News

The French operator said it will shut down its 2G networks in 2026, followed by its 3G network in 2029

This week, Bouygues Telecom’s B2B Market Director, Jean-Christophe Ravaux, has been quoted by French news media L’Usine Digitale suggesting that the company still has a few years to go before shutting down its 2G and 3G networks.

According to the article, Ravaux says that the French mobile operator is aiming to shut down its 2G network in 2026 and its 3G network by 2029.

“The closure of these networks is a fundamental trend because these technologies are coming to an end,” he said. “That’s why it makes sense to reallocate these frequencies to 4G and 5G for better quality of service. This is the meaning of the story. We have therefore decided, after studying the interest for our customers, to switch off our 2G network at the end of 2026 and our 3G network at the end of 2029.”

This schedule is roughly in-line with that the company’s local rivals; Altice France (SFR) said earlier this year that they are also aiming to decommission their 2G network in 2026 and their 3G network by the end of 2028, with Orange saying it would target 2025 for the shutdown of 2G and 2028 for 3G.

It is worth noting here that strategies regarding the shutdown of 2G and 3G networks vary widely from market to market. In the UK, for example, all of the national mobile operators have committed to shutting down their 3G networks by the end of 2024, though 2G networks may, in some cases, remain operational until 2033.

This is because 2G networks provide a useful low-power fallback, is well suited for machine-to-machine communications (such as for smart meters), and in some cases is the only network available in some of the country’s most rural regions.

France’s neighbour Germany has been even faster to sunset these older networks, with all of the country’s mobile operators having shut down their 3G services already, and most targeting 2G decommissioning by the end of 2025.

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News

The regulator says its provisional view is to not intervene over Openreach’s plans to further reduce fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) product prices for ISPs

Today, Ofcom has opened a consultation on Openreach’s controversial proposed discount plan, Equinox 2, which would offer major discounts to ISPs purchasing the operators wholesale fibre products.

In its statement, Ofcom said that their provisional decision would be to allow this latest wave of discounts, saying that the move would not threaten competition.

“We have carefully assessed Openreach’s offer – taking into account the interests of consumers, as well as the impact on competitors and retail broadband providers,” Ofcom said in a statement. “Our provisional view is that we should not intervene to prevent Openreach from introducing Equinox 2. We consider the offer is not anti-competitive and is consistent with the rules we consulted on before introducing them under our market review in 2021. Maintaining these rules for the period of the review is also important to achieving certainty for all companies looking to invest in broadband networks.”

“In our provisional view, the proposed offer is consistent with our primary strategic goal of promoting investment in high-speed networks to deliver fast, affordable broadband to people and business across the UK.”

Openreach’s Equinox discounts are a controversial topic for the UK fibre industry.

The original Equinox discounts were first envisaged following the publication of Ofcom’s Wholesale Fixed Telecoms Market Review back in March 2021. Regulatory changes within this document allowed Openreach to potentially launch a range FTTP product discounts – now knowns as Equinox 1 – saying doing so would help keep their products competitive versus the typically cheaper products available from altnets.

In case cases, these original Equinox offers would provide price cuts for ISPs of up to a third for fibre products.

Naturally, this was a controversial proposal, with the UK’s altnet community arguing that it would be unfeasible for them to drop their prices to similar levels, thereby squeezing them out of the market. They also argued that this pricing would be a huge barrier for new market entrants to compete with the incumbent.

Nonetheless, Ofcom ultimately allowed Openreach to launch the Equinox offers, which were formally introduced in October 2021.

Now, Ofcom’s seemingly affable attitude towards further discounts in the form of Equinox 2 could set the altnets on the war path once again. While the provisional decision is certainly in keeping with Ofcom’s original ruling over Equinox 1, additional discounts will heap further pressure onto altnets and we are likely to see significant push-back during this consultation period.

In fact, some legal challenges against these discounts have already been raised, with CityFibre lodging an official complaint to the Competition and Markets Authority late last year, arguing that Ofcom was allowing Openreach to pursue “an aggressive strategy to foreclose infrastructure competition in the UK fibre broadband market”.

This is not the first time that CityFibre has been at the helm of a legal challenge against Equinox, having seen a previous appeal to the Competition Appeal Tribunal rejected last year.

Ofcom’s final decision on Equinox 2 will be announced at the end of March.

How will Openreach’s Equinox discounts affect the UK fibre market? Join the broadband community in discussion at this year’s live Connected North conference

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Mobile operator Three UK has confirmed that they too have joined EE (here) and Vodafone (here) in starting to rollout their ultrafast 5G (mobile broadband) service on the London Underground (tube trains), with Archway, Tufnell Park, and Notting Hill Gate stations this week becoming the first to be upgraded. David Hennessy, Three UK’s CTO, told […]

A short but interesting debate took place yesterday in the House of Lords (Parliament), which saw many cross-party peers call on the UK government – represented by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (DCMS) – to do more to help tackle the impact of recent above-inflation price hikes by broadband ISPs. The debate, which provides an […]

The Welsh Government (WG) has today signalled its intention to follow England’s updated Building Regulations by launching a consultation into proposals that would echo those, not least by requiring housing developers to “ensure all new build houses be equipped with gigabit broadband capability“. Just to recap. At present around 57.07% of premises in Wales are […]

SpaceX’s popular Starlink service, which harnesses a mega constellation of compact satellites in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) to deliver low latency ultrafast broadband speeds to homes, has been given approval to test up to 200 models of its “next-generation phased array antennas” (i.e. the dish that goes on your home) to improve connectivity. Customers in […]

Viewpoint Article

By Azfar Aslam, Vice President & Chief Technology Officer, Europe at Nokia

For a long time, industries have been looking for ways to boost productivity, efficiency and resilience, with digitalisation becoming one of the central methods to achieve that. COVID-19 has allowed companies to accelerate their digital transformation journeys, opening up a myriad of opportunities many never thought possible before.

One path many have taken is the adoption of emerging Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) such as artificial intelligence (AI), edge cloud computing and SaaS models. Driven by trends such as environmental sustainability and cybersecurity, this move will allow for more innovative solutions to be born, and, fused with 5G networks, is set to add $8 trillion to the global GDP by 2030.

Whilst most digital industries such as online retail, media and banking have pivoted during COVID, more physical sectors such as manufacturing, healthcare, transportation and energy have only scratched the surface of the significant value that digitalisation can  generate in terms of increased safety, productivity and efficiency (SPE).

Luckily, the world is now approaching the ‘big inversion’ – a new ecosystem of 5G and key-related technologies such as edge cloud infrastructure, softwarisation, augmented intelligence/machine learning, as well as advanced sensors and robotics.  Infused with these capabilities that we refer to as 5G+, the Operational Technologies in physical and digital industries will find the necessary solutions to undergo the much needed digital transformation within the next ten years.

As a result, the need for digital skills of the future will become more critical, fuelled by the emerging technologies powering Web3, the cloud and perhaps one of the biggest ICT innovations of all, the Metaverse.

The rise of the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse

Described as ‘the next evolution in social connection and the successor to the mobile internet’, the Metaverse’s focus to date has been on consumer-led experiences driven by brands’ engagement. However, the biggest and most impactful opportunities will come from other forms of this virtual and augmented environment: the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse. It is these applications which will allow organisations to blur the lines between physical and digital environments and reshape the world –  referred to as ‘digital twins’.

In practice, this means that projects can take place virtually before being replicated in the real world. For example, using Augmented and Virtual Realities (AR/VR), employees at a factory will be able to design and test equipment before deploying it to a live production line, thus limiting risks and more precisely, predicting production volumes. The current use of 5G+ networks in certain industries is already a great testimony to the further benefits the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse can bring.

We are already reaping rewards from digitalisation in several industries. An analysis of an iron ore mine in Australia showed that the use of private wireless networks instead of WiFi had seen a 20x reduction in wireless access points and a 4x reduction in the personnel required to maintain sites, bringing annual savings of €70 million. In another case, a farm in the Netherlands deployed a precision farming approach with 5G technologies where an application identified good crops from weeds and remotely triggered automatic spraying to eliminate the weeds. This resulted in a 6.7x increase in productivity, and if the same technology was applied to at least 15% of global farms, would lead to an increase in yields by up to 300 million tonnes and a reduction in water consumption by up to 150 billion cubic meters annually.

Further advancement of the Metaverse and the ability to initiate or replicate projects in the virtual environment will mean less time, lower costs and reduced risks. As mentioned by Nokia CEO Pekka Lundmark at Brooklyn summit, take the Brooklyn Bridge as an example – it took 14 years to build, with at least 20 casualties back in the 19th century. If the construction took place today, the approach would be completely different.

Using 3D modelling in the virtual environment, engineers can design construction projects like bridges down to the smallest detail and plot their life cycles up to 100 years in the future. Using the bridge as an example, the Enterprise Metaverse allows project players to co-design and interact with the bridge no matter where they are, providing space for limitless collaboration. Similarly, the Industrial Metaverse allows for sections of the bridge to be prefabricated in factories using AI-powered systems, with production workers ‘operating’ machines through AR and VR tools. Moreover, once the bridge is built, applying sensors to every stress point allows authorities to monitor its condition in real-time and maintain it using drones and robotic technologies. The Brooklyn Bridge of the 21st century could be completed in less than a third of the time, with zero fatalities, and maintained without significant closures and disruption to traffic.

But it’s not just the construction industry that can benefit from the Metaverse. Break-through discoveries in medicine and science will happen at a quicker pace too, allowing for organisations and nations to come together to solve pressing world problems such as finding a cure for cancer or tackling the climate crisis: not just leveraging the power of today’s cloud, but realtime interactions with the genome or climate digital twins from anywhere in the world Clearly, the advantages are numerous. However, in order to allow for a fully immersive experience, there are a few other technology solutions that will need to catch up first.

The connectivity opportunities of the Metaverse

The Metaverse is accessed via smart devices and wearables, which require a high-speed, flexible and stable internet connection. To accommodate this, networks need to make significant advancements in latency, reliability and speed, including retiring or recycling legacy 2G and 3G networks and frequencies in favour of those focused on 5G and 6G.

As we enter a new era of unprecedented immersion and industrial digitalisation, there will be a new level of expectations set for network providers based on the reliability, ubiquity, security and sustainability of the networks they operate on. Whilst consumer adoption will come after several years, we are already seeing industrial and enterprise adoption taking place at a fast pace. To cite an example, IBM already has a digital twin exchange platform that allows organisations to purchase digital twins from their partners. With this in mind, there is a clear argument to move towards a standard of open accessibility for both established and emerging companies looking to improve and grow the potential of the Metaverse.

The launch of 6G networks will finally see the full fusion of our digital and physical lives, which will help companies build the underlying infrastructure of the Metaverse. The development of programmes such as Hexa-X-II, the second phase of European 6G flagship initiative led by the European Commission that will form the basis of 6G standardisation, will also allow organisations to come together and drive future developments in connectivity.

Collaboration is the key to success

The Metaverse economy is predicted to reach over $824 billion by 2030. Organisations investing in this technology now are the ones that will win the initial innovation race. However, the Metaverse can only achieve its full potential if organisations work together to create an open, secure, ecologically sustainable and all-inclusive environment that encourages innovation and translates into value for everyone involved. This will require heavy investment and technology adaptation, sophisticated content creation tools and large servers in order to maintain the stability of the system and create a truly immersive experience.

For this reason alone, the Metaverse can never be solely owned by one person or organisation, and initiatives such as the Metaverse Standards Forum should help drive industry standards of cooperation and openness. Long gone are the days when technology start-ups were able to break through and build their empires on their own. As we move from the 5G to the 6G era, digital transformation will take over every industry through technology collaborations and digital-physical fusion ecosystems.

By 2030, everything taking place in the digital world will affect the physical one and vice versa, and every physical object that can be linked to the digital world will be connected. Whilst many consumers will be looking at Metaverse as a new means to join communities and engaging activities, businesses and entire nations will be using the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse to boost innovation, collaboration and economy, as well as to create safer and simpler ways of operating highly complex technologies. This is where the Metaverse really does become exciting.

Keep up with all the latest news and views from the telecoms sector with Total Telecom’s daily newsletter

Also in the news:
Regulators set deadline for decision on Orange–VOO tie-up
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Ofcom has today opened an expected consultation into Openreach’s ‘Equinox 2‘ discount scheme, which will further reduce the wholesale prices of their Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) based broadband products for ISPs and thus consumers. But their “provisional” view is “not intervene“, which is likely to anger alternative networks (AltNets). As we reported at the end of last […]

Mobile operator Vodafone has confirmed that customers using the Notting Hill Gate station on the London Underground have started to receive their ultrafast 5G (mobile broadband) signal. The tunnels from Holland Park to Queensway (Central Line) and Archway to Kentish Town (Northern Line) will follow by the weekend. The move to introduce 5G on the […]

BT’s trading update for the nine months to 31 December 2022 showed a fall in revenues but a massive growth in profit in what the company described as ‘strong performance in tough market conditions.’

Neil Shah, Director of Content and Strategy at Edison Group, reaffirmed BT’s own statement saying “Today’s announcement from BT Group is a welcome one for investors and only just below market expectations. The company reiterated its full-year outlook, despite seeing third-quarter revenues slip by 3% to £5.2bn, with adjusted earnings rising 2% to £2.01bn.”

Post-tax profit grew 49 per cent to £1.3billion for the latter nine months of 2022, although revenue fell 3%. The strong performance was driven on one hand by the formation of a 50-50 JV with Warner Bros. Discovery, boosting the division’s underlying earnings by 15%, and on the other hand by the performance  of the group around fibre-to-the-premises customers.

It was the latter area that prompted Philip Jansen, Chief Executive, to say “On full fibre, we’re building – and now connecting – like fury: 9.6 million premises reached to date, with 29% already connected”.

More controversially he is quoted by the Financial Times as later saying “There is only going to be one national network,” and “Why do you need to have multiple providers?”

It is likely to be these latter comments that will likely draw ire from the likes of CityFibre and VirginMedia O2 as will Jansen’s comment that the market would ultimately be just a “couple of big players” a process that would “end in tears” for many of the other operators.

CityFibre’s Greg Mesch in particular said publicly at Connected Britain in 2019 that “that no one operator can deliver on the UK’s fibre targets alone” and the company has just reported 2022 to be their most productive year ever, with the network footprint increasing 83%. However yesterday CityFibre showed its not all plain sailing, announcing a restructuring process that could result in up to 20% of their 2,000 strong workforce losing their jobs.

Greg Mesch, CityFibre’s CEO stressed the need to take responsible financial and operational decisions saying, “The UK’s economy is struggling, and this is affecting both the market and our customers.”

How many operators can the UK market support? Join the debate around the rollout of fibre networks at our Connected North event in Manchester this April. Find out more here.