shanghai, projected to improve traffic efficiency by 30% and reduce people’s commute time by 20%,” says Liu Kang.

In his closing remarks, Liu Kang noted that the development of industry is dependent on the collaboration of business with technology, “Only in this way can a virtuous circle of input and output be formed.”

 

News

Weighed down by a $26 billion debt pile, Dish Network says it will likely pass on the chance to buy more spectrum from T-Mobile

Back in 2020, the controversial $24 billion merger of US mobile giants T-Mobile and Sprint was finally completed, reducing the number of major national operators in the market from four to three.

As part of regulatory remedies applied to the deal, Dish was permitted to purchase all of T-Mobile’s 800 MHz licences for roughly $3.69 billion by June 30, 2023. This was intended to both help Dish establish itself as a national mobile network operator in the US, as well as reducing the massive potential spectrum advantage held by the newly combined T-Mobile.

However, by summer last year, it was clear that Dish was in no position to make the purchase at such a price. After lengthy negotiations, the subsequent dispute between Dish and T-Mobile was ultimately resolved with Dish agreeing to pay a deposit of $100 million in exchange for an extension of the purchase deadline to April 1, 2024.

But now, with that deadline just a month away, Dish says it will be highly unlikely that the company will be able to make the scheduled purchase.

“We no longer believe it is probable that we will exercise the option,” said Dish via parent company EchoStar late last week.

Dish has been struggling to raise additional financing for a number of months now, having invested billions in their new Open RAN-based 5G network, all the while being stung by surging interest rates. The company saw both its mobile and pay-TV subscribers decline last year, leaving investors with little confidence in the business.

The company was reacquired by its once-parent business, satellite company Echostar, earlier this year, in a move seen by many as an attempt to shore up the operator’s finances.

With the spectrum purchase by Dish seemingly out of the question, T-Mobile will now be forced to offload the spectrum via an auction process, provided it raises at least the promised $3.6 billion.

Connected America is just one week away! Join the telecoms ecosystem in discussion around all the hottest topics live in Dallas, Texas. Get your tickets today!

Also in the news:
VMO2 records £3.3bn loss as interest rates begin to bite
Verizon to trial private 5G networks at NHL stadiums
From humble beginnings: The amazing journey of Hormuud Telecom CEO Ahmed Mohamud Yusuf

Customers of broadband ISP Virgin Media (VMO2) are reporting that a recent firmware update to their Hub 5 (Sagemcom F3896LG-VMB) router, which has the version number of LG-RDK_7.6.15-2306.5, appears to have caused the device’s sole 2.5Gbps network (LAN) port to stop functioning correctly. The issue – as covered on Virgin’s Community Forum (credits to Paul […]

The Chief Security and Networks Officer of BT, Howard Watson, has hinted that EE may be in a position to begin their commercial deployment of 5G standalone (5G SA) mobile network technology during the second half of 2024. But they won’t have a better idea of the likely timing until this summer. Most existing 5G […]

New research from Point Topic has revealed how the adoption rates of “full fibre” (FTTP) broadband ISP networks vary between 30 countries within Europe (i.e. how many subscribers take the service vs premises passed). Overall, the average take-up stands at 54.4% (up from 53.3% in mid-2021), while the UK scores just 34.7%. Before we get […]

A small but important development is happening this month as BT finally ends the free distribution of a physical phone book on 31st March 2024. The move, which was announced last year, will bring to end a service that has been running since as far back as 1880. But these days, the vast majority of […]

Network builder and ISP Brsk, which is deploying a gigabit speed Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network across the Midlands of England and beyond (rollout plan), have informed ISPreview that their coverage has grown to pass 450,000 homes (up from 358,000 on 10th Nov 2023). Customer take-up has also increased. The operator – fuelled by an investment […]

Broadband ISP Zen Internet has furnished ISPreview with a small update on their efforts to make their gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based broadband packages available – nationwide – across CityFibre’s entire UK network, which was previously due to complete at the end of 2023. Just to recap. Back in March 2022 we reported that Zen Internet […]

News 

Pressure on the public sector to embrace AI must be “constant and relentless”, he said Deputy PM Oliver Dowden

The UK government has announced that it will test AI systems to increase efficiency and productivity within the civil service. 

Roles that the AI systems could assume include administrative work, analysing responses to government consultations, and drafting preliminary responses to parliamentary inquiries. 

The number of civil servants has skyrocketed in recent years, increasing by over 100,000 since 2016, reaching 519,780 last year. During the same period, the number of employees earning a six-figure salary has also doubled. 

Therefore, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has ordered public services to cut spending to pay for tax cuts, and is expected to signal reductions in income tax or national insurance in next week’s Spring Budget. 

As such, AI is seen as a key technology in making the bureaucracy of government more efficient and reducing staffing costs. 

“It really is the only way, I think, if we want to get on a sustainable path to headcount reduction,” said Dowden speaking to the Telegraph. 

“Remember how much the size of the Civil Service has grown as a result of the pandemic and, and EU exit preparedness. We need to really embrace this stuff to drive the numbers down,” he continued. 

Dowden also cited a recently published report from think tank IPPR which concluded the government could save around £24 billion by increasing AI adoption, which Dowden confirmed is “the sort of target we should be aiming for”. 

Similar AI trials were also announced with the NHS, covering many fields such as diagnostics and prescription tailoring, which if given the go-ahead, will save hundreds of millions of pounds.  

The Deputy PM stressed that pressure on the public sector to adopt AI must be “constant and relentless”, adding “we can’t have the private sector adopting it at pace, and then us being laggards”. 

To aid in this AI transition, the ‘i.AI’ – the team of scientists, engineers, and experts commissioned last year by the government to work with various public sector departments in the adoption of AI – will be doubled in number, reaching 70 personnel.  

Keep up to date with the latest telecoms news by subscribing to the Total Telecom daily newsletter 

Also in the news:
VMO2 records £3.3bn loss as interest rates begin to bite
Verizon to trial private 5G networks at NHL stadiums
From humble beginnings: The amazing journey of Hormuud Telecom CEO Ahmed Mohamud Yusuf