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News

The deal will see private equity firm EQT Partners take a 67% stake in SK Shieldus

The deal will see EQT acquire the entirety of Macquarie Group’s 37% in the business, with the rest of the equity being purchased from SK Square directly.

After the sale, SK Square will retain a 32% stake in the business.

SK Shieldus currently provides security infrastructure across 680,000 commercial customer sites and more than 100 central monitoring and dispatch centres across South Korea. The company also provides options for both physical and cyber protection at strategic customer locations.

The company’s key partners include South Korea’s police and security services.

“The company is a clear leader in both the Korean physical and cyber security markets and EQT Value-Add Infrastructure is excited about partnering with SK Square to support SK Shieldus as it continues to roll out new digitized security solutions and invest in the decarbonisation of its vehicle fleet,” said Sang Jun Suh, Managing Director and Head of South Korea for EQT’s Infrastructure Advisory Team.

As always, the transaction is subject to the typical regulatory approvals, with the deal expected to close in Q3 this year.

Originally named ADT Caps, SK Shieldus spun off and given its new name back in 2021, with the company saying it would leverage artificial intelligence, cloud computing and quantum-safe security capabilities, the company will double down on new growth engines. Its four major focuses were given as cyber security, physical security, convergence security and safety and care.

Following the spinoff, SK Group quickly planned an initial public offering worth around $2.8 billion. However, in September last year, SK Group said they had pulled the plug on a plan citing unfavourable global economic conditions.

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Also in the news:
Viasat–Inmarsat merger gets provisional greenlight from CMA
Verizon shuffles executive team in search of growth
Ericsson to pay DoJ $206.7m over bribery scandal

Press Release

Orange Business today announced that it has been selected by Lucid Motors, the American electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer, to be the preferred European partner for its next-generation in-vehicle connectivity and digital expertise. Guided by its focus on innovation, Lucid plans to sell its all-electric Lucid vehicles direct to consumers as it expands its operations in Europe, offering infotainment and telematics connectivity from Orange Business.

In addition to Orange Business providing seamless pan-European IoT and Internet connectivity for Lucid’s software-defined vehicles, Orange has helped Lucid orchestrate the customer journey in Europe, simplifying and navigating complex regulatory requirements. Furthermore, Orange is now directly integrated into Lucid’s manufacturing supply chain and helped them adapt connectivity test procedures for vehicles delivered into Europe. In terms of end-user benefits, services by Orange enable infotainment and Internet-enabled content, including navigation, security and communication tools, diagnostics, and streaming audio. Additionally, over-the-air updates are pushed to vehicles to ensure the most up-to-date software to deliver a premium Lucid customer experience.

“Lucid is not only building sleek and luxurious EVs for sustainable mobility, but they are keenly focused on delivering a premium user experience. Providing a personalized customer experience that creates value is exactly how Orange Business wants to support its customers. We are proud to have the application development, data analytics, network and integration experience, and assets to help American automotive companies like Lucid expand operations in Europe,” said Scott Williams, Senior Vice President of the Americas, Orange Business.

Orange is a licensed and experienced Electronic Communication Services (ECS) provider for both IoT and Internet Access services. This provides significant support for OEMs looking to navigate the complexity of the European regulatory environment with both EU requirements and individual country provisions. When it comes to expertise in the IoT market, Orange Business is once again positioned as a Leader in the 2023 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Managed IoT Connectivity Services, Worldwide – the sixth consecutive time that the company’s Completeness of Vision and Ability to Execute have been recognized.

Want to keep up to date with all of the latest telecoms news? Receive Total Telecom’s daily newsletter direct to your inbox

Also in the news:
Viasat–Inmarsat merger gets provisional greenlight from CMA
Verizon shuffles executive team in search of growth
Ericsson to pay DoJ $206.7m over bribery scandal

News

Almost three years on since the peak of the ‘untrusted vendors’ debate, Germany may move to place more direct sanctions on Huawei and ZTE

This week, reports from German media site Die Zeit suggest that the country is currently planning to ban the nation’s mobile operators from using 5G equipment made by the Chinese vendors Huawei and ZTE.

Exactly what types of equipment would be included in such a ban is currently unclear, but may include a number of key components already built into existing networks.

If this does turn out to be the case, it would present the German operators with an expensive and long-winded process of removing and replacing this equipment from their existing networks.

Back in 2020, fuelled in part by geopolitical tensions between the US and China as well as upcoming 5G rollouts across the continent, European governments were heavily scrutinising telecoms network equipment providers on security grounds.

At the time, the US government was arguing that Huawei and ZTE’s role in national network infrastructure represented a national security risk, potentially giving the Chinese state access to sensitive European data. The Chinese vendors, on the other hand, said that they were being unfairly discriminated against, noting that their equipment had undergone the prerequisite security checks, just like any other potential vendor.

By the end of the year, the UK and Sweden had banned Huawei and ZTE from their networks outright, ordering their operators to remove gradually existing equipment from these vendors over the coming years. Other European nations, however, took a more tentative approach, conducting their own investigations into the matter and refusing to issue an outright ban.

Germany was in the latter camp, with the government repeatedly delaying a formal decision and rejecting calls for a ban.

It was around this time that the EU released its ‘5G security toolbox’, which aimed to provide guidelines for 5G network security. Alongside following these recommendations, Germany itself passed a new IT security law in 2021, that would allow the government to intervene in telecoms contracts related to ‘untrusted vendors’ and issues of national security. Taken together, it was posited that these measures would represent a de facto ban on telecoms operators signing new contracts with the likes of Huawei and ZTE.

In reality, however, it seems that this new law has posed little challenge to Huawei and ZTE, with the new law’s special mechanism having rarely been exercised, and never at scale.

By the end of last year, a report from consulting firm Strand Consult was announced showing the extent of the role that Huawei in particular still played in German networks, with estimates suggesting the vendor’s equipment now accounts for 59% of Germany’s 5G RAN and 57% of its 4G RAN.

Now, it would seem that this report, coupled with changing attitudes within the relatively new administration under Olal Scholz, are forcing the government to re-examine the issue.

According to the report from Die Zeit, Germany’s Federal Office for Information Security and the Federal Ministry of the Interior are currently conducting tests on 5G equipment currently deployed in the nation’s networks. While these tests will not formally be completed until the summer, the report suggests the existing results are already ‘clear’ enough for the government to begin planning a ban.

It is perhaps no coincidence that this news comes just a day after China’s premier XI Jinping officially began an unprecedented third term as the head of state. In various speeches at the annual political meeting, Xi said the country must strive for greater self-reliance and a dominant market position when it comes to science and technology.

Germany remains China’s biggest trading partner, with a particular reliance on the Asian nation for the import of rare earth metals and other raw materials.

What impact would a ban on Huawei and ZTE network equipment have on the German telecoms industry? Join the operators in discussion about this and other key issues at Total Telecom’s Connected Germany conference live in Munich

Also in the news:
Viasat–Inmarsat merger gets provisional greenlight from CMA
Verizon shuffles executive team in search of growth
Ericsson to pay DoJ $206.7m over bribery scandal

Broadband ISP 4th Utility, which is rolling out a gigabit speed Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network to serve UK homes (SDU) and large residential blocks (MDU), has today announced the appointment of Steve Wilson to be the CEO of their new consumer business unit. The provider, which holds an ambition to treble its customer base over the […]

The Welsh Government (WG) has published a Q4 2022 progress update on their £52.5m Phase 2 Superfast Cymru contract with Openreach (BT), which reveals that a total of 35,770 extra premises (up from 34,122 in Q3) have now gained access to their gigabit speed Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband ISP network. The original plan consisted of two […]