News

News The deal includes the supply of both 4G and 5G network equipment over the next three years This week, Vodafone Idea has concluded a $3.6 billion telecoms equipment deal with Ericsson, Nokia, and Samsung. The deal will see the trio of vendors provide Idea with equipment over the next three years. Idea will use this equipment to expand its 4G population coverage from 1.03 billion to 1.2 billion, as well as launching 5G in selected markets and expanding existing capacity. Idea says this will...

Viewpoint [Singapore, September 17, 2024] At the FutureNet Asia 2024 Summit in Singapore, the General Manager of Huawei ADN Solution, Sam Wang, delivered a keynote speech titled “AI for Network, Ushering in L4 New Era.” Sam Wang, General Manager of Huawei ADN Solution delivers the keynote speech As communications service providers (CSPs) worldwide strive towards network automation, Autonomous Networks (AN) have become an industry consensus. The AN Level 4 industry blueprint, released jointly...

News  “AI’s potential to drive economic growth and scientific progress is enormous, but Europe’s fragmented decision-making is putting it at risk of being left behind,” reads the open letter published in the Financial Times  A coalition of major tech companies, researchers, and institutions has issued an open letter calling on European regulators to provide clear, consistent rules for AI development to ensure the EU remains competitive in the global race for AI supremacy.  The letter, signed...

Telecoms and broadband giant BT, which is already in the process of recruiting another 500 UK apprentices and graduates for 2024 (here), has today committed £4m to support a new Apprenticeship Fund that is designed to support SMEs, charities and public sector organisations across England by providing access to funding over an initial 4-year period. Since 2017, companies with an annual wage bill of more than £3m have been required to pay the “apprenticeship levy“, using the funds to recruit and...

Interview At Connected Britain 2024, we spoke with Openreach’s chief commercial officer, Katie Milligan, to discuss the company’s latest Project Gigabit contracts, sustainability progress, and how Sky’s new deal with CityFibre will affect competition in the retail market. Check out the full interview...

The business division of mobile network operator O2 (Virgin Media) has today confirmed that, as part of their plan to switch-off 2G and 3G services across the United Kingdom, they’ll also be withdrawing inbound roaming services on both of those older mobile networks from 1st October 2025. Just to recap. Last year saw VMO2 become the final operator to reveal their plan for switching off their 3G mobile (mobile broadband) network (here), which will begin in 2025 and the withdrawal will then...

Mobile operator and broadband ISP Sure has successfully managed to improve the 4G and 5G signal across the north of Guernsey (English Channel Island) by hiding a new mast in plain sight, which was achieved by deploying the new infrastructure in a marina and making it look like a tall white yacht mast. Trying to hide or disguise large mobile masts is rarely an easy task. Over the years we’ve seen various attempts at concealment, some of which work better than others (e.g. painting them to blend...

The Welsh Government has today issued a progress update on their Local Broadband Fund (LBF), which was launched in 2020 and has so far allocated £12m – across four funding phases – to help local authorities and social enterprises to deliver faster broadband networks to areas and sites that need it (i.e. those unable to access speeds of 30Mbps+ today). For example, three adult residential care homes in Newport, including Parklands Care Home, now have gigabit-capable full-fibre broadband for the...

The Scottish Government has finally caught up with similar legislation in England (here and here), which was introduced at the end of 2022, by effectively mandating that property developers must ensure their new build homes are constructed with support for gigabit-capable broadband connections. This will become effective from 1st January 2025. At present every new building and building unit in Scotland must already be designed and constructed in such a way that a “high-speed ready” (30Mbps+)...

Interview Is the new Labour government’s approach to digital infrastructure going to be effective? In this Connected Britain interview, Simon Miller, Director of Public and Regional Affairs at Virgin Media O2, describes the “encouraging” discussions with government so far and how the UK’s digital infrastructure landscape is shifting in 2024. Check out the full interview from the link...