SK Telecom Achieves the World’s First Live TV Broadcasting over Commercial 5G Network

SK Telecom today announced that it has achieved the world’s first live TV broadcasting using its commercial 5G network and live broadcasting solution.

Light Reading's 41 Most Popular Stories in 2018

Everything from enterprise strategies to 5G devices caught our audiences' attention during 2018. At a time when so many changes are bearing down on the telecom world, it's clear that a lot of us still have our heads in the cloud.

Serverless and Knative Underline Cloud Native Evolution

Knative is seen as an important catalyst for unifying the dozens of serverless platforms in the market.

Networking Vendors Jump On 400GbE in 2018

The 400GbE standard is four times as fast as 100 gig Ethernet, and it offers an economically attractive price-per-port and better power efficiency.

Who Went Where: The Top Personnel Changes of 2018

From Hans Vestberg’s quick rise at Verizon to Google Cloud’s leadership shakeup, this year was full of personnel changes that turned heads.

2019: AI takes root across telecom industry

The artificial intelligence seeds that were sown this year will start to bear fruit in 2019.

2019 Preview: Video to be key part of operators' strategies

It’s no secret that video accounts for the bulk of wireless traffic.

2019 Preview: Midband spectrum takes center stage

All eyes are on the 3.7-4.2 GHz band, also known as the C-Band, as the industry moves into 2019.

Light Reading's 22 Most Popular 5G Stories of 2018

2018 is the year that the next generation wireless technology went viral.

DoJ Won't Pursue Comcast-NBCU Merger Probe – Report

Trump had drawn attention to American Cable Association's call for the US DoJ to open antitrust investigation into Comcast's ownership of NBCUniversal.

Why SCTE Is Plunging Into Patent Pool

Seeking to expand its role in the cable tech sector, the industry training and standards group is now looking to patent new products in the energy management and system operations areas.

5G Will (Almost) Make Smart Cities Possible

The reliability of 5G networks is critical to the success of smart cities applications. This puts network testing back into the communications technology spotlight.

Light Reading's 23 Most Popular TV Stories & Interviews of 2018

Light Reading's on-camera coverage during the year spanned a wide range of topics and technologies, from 5G and 4K to HDR, AI, automation, edge computing and more...

Infinera Corporate Restructuring Plan Hits 53 Jobs in California

The initial phase of the program will cost between $6 million and $8 million and is linked to Infinera's recently closed $430 million acquisition of Coriant.

Trump Considers New Attack on Huawei, ZTE

But Huawei may be getting the best kind of revenge. The company says its revenues in 2018 grew 21 percent over the previous year.

Dell Runs the Gauntlet to Achieve Its Goal of Going Public

It took Michael Dell 12 months of battling shareholders — and ultimately paying them about $14 billion — to once again take his company public.

2019: SD-WAN vendor numbers will shrink

Using the proverbial hockey-stick analogy, SD-WAN will continue to boom in 2019, but a maturing market will bring on some changes.

2019 Preview: Open RAN efforts gain momentum

Perhaps nowhere is disruption more evident than in the efforts around the radio access network and freeing that up for more competition.

2019 Preview: Mobile grows further beyond phones

A trend that has shown some signs of growth will likely find additional footing. That trend is the internet of things.

ZTE Spent 2018 Engulfed in International Intrigue

ZTE's year included claims of espionage, direct intervention from President Donald Trump, a growing list of countries banning use of its equipment, and a $1 billion hit to its bottom line.

Trump to Ban Huawei, ZTE in US in January?

The Trump administration reportedly could bring an emergency ban on US companies buying Huawei & ZTE equipment in January 2019.

Digital Transformation: Telcos Face the Future

How MEF's work impacts telco businesses, SD-WAN and digital transformation, from the perspectives of AT&T, PCCW and Verizon.

Huawei Expects 2018 Revenues of $108.5B

In its annual message to the industry, a defiant Huawei boasts of an annual sales increase of 21%.

SSIMWAVE Makes Waves in Video Quality

Canadian video tech startup apes human perception to track video quality on any screen.

2018 Is a Year Huawei Would Like to Forget

Can it get much worse than having its CFO arrested and being accused of violating sanctions?

Air Bud Saves Money, Scores Slam Dunk With Cohesity

When Air Bud’s legacy storage system gave out, leaving the film company with no way to backup or restore files, “it was panic,” said Technical Director Tyson Clark.

North America to Dominate 5G Connections in 2019

Industry trade group 5G Americas predicts that there will be 336,000 5G connections in North Americas by the end of 2019. That will account for 47 percent of global 5G connections.

2019 Preview: 5G to ripen, at least a little bit

If 2018 was the appetizer for 5G, 2019 will certainly deliver a main course (though it may be one of several).

2019: The edge (pick one) heats up

Forces are aligning to make the edge burn red-hot across the telecommunications industry next year.

2019 Preview: CBRS ecosystem proves how sharing works

2019 marks the year when the Citizens Broadband Radio Service ecosystem breaks out.

The Top Acquisitions of 2018 in SDxCentral's World

Open source and containers found themselves at the center of M&A activity this year.

Light Reading's 23 Most Popular Cisco Stories in 2018

Cisco transformed its service provider business, fended off VMware and white box threats and beefed up network automation.

This Olde Website

Fire up the Flux Capacitor! It's time for another jog down Memory Lane of the Web to visit sites from yesteryear and the sepia-tinged digital storefronts of Apple, AOL, Huawei, Netflix, TiVo... and many more.

Digital Transformation: Telecom Executives Sound Off

Thought leaders from AT&T, PCW and Verizon Partner Solutions talk with MEF about their priorities for now and the coming year.

Light Reading's 22 Most Popular Huawei Stories in 2018

Why have it your way when you can have it Huawei?

Vendors Ready Themselves for 5G Capex Influx

Auctions of 5G-suitable spectrum are now generating billions. Meanwhile, vendors are waiting on a different bounty — the further billions operators will need to spend to finally realize their 5G ambitions.

Cloud Constellation Banks $100M for Space Laser Cloud Security

Christmas came early for Cloud Constellation, which scored $100 million in funding toward its dream of building a network of orbiting satellites to secure cloud data.

Cologix gets in the hyperscale game with COLO-D deal

After six months of due diligence, Cologix pulled the trigger this week by buying Montreal-based COLO-D.

28 GHz spectrum auction limps toward holidays

Bidding action continues to dwindle in the FCC’s auction of 28 GHz licenses as the holiday break looms.

Sprint to pay $330M in settlement with N.Y. attorney general

New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood announced Sprint will pay a record-breaking $330 million settlement.

Tech M&A in 2018: The year of the bad deal?

With a tech market crash punctuating the year, 2018 will probably be remembered as a year of bad tech deals.

AT&T to begin upgrading existing LTE phones to ‘5G E’

AT&T will soon begin changing the “LTE” indicator on some of its current Android phones to “5G E” in roughly 400 markets.

IBM Will Use Samsung’s 7nm Tech for Data Center and Cloud Servers

The news comes as other manufactures including TSMC race to bring their next-gen silicon to market — and challenge Intel’s long-standing chip dominance in the data center.

SDxCentral's Weekly Roundup — December 21, 2018

Google Cloud acquires DevOps Research and Assessment (DORA); Telecom Italia (TIM), Qualcomm, and Ericsson successfully complete a live video call using 5G mmWave spectrum; AT&T offers new security service.

Top telco execs make their 2019 predictions

With 2018 rapidly heading toward the rearview mirror, it's time to take a look at what might be coming down the road in 2019.

A bunch of telecoms predictions for 2019

It’s that time of year again and before we set about the food, booze and pressies with shameless abandon we decided to collate some predictions from the cognoscenti of our industry.

Composable Infrastructure Players to Watch in 2019

The technology is still in its infancy with only a handful of vendors shipping products. We expect to see more action in 2019.

Liberty Global's European Shrinkage

The cable giant is selling more European assets – how far might it go? And what might it do with its prime asset, the UK's Virgin Media?

VIVA & Huawei Strike Digital Oil in Kuwait

Without a solid digital transformation strategy, mobile network operators will face challenges to adapt to ever increasing customer expectations and expedite time to market for the new services.

Masergy's Ray Watson: Customers Want Security but Pay for Performance

Ray Watson, VP of Global Technology at Masergy, discusses the challenge of securing virtualized telco infrastructure and weighs in on how to handle corporate hacks as well.

AT&T's Nighthawk 5G: Potential Download Could Cover a Wide Range of Speeds

Expect a wide range of download speeds from AT&Ts Nighthawk 5G unit as you use the hotspot in AT&T's initial 5G cities.

Huawei Preps 'Security Transparency Center,' Gets Vote of Confidence From 5G Customer

Huawei is continuing its push-back against its international critics with details of security testing facilities, while one of its customers in Korea talks of its confidence in the embattled vendor.

Eurobites: Liberty Global Offloads East European DTH Ops

In today's EMEA regional roundup: Liberty Global sells eastern European satellite TV operations; 5G in Estonia; Vodafone needs a new auditor; taxing times in Finland for freelance Santas.

WiCipedia: Israeli Tech Flounders, CIOs Make Change & How to 'Bust Down Those Doors'

This week in our WiC roundup: Israel struggles to find techies; CIOs have diversity sway; the visibility lynchpin; and more.

Telia extends 5G reach to Estonia

Just a few weeks after lighting up a 5G network in Sweden, Telia has taken the connectivity euphoria across the Baltic Sea to Estonia.

Our supply chain won’t tread the ZTE path – Huawei CEO

One of the biggest stories of the year, and one of the major catalysts of the US/China trade war, was ZTE’s brush with extinction, but Huawei thinks it’s robust enough to withstand the US economic dirty-bomb.

US Indicts Chinese Hackers in MSP Network Scheme

While the government didn’t name the network providers, Reuters reports that HPE and IBM were among the compromised networks.

An Ode to Christmas: The Twelve months of Telco

It’s not very good, but here’s another attempts at a Telecoms.com poem. This time around we’ve destroyed the much loved ‘Twelve Days of Christmas’ and wrestled in some of the stories from the last twelve months.

Colt is lining up several key projects in early 2019

Colt Technology Services will kick off 2019 with several key initiatives it has been building toward over the past few years.

Comcast refuses to go public with assessment of Sprint/T-Mobile merger

Sprint and T-Mobile are urging Comcast to say publicly how it believes it will be affected by the proposed merger between the companies.

Automation is the top funding priority for IT—survey

IT departments from around the world have rated operations automation as their top funding priority for next year.

The Kubernetes Top 5 Hits of 2018

The Kubernetes project made a lot of progress in 2018 in terms of maturity, stability, and scalability, which helped drive M&A activity and a greater focus on security.

AT&T’s new tower deals cut rent costs in half

According to AT&T's vice president of tower strategy, the company's efforts to reduce costs are paying off.

Intel, Dell Study Finds Data Center Expansion Eats Up the Bulk of IT Teams’ Work

It concludes that IT teams are looking to new technologies like artificial intelligence to meet their data center demands.

Oracle’s Purchase of Talari Makes It the First Major Public Cloud Provider to Offer SD-WAN

Oracle had previously tried to create its own SD-WAN technology, but it couldn’t get it to market fast enough for its customers.

Huawei CEO hits back at security claims

Huawei, and China on the whole for that matter, has become the telco industry’s punching bag over the last couple of months, but Rotating CEO Ken Hu has hit back at the allegations.

CityFibre bags £1.1bn for nationwide fibre rollout

During yesteryear, CityFibre was known for moaning for the sake of moaning, but in securing a debt package of £1.12 billion, the firm’s ambitions are starting to look very real and very interesting.

Farewell, Fierce

At the end of this month I’ll be leaving Fierce. I’m excited about my next gig, but I’m sad to be leaving an extraordinary team.

Ericsson Turnaround Could Limit Growth Potential, Says TBR

The report cited a divergent business path compared with Nokia and hinted at a potential upside for Ericsson due to continued geo-political issues for Huawei and ZTE.

T-Mobile US won’t be rushed on TV proposition

The T-Mobile US TV launch has been anticipated for some time now, but we’ll have to wait until at least mid-2019 for this dream to become a reality.

Washington DC takes Zuckerberg to court

The Attorney General for the District of Columbia has filed a lawsuit against Facebook on the grounds of failing to protect user’s privacy and enabling one of the biggest digital scandals to date.

UWB Alliance to focus on interoperability

UWB, a technology that seems to have been around since the beginning of time, is getting another lease on life in the form of the UWB Alliance.

Private 5G Networks to Be Enabled in Next Major Release of 3GPP Standard

Unlicensed 5G NR could open up a world of possibilities for companies wanting their own private 5G networks.

Eurobites: Analyst Upgrades Ericsson as Huawei Backlash Intensifies

In today's regional roundup: Huawei's troubles could be good news for Ericsson; Enea lines up another acquisition; Orange Business Services lands smart meter IoT deal; Ciena heads to the UK countryside; and more Ericsson.

What Is Comcast Doing With VivaLiveTV?

SEC filings claim that company behind a skinny-bundle, subscription OTT-TV service has notched a content and tech partnership with Comcast Technology Solutions that kicks in January 2019.

Verizon Invites Independent Filmmakers to Explore 5G Tech

A cohort of independent filmmakers and storytellers will have access to a working 5G network in their next project thanks to a collaboration between Verizon's RYOT studio and the Independent Filmmaker Project (IFP).

India's RCom in Distress as Jio Backs Away From Spectrum Deal

India's Reliance Communications is exposed and its prospects aren't good.

NASA breach shows there is something wrong with data rules

Two months ago, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) got hacked, yesterday it told employees. For just over eight weeks, employees were blissfully unaware they were the victim of cyber-crime.

Lowenstein: Peak smartphone vs. other phone ‘peaks’

Smartphone unit sales will decline for the first time ever this year, and even Apple's stock is off 25%. It appears that we have reached "peak…

Another edge computing wrinkle: getting space for the equipment

Obtaining permits for the physical space that the edge data centers will require may be another challenge for wireless players.

CMA backs super complaint against loyalty penalties

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has backed a ‘super complaint’ raised by Citizens Advice which suggests UK consumers are being ripped off by loyalty penalties on services such as broadband.

Facebook back on the ropes with more privacy punches

Facebook faces fresh questions surrounding data privacy, with reports emerging it granted advertising customers access to user’s private messages with friends and family.

Industry Voices—Lowenstein: AT&T 5G launch is a commercial test

Congratulations are in order for AT&T, which launched mobile 5G services Tuesday in parts of 12 cities.

Telecom operators need to be more than a dumb pipe: report

Telecom operators need to get their AI, SDN and cloud ducks in a row or risk becoming a "dumb pipe" for connectivity, according to a report.

Security analytics market will hit $12 billion by 2024—report

Businesses are always under the threat of cyberattacks, and must constantly update their security toolsets—especially as IoT takes the fore.

AT&T answers 5 questions about its mobile 5G service

The details of AT&T's mobile 5G service remain fuzzy, and it’s clear that AT&T’s 5G rollout is in a very early stage.

IoT Security Startup Phosphorus Builds Agentless ‘Update-All’ Button

IoT devices have two types of update mechanisms: an API call or user-initiated update. Phosphorus covers all that with its update-all button for IoT.

T-Mobile fires back against ‘misrepresentations’ of coverage data

T-Mobile issued a blistering response to allegations by the Rural Wireless Association that the carrier filed inaccurate coverage maps.

Kubernetes Security Flaw Expected, Won’t Be the Last

The latest flaw was coincidentally announced on the same day as the latest version of Kubernetes was released. Project members said security concerns do not impact the release cycle.

InterDigital Solves Mobile 5G Problems Far in Advance of Standards

InterDigital competes with Qualcomm, Ericsson, Nokia, Huawei, and Samsung. These vendors also do technology innovation in conjunction with emerging standards. But their standards work is “subsumed” within other business units, while InterDigital...

Raynovich: Why telco automation isn't easy

There are few more abused sets of buzzwords than "network automation."

Huawei Is the No. 1 IoT Platform Vendor, Says IHS Markit

The Chinese vendor beat out Cisco, Microsoft, and PTC for the top spot in the analyst firm's IoT Platform Vendor Scorecard.

Verizon breaks Oath

Less than two years after coming up with the name ‘Oath’ to encompass all its media properties, Verizon has sensibly concluded it’s a rubbish name.

US starts whispering to Germany about China ban

The anti-China road-trip has finally made it to Europe as representatives of the US government have met with German counterparts to argue the case to ban Chinese vendors from the 5G deployment.

Telefónica Germany and Nokia Enter 5G Testing Stage in Berlin

The German carrier along with Nokia is now in a position to test use cases for industry and enhanced massive broadband.

Charter Invests in Online Gaming Startup

MSO forms partnership with Blade, the company behind a cloud-based computer gaming platform called Shadow.

Podcast: Ciena CEO Gary Smith Plans for More Growth

With its competitors stumbling, its largest customers remaining stable and its markets outside of telecom growing, Ciena is enjoying relatively smooth sailing in CEO Smith's 17th year at the helm.

T-Mobile Dumps Plan to Debut New OTT-TV Service in 2018 – Report

Launch delayed to 2019 reportedly due to unforeseen complexities and desire to avoid launching a me-too video offering.

CableLabs Unit Morphs Something Old Into Something New

Kyrio has turned Go2Broadband service locator into a digital, hyperlocal service locator for cable resellers with plans to extend that capability to other service-oriented industries.

3GPP NR Spec Delay Will Not Affect Initial 5G Launches

Qualcomm and Samsung tell Light Reading that 3GPP 'late drop' delay won't hold up 5G launches in 2019.

SoftBank's Stock Slides After $23.6B IPO

Japanese mobile operator's shares dipped by more than 14% during the first day of trading on the Tokyo exchange.

Eurobites: €1.75B Plan for IoT, Connected Car R&D Gets EC Green Light

In today's EMEA regional roundup: Euro giants to collaborate on multi-billion euro IoT and connected car chip/sensor developments; TIM and Sony Mobile forge 5G pact; Telefónica Germany and Nokia build their joint 'Early 5G Innovation Cluster' in Berlin; Open Fiber lands another broadband rollout tender; G+D Mobile Security boasts of Orange eSIM engagements; Altice and KKR have a Hivory; and more.

Telecom Italia Stands by Huawei as Peers Waver

Italy's biggest operator says it will continue to work with Huawei unless it is told not to by government authorities.

It’s all go on AT&T’s 5G network

If you’re lucky enough to live or work anywhere near one of the flashy new AT&T 5G cell sites, and have won the telco lottery, you’ll only have to wait until Friday to live the dream.

Aviation community worries about effects of 5G in C-Band

Aviation officials want to make sure aviation systems in the 4.2-4.4 GHz band are not adversely affected by changes to the 3.7-4.2 GHz band.

Wi-Fi Alliance: Wi-Fi, 5G complementary

The Wi-Fi Alliance wants everyone to know: Wi-Fi 6 and 5G are complementary technologies, both contributing their strengths to expand the power of the overall…

The cloud is booming but no-one seems to have told Oracle

Revenues in the cloud computing world are growing fast with no end in sight just yet, but Oracle can’t seem to cash in on the bonanza.

T-Mobile and Sprint Get Nod of Approval From U.S. Gov Agencies

According to reports, the deal was cleared after Deutsche Telekom and SoftBank offered to stop using Huawei equipment.

Red Hat Flat as IBM’s $34B Purchase Nears

The company closed 100 deals valued in excess of $1 million and added more than 100 new customers to both its OpenShift and Ansible platforms during the quarter.

Google has apparently pulled the plug on its censored search engine for China

Google bowed to pressure by terminating its data analysis system that is vital to its planned re-entry into China with a censored search engine.

ETSI launches blockchain industry group

The European Telecommunications Standards Institute announced Tuesday that it has launched a new industry specification group for blockchain.

Ofcom eyes rural coverage for next spectrum auction

With another spectrum auction creeping up on us, Ofcom has started to throw its weight around with the terms and conditions.

Huawei fights back with $2B security pledge

Huawei held a rare press conference in China to fight back against allegations that the company’s equipment could open the door for espionage.

CBRS Alliance, ATIS collaborate to advance CBRS ecosystem

The CBRS Alliance and ATIS will work together to address critical technical challenges and business opportunities related to the CBRS band.

OpenFog combines forces with Industrial Internet Consortium

The OpenFog Consortium and the Industrial Internet Consortium are joining forces in hopes of advancing the state of the industry.

Sprint touts 5G progress apart from T-Mobile

As 2018 comes to a close, Sprint said it has much to show for the roughly $5 billion it spent throughout the course of this year.

T-Mobile/Sprint merger heads towards final two hurdles

With the CFIUS giving a green light on the $26 billion merger of TMUS and Sprint, attention can now be turned to the final hurdles presented by the Department of Justice (JoJ) and FCC.

Cisco buys chipmaker Luxtera for $660M

Cisco announced Tuesday that it's buying privately held semiconductor company Luxtera for $660 million in cash and assumed equity.

CenturyLink beefs up security with Managed Palo Alto Firewall

CenturyLink announced Tuesday that it has blended Palo Alto Networks' next-generation firewalls into its Security Log Monitoring service.

AT&T launches mobile '5G+', teases plans with 15 GB for $70/month

AT&T said it turned on its mobile 5G network in parts of a dozen cities via connections to a portable hotspot.

Samsung and LG set to launch 5G smartphones in February

The Korean media has reported that the world smartphone leader Samsung and its struggling compatriot are going to launch the first 5G smartphones at MWC and ship in March.

Charter to Pay $175M to Settle Broadband Speed Suit

Settlement stems from 2017 suit claiming that systems formerly run by Time Warner Cable in New York had under-delivered on promised Internet speeds.

AT&T's 5G Switches On in 12 US Cities, but Only for 'Early Adopters'

The service is initially available to select business 'early adopters,' with 5G to become available to the wider public next spring.

Eurobites: CityFibre Secures £1.12B for Fiber Rollout

In today's regional EMEA roundup: CityFibre celebrates fiber funds; BT revamps its CEO bonus assessment scheme; ETSI launches a blockchain group; and more.

The Telecoms.com Podcast: 2019, Digital Media & Coffee Mishaps

Cisco Sees Optics Innovation, Manufacturing Automation in Luxtera

Why spend more than $600M on a company that makes optical transceivers? It wasn't just one product, but an entire automated manufacturing process that may help Cisco stay ahead of future bandwidth bottlenecks.

Sprint-T-Mobile Merger Passes Major US Security Reviews

On track to completion in the first half of 2019.

Huawei's Hu Hits Back

Vendor is on the counter-offensive, claiming strong 5G momentum, a clean security record and expected milestone revenues.

How Long Will Oracle Just Tread Water?

While Oracle's revenue and cloud growth is nearly flat, despite a booming cloud market, its application growth is 'spectacular' and cloud database is poised to take off, the company says.

Oracle's Ellison: No 'Normal Person' Would Move From Us to Amazon

Even Amazon, with all its resources, is having difficulty with the transition, says Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison. Give that man a microphone and he trashes AWS, every time.

TIM flips on the 5G switch in San Marino

Telecom Italia has confirmed it has switched on 5G in San Marino, claiming to have covered 99% of the population and territory.

France goes solo in quest to hold Silicon Valley accountable

With some European nations unable to summon up the courage to tackle the infamous creative tax strategies of the internet giants, France has decided to write its own rules.

Google pours $1B into New York City campus

Google is expanding its presence beyond Silicon Valley by investing more than $1 billion to establish a new campus in New York City.

Report: Huawei tops Q3 cloud-native EPC rankings

Huawei ranked first in cloud-native evolved packet revenue in the third quarter, according to a report.

Openreach talks fibre in Edinburgh

With fibre becoming an increasingly politicised topic, fixed infrastructure wholesaler Openreach decided to hang out with a couple of Scottish politicians.

AT&T teams up with AWS on cloud recovery

AT&T is teaming up Sungard Availability Services and Amazon Web Services (AWS) to offer its business customers cloud recovery support.

AT&T reiterates tower threat: Lower costs or else

AT&T announced today that Tillman Infrastructure has built “hundreds of new macro cell towers” for AT&T’s network equipment.

T-Mobile/Sprint edge towards finish line following Huawei snub

T-Mobile US and Sprint are reportedly rubbing regulators the right way, in the continued effort to get the prolonged merger approved, by overtly shunning Chinese kit vendor Huawei.

T-Mobile/Sprint merger reportedly hurdles security concerns

Officials at the CFIUS may sign off on the proposed merger between Sprint and T-Mobile as early as this week, according to a new report.

Germany takes an innocent until proven guilty approach to Huawei

Germany’s Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) has made a bold statement, bucking global trends, saying it will not ban Huawei from its borders unless someone can table some evidence of espionage.

GE Spins Off Its Digital Business, Including Predix, Into a Separate Company

GE Digital CEO Bill Ruh departs the company "to pursue other opportunities."

Vivendi doesn’t think the TIM board is independent enough – hmm

As promised Vivendi has written to the board of Italian operator group TIM in a bid to replace Elliott-nominated members with its own proposed ones.

AT&T’s Extensive SDN Plans Pave Way for 5G

AT&T CTO Andre Fuetsch said the carrier is at 63 percent SDN control of its network operations that can be virtualized, pushing toward its goal of 65 percent control by year-end.

Omnichannel is a real thing after all – Nielsen

It is becoming increasingly difficult to capture the attention of customers nowadays, but short-attention spans and multiple screens might turn out to be an advantage.

VMware Helps Make-a-Wish Foundation Save Millions on IT

On average, it takes $10,500 for a wish. And the Foundation must balance the need to grant wishes with the need to update its IT infrastructure.

3GPP Delays ‘Second Wave’ of 5G Specs

The standards body insists there is no need for panic, as it announces a three-month delay in the completion of the Release 15 standard.

T-Mobile defends its C-band plan

T-Mobile met with FCC officials to double down on efforts to evangelize its proposal on how to handle the 3.7-4.2 GHz, or C-band.

Parallel Wireless scores Open RAN deal with Cellcom

Parallel Wireless announced it was selected by Cellcom to supply its Open RAN solution as part of Cellcom’s network expansion in the Midwest.

More states expected to pass small cell legislation in 2019

So far, 21 states have enacted legislation aimed at speeding up the deployment of small cells. That number may increase next year.

GE: Digital Transformation Gone Wrong

GE is spinning off its $1.2B industrial IoT business, and selling its majority stake in ServiceMax, as the floundering industrial giant looks to right the ship.

Here's What VMware Paid for Kubernetes Startup Heptio

VMware paid a hefty premium over Heptio's funding to advance its open source containers strategy.

DT, Orange Prove Europe Remains Hostage to US, Chinese Tech

Two of Europe's biggest operators are desperate to wean Europeans off US and Chinese technology, but they are uncomfortably reliant on it themselves.

FCC 28GHz 5G Auction Hits $688.7M

The 28GHz auction continues, as the FCC expects to open up almost 5GHz of millimeter wave spectrum for 5G in 2019 and beyond.

Analyst: AT&T Made 'Major Strategic Error' on SVoD Plan

Decision to launch a trio of direct-to-consumer services and continue to license content is the wrong move, analyst says.

Virtual Reality Gets Real Gimmicky

Sling TV, ESPN, Fox bring video streaming apps to the Oculus Go.

Google Splashes $1B on New York Expansion

Google came to New York in 2000 with a one-person sales office operating out of a Starbucks.

How RJio Changed the Rules of the Game

India's youngest operator has turned the industry upside down since it first launched mobile services just over two years ago.

Eurobites: Telenor Uses Nokia for Cloud-Native Core

In today's regional round-up: Nokia secures core role at Telenor; Elliott Management eyes Telefónica; mobile subscribers in the EU have made the most of the abolition of roaming charges; Tele2 banks a NIM loan; and Synamedia tackles 'credentials sharing.'

Orange Exec Talks Digital Innovation

Orange's VP of Digital Innovation, Patrice Slupowski, talks to Light Reading's Iain Morris on the sidelines of our recent 2020 Vision Executive Summit in Lisbon about the potential for digital services, the use of open source code and the future of telco services.

3GPP to delay Release 16 by 3 months

In what could be construed as a “surprise, no surprise,” 3GPP has decided to delay Release 16 by three months.

5G heads to unlicensed land

3GPP agreed to start a work item dubbed NR-U, which will define how 5G New Radio is introduced in unlicensed spectrum.

Italy spectrum auction looks like a cheap bit of business – RBC

A research note from RBC, the Royal Bank of Canada, suggests Italian telcos in Italy might not have overpaid that much in the grand scheme of things.

Report: Edge compute is driving colocation services

Edge computing requirements are driving enterprises toward increased use of colocation services, according to a report by IHS Markit.

Ofcom reckons we’re clueless about broadband pricing

UK telecoms regulator Ofcom thinks consumers are ill-informed about the best broadband deals and wants ISPs to help rectify that.

Doyle: Managed SD-WAN: A look back and a look forward

The widespread adoption of SD-WAN continues to impact the $40 billion market for managed business services.

Verizon, Sprint tweak holiday promotions

Both Verizon and Sprint this week introduced noteworthy promotions aimed at spicing up their respective offerings.

CenturyLink cuts 175 jobs, eliminates holiday bonuses

CenturyLink is trimming its workforce by approximately 175 jobs in locations across the 16 states that it serves, a spokesman confirmed this morning.

2019 is looking good for the tower industry

The good times appear set to continue for the nation’s tower companies, at least according to some Wall Street analysts.

SK Telecom Firms Up 5G Mobile Edge Partnership With Deutsche Telekom

The South Korean carrier is to partner with MobiledgeX, building on the deal signed with DT in October 2018.

SDxCentral's Weekly Roundup — December 14, 2018

Amazon Web Services opens in Sweden; Apple expands across the US; and the Hyperledger project expands its membership.

JEDI Wars: Amazon Web Services Strikes Back

AWS argues that it has a “direct and substantial economic interests at stake.” It says Oracle’s conflict-of-interest accusations are “meritless.”

Anti-Huawei Forces Focus on Sprint/T-Mobile Deal

A new report suggests that the US is using its merger approval process to pressure Sprint and T-Mobile's parent companies to back away from Huawei.

Cable 5G Transport Shows Promise & Complexity

US cable providers are gearing up to play a crucial role by supporting transport of 5G communications, but their aspirations are clouded by the complexity of 5G itself.

5G Standard Hits Unexpected 3-Month Delay

3GPP drops 'mini bombshell' at meeting in Italy this week, says an observer, with its announcement of unexpected delays to the 5G standardization process.

WiCipedia: Hardwiring Sexism, Brogrammer Culture & Wall Street Fearmongering

This week in our WiC roundup: Brogrammers are still thriving; TPG puts the spotlight on a female hire; Wall Street's fear of women; and more.

Arista Extends Its Reach Into Containers

Networking containerized environments is tough; Arista wants to help.

CableLabs Open Source IoT Project Shoots for Scale

MSO-backed group sees no 'one clear winner' in LPWAN market.

Full-Duplex DOCSIS Not One-Size-Fits-All

Node+0 requirement of FDX is a deal-breaker for some MSOs, and could open the door to other, less-limiting alternatives, Daniel Etman, cable consultant at Switzerland-based Quickline, says.

Infinera Restructures as It Absorbs Coriant

The optical networking vendor said in a filing with the SEC that it will take a charge against earnings related to severance and other related costs.

Migration Strategies for 5G Core Networks

Many operators are expected to initially deploy 5G RANs in non-standalone mode on an LTE network, migrating later to standalone mode. But that migration is less than straightforward, and there are multiple options to consider.

Eurobites: Deutsche Telekom Joins Caravan of Concern Over Huawei

In the spirit of German Christmas markets, where supersized hot dogs are sold from souped-up garden sheds in snow-starved town squares across Europe, today's Eurobites is mainly about Deutsche Telekom. Oh, and there's a bit about UK broadband.

The US digital divide – does anyone have a clue what’s going on?

Depending on who you listen to the severity of the digital divide varies greatly. But with so many different opinions, how do you actually know what is going on? And if you don’t have a clue, how can you possibly solve the problem?

Ursula Burns officially made Veon CEO, at last

Eight months after losing its last CEO, telecoms group Veon has decided to stick with Chairman Ursula Burns in the dual role.

Carrier wireless service revenues predicted to expand next year

According to a new Wall Street research report, the nation's carriers will grow their service revenues next year.

Telus: SDN Gives Us a Dynamic, Automatically Controlled Network

“SDN is going to be a very broad deployment,” said Telus’ Bryce Mitchell. “We made sure we included SDN within the NFV pods themselves.”

Aussie watchdog sniffs around TPG and Vodafone merger

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is having a closer look at the AUS$15 billion TPG and Vodafone merger, with the signs looking rather ominous for the pair.

Orange Business Services racks up another SD-WAN customer

Orange Business Services recently added another SD-WAN customer to its roster: Dubai-based Majid Al Futtaim Retail.

Qualcomm has one last 2018 5G fest with TIM in Rome

Qualcomm’s events team has had a frantic end to the year, culminating in the demo of a 5G NR video call over millimeter wave in Italy.

SK Telecom and MobiledgeX team up on MEC

SK Telecom has teamed up with MobiledgeX to jointly develop mobile edge computing (MEC) technologies and business models.

Masergy’s New CEO Is Tasked to Grow Its SDN-Based Offerings

The company was pretty revolutionary with its idea to layer SDN on top of multiple third-party transport before all the SD-WAN vendors conceived of this.

Cable industry to add 1.6M mobile customers in 2019: analysts

Morgan Stanley expects cable players Comcast, Charter and Altice to collectively sign up 1.6 million new mobile customers next year.

FCC sets the rules for third mmWave auction

The FCC has unveiled the rules for the next mmWave auction, set to take place in second half of 2019, for airwaves in the 37 GHz, 39 GHz and 47 GHz spectrum bands.

Comcast Is Working on a uCPE That Runs Multiple VNFs With Its SD-WAN

The service provider is hoping to launch a cost-effective uCPE platform that supports more VNFs along with its SD-WAN early next year.

Dell EMC Claims Top Server Vendor Spot With $4B in Revenue, IDC Says

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) once again came in No. 2, with 16.3 percent revenue share or $3.81 billion.

Dish, CWA, others form coalition against Sprint/T-Mobile merger

A group of public interest groups, telecom companies and others formed a new coalition to challenge the proposed merger between Sprint and T-Mobile.

UK’s slowest street gets 0.14 Mbps, but who’s fault actually is it?

New research from uSwitch suggests the slowest broadband in the UK is 0.14 Mbps, while 5% of the UK are not able to reach 5 Mbps, though this could be their own fault.

Cellcom Picks Parallel Wireless vRAN Solution to Expand 4G, Prep for 5G

A regional U.S. carrier adds Parallel Wireless to its vendor portfolio to benefit from the flexibility of an open RAN approach for 4G and eventually 5G.

Verizon Has Migrated 80 Apps to Cloud Native Platforms

The carrier is near the half-way point on its 5-year journey in taking advantage of public cloud platforms.

VMware Paid $550M for Heptio to Boost Its Kubernetes Portfolio

That amount was a substantial premium over what Heptio had raised from investors and other similar deals in the Kubernetes space.

CBRS takes a step forward as NTIA completes testing

The NTIA said it finished its testing of the CBRS 3.5 GHz spectrum-sharing scheme—a key milestone as the spectrum nears commercial availability.

SMS, MMS deemed ‘information services'

The FCC voted 3:1 to deny requests from Twilio and others to classify text messaging services as “telecommunications services,” which would subject them to…

KT Corp. Launches 5G Service with AI Robot in S. Korea

KT Corporation, South Korea’s largest telecommunications company, has officially launched its 5G network commercial service through an AI-equipped robot named Lota, marking a new era of innovation in the world’s information and communications technology (ICT) sector.

Private Line Transformation for Media and Broadcast Service, Operators' New Blue Ocean Market

Forming the network infrastructure of the video industry, private lines for media and broadcast services have many potential high-value customers that represent an untapped revenue source for operators.

Orange Rules Out Huawei for 5G in France

French telecom incumbent deals the latest blow to China's biggest equipment vendor amid an international backlash.

Cable One Gets Credit for Putting Pipes Ahead of Programming

Top analyst upgrades the stock as Cable One banks on high-margin broadband, de-emphasizes its declining pay-TV biz.

Apple to Build $1B Austin Campus & $10B Nationwide Data Center Expansion

Apple plans to spend $10 billion over five years on new data center facilities, as well as expanding its facilities in Austin, Seattle, San Diego and beyond.

Telia Carrier's Evangelist on Internet Traffic Trends

On the sidelines of Light Reading's 2020 Vision Executive Summit, Mattias Fridström, chief evangelist at Telia Carrier, discusses the latest shifts in public Internet traffic trends and whether the likes of 4K/8K video, SD-WAN and 5G will impact international traffic patterns.

Where Huawei Fears to Tread

Growing restrictions on Huawei by governments and operators outside China could swiftly diminish its role in the global equipment market.

Eurobites: Do Look a Huawei Gift Horse in the Mouth, UK Universities Told

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Bouygues forms FTTH provider; Telia legs it from Kazakhstan; Ericsson demos 5G NR in South Korea; VEON gets new CEO.

Vodafone Ireland's Kiss Kalló on Edge Computing's Potential

Can mobile operators take advantage of edge computing's potential? At Light Reading's 2020 Vision executive summit in Lisbon, Csaba Kiss Kalló, Vodafone Ireland's Head of Connectivity, Mobility and Security Portfolio, says they can.

The Long Goodbye Finally Ends

Two years after first announcing my retirement plans, I'm really doing it. No, really.

Robocall Fix Not a Silver Bullet

Shaken/Stir holds promise to authenticate calls and improve blocking services, but there are challenges and complexities to consider.

Oracle: Legacy Customers Are Our Secret Weapon

Oracle debuts a hybrid platform as it looks to catch up from far behind in the cloud.

Ciena Signals Steady Growth & Smooth Sailing Ahead

The optical networking specialist is benefiting from 5G buildouts and webscale traffic monsters, and doing what it can to avoid sitting on a lead.

Europe is losing in the race to secure digital riches – DT CEO

Despite politicians around the world declaring the importance of technology and insisting their nation is one of the world leaders in digital, Deutsche Telekom CEO Tim Hottges does not believe Europe is competing with the US and Asia.

CCA: U.S. needs 320 MHz of C-band

The CCA and others say the C-Band Alliance’s market-based approach for the 3.7-4.2 GHz band will result in a windfall for satellite operators.

IBM, Nvidia Team Up on Converged Storage for AI Workloads

The new converged infrastructure combines IBM’s NVMe flash storage and software with Mellanox networking on Nvidia servers. It also uses Nvidia’s AI software stack.

Report: Third-quarter server revenues break record

Driven by enterprises and hyperscale service carriers, server vendor revenues reached a record high in the third quarter, according to a report.

37, 39 and 42 GHz bands head for auction in 2019

As expected, the FCC voted to move forward with an incentive auction that combines the upper 37, 39 and 42 GHz bands.

Verizon joins O-RAN Alliance board

The O-RAN Alliance announced new board members—including Verizon—and a collaboration with the Linux Foundation on open source software.

Apple, Nokia, others worry over manufacturing in China

Apple’s suppliers are reportedly considering moving manufacturing of Apple products outside of China, according to a Bloomberg report.

GSMA Highlights Potential $565B GDP Boost From the ‘Right’ 5G Spectrum

The mobile operator association uses GDP and tax arguments to persuade governments to support the allocation of sufficient mmWave spectrum for 5G at WRC-19.

Ofcom to force feed localised fibre diet

It’s a new week, and therefore time for a new Ofcom consultation. This time the UK watchdog will be trying to understand whether it is feasible to hyper-localise regulations to encourage full-fibre networks.

Napatech and Intel Partner on FPGA Technology for Standard Servers

The big hyperscalers use field programmable gate array technology on standard servers in their data centers. But there’s a trend for other enterprises to emulate these hyperscalers.

IBM’s JEDI Protest Dismissed, Oracle Takes the $10B Pentagon Cloud Deal to Court

Oracle’s lawsuit alleges conflicts of interest and says two people involved in the procurement process have close ties to Amazon Web Services.

Orange squares up to OTTs in battle for smart home

With it abundantly clear connectivity alone is not enough to meet the profitability ambitions of the telcos, Orange has made a fresh push to wrestle control of the smart home away from those greedy internet players.

Verizon, Reliance Jio, TIM Join the O-RAN Alliance

Verizon and Jio were both original members of the xRAN Forum, which merged with the C-RAN Alliance this year to form O-RAN.

Huawei: an awkward state-of-affairs – Infographic

With Huawei continuing to be the world’s bogey man, we thought it might be useful to figure out how high the rising water has gotten.

ONF explores next frontier: mobile-access edge cloud

The Open Networking Foundation is developing its strategy around mobile-access edge cloud technologies and applications.

Ericsson launches new IoT center of excellence

Ericsson has appointed Rob Tiffany to lead the company’s new IoT “center of excellence” in North America.

T-Mobile, Verizon may face FCC probe over incorrect mapping data

The Rural Wireless Association claimed that both Verizon and T-Mobile submitted incorrect and overstated mapping data.

GSMA Loses Two Top Execs

Long-time marketing chief Michael O'Hara and the head of LatAm Sebastian Caballo are out the door — GSMA head calls for calm as MWC approaches.

Verizon Gives Fios TV a Facelift

Upgraded, multi-room 'Fios TV One' platform adds support for 4K video, voice search & navigation, Netflix integration, WiFi-connected video clients.

Powder Offering Powerful Wireless Testbed

New project jointly funded by NSF and industry consortium brings the power of profiles and fast instantiation to testing of massive software projects.

CableLabs Sues Buckeye Over Delinquent Dues

MSO notified CableLabs of intention to terminate its membership in January 2018, but CableLabs cites that it requires at least three years notice.

Djingo Unchained: Orange, DT Take AI Fight to US Tech Giants

Unveiling a new smart speaker in Paris today, the CEOs of Deutsche Telekom and Orange hope growing concern about data privacy will provide a spur to Europe's homegrown technology expertise.

How 5G Microwave Can Fast-Track Mobile Broadband Growth in Emerging Markets

As emerging markets realize the social benefits brought by the information superhighway, many nations are developing broadband plans from a strategic perspective to speed up the deployment of fixed and mobile broadband infrastructure.

Huawei CFO Posts Bail in Canada

Huawei's CFO Meng Wanzhou is free on about $7.5 million in bail following a Canadian court ruling on Tuesday. President Trump offers to intervene if China will do a trade deal.

FCC Plans Major Spectrum Auction in 2019

FCC wants an incentive auction to sell upper 37GHz, 39GHz and 47GHz bands in 2019, opening up more mmWave bands, as the global 5G 'race' gets real.

Unlocking the Secrets to Next-Generation Service Assurance

Service assurance will need to tackle three significant challenges to succeed in the future.

Open RAN, Open Innovation

Next-generation networks need innovation in the radio access network and Open RAN developments are set to disrupt the market – in a good way.

Cisco: 5G Transforms Data Center Networks

Communications networking developments, such as IoT, edge computing and now the introduction of 5G services, has a "profound impact on the data center," says Ishmael Limkakeng, Cisco SVP data center business, who talked with Light Reading's Mitch Wagner.

Eurobites: Orange Preps 5G Launch in 17 European Cities

In today's EMEA regional roundup: Orange unveils initial 5G plans; the latest boardroom shenanigans at TIM; Turkcell builds TV App Store with Metrological; ADVA unveils its Ensemble Controller.

European Commission Digs Into Vodafone-Liberty Global Deal

Regulatory group opens 'in-depth investigation' amid concerns that the deal could reduce competition and lead to higher prices in Germany and the Czech Republic.

Amdocs CTO: How 5G Will Enable Charging for Specific Services, Rather Than Just Data

Amdocs CTO on how the company will play a role in the move to 5G services.

Podcast: The Heat Is on Huawei

If Huawei catches a 5G cold, how many operators around the world will suddenly feel a little sick and stay in bed? 'Tis the (flu) season for rampant, worldwide speculation on the Light Reading podcast.

Pivot3 Adds Encryption, Key Management to HCI Stack

Adding these policy-based security capabilities to the Pivot3 Intelligence Engine enables customers to integrate data encryption and key management into the same workflow for managing applications and storage.

The Silicon Valley inquisition gathers pace

A number of independent online commentators have been blacklisted by technology giants for seemingly arbitrary reasons.

F5 Networks puts Aspen Mesh into beta testing

F5 Networks announced this week that its Istio-based service mesh was now in public beta testing.

Etcd Joins CNCF’s Growing Cache of Open Source Projects

Etcd is the primary storage location for Kubernetes and needs to be established before Kubernetes can be run on a system.

Huawei equipment deployed by 25% of U.S. rural wireless carriers: RWA

The Rural Wireless Association said that it believes fully a fourth of its membership currently uses equipment from Chinese suppliers like Huawei.

Ciena, Juniper Lead Data Center Interconnect Market, Dell’Oro Says

Data center interconnect equipment revenue will increase 85 percent over the next five years, from $2.7 billion in 2017 to $5.1 billion in 2022, according to Dell’Oro Group.

Huawei Flags 5G Network Slicing Landmark, Signs New 5G Deal

Amid all the political noise, Huawei ploughs on regardless with a further advance in 5G network slicing and a new 5G network deal with Altice Portugal.

Arista Works With Red Hat and Tigera on Container Environments for Enterprises

The collaboration focuses on the three biggest container pain areas for enterprises: 1) networking; 2) visibility; and 3) security.

T-Mobile/Sprint merger financials are looking better than predicted

Cowen analysts believe the financials of a merged company will be better than Sprint and T-Mobile executives predicted.

Adva unwraps new Ensemble Controller

Adva added a key piece to its SDN and NFV lineup with today's release of its Ensemble Controller.

Japan is the latest country to prohibit Chinese vendors in 5G networks

Huawei and ZTE have been dealt another blow ahead of the 5G bonanza as Japan’s four operators join the government in snubbing Chinese communications equipment.

Headcount: The Latest in Firings, Hirings, and Retirings — December 11, 2018

Joe Cozzolino departs Cisco to join private equity firm; CenturyLink CTO joins the MEF board of directors.

Vivendi inevitably tries to get rid of some Elliott directors

It was just a matter time before Vivendi reacted to its man being sacked as CEO of TIM and replaced by an Elliott ally.

Aussies determined to undermine security with anti-encryption law

Ten of the world’s largest tech brands have banded together to denounce a recent law passed by the Australian government which could be viewed as the first step towards a Big Brother government.

Dell Wins Shareholder Vote, Will Go Public This Month

More than 61 percent of shareholders approved the deal that allows Dell to buy back the stock that tracks its controlling stake in VMware.

Verizon, Samsung tee up new 5G fixed, mobile trials

Verizon is asking the FCC for permission to conduct periodic testing over a 6-month period with Samsung using 28 GHz spectrum and unlicensed spectrum.

Verizon Entices 10,400 Workers to Take Severance Package

The telecom giant is looking to cut $10 billion in costs from its operations as it positions itself to boost its focus on 5G.

Survey Says: Midsized Businesses Hyped on Digital Transformation

Survey sponsored by CenturyLink shows they are enthusiastic about its benefits even if almost half of them have yet to start the process.

Google Extending Managed Kubernetes With Istio Support

Google is launching beta support for Istio, the open source software for managing communications between Kubernetes containers, in its Google Kubernetes Engine.

More Pain for SeaChange

Deal delays cause the video software company to slash revenue guidance for full-year 2018, and note that Liberty Global divestitures could put a 'dent' on future numbers.

Roller Coaster Ride for Lumentum

Optical components vendor will never forget December 2018.

Zodiac Names Former Comcast Exec as CEO

New boss for the set-top software specialist involved in Charter's Spectrum Guide and WorldBox efforts.

Verizon Faces $6.7B in Q4 Charges on Oath Biz & Layoffs

Verizon says charges on its Oath business and severance charges will be reported in Q4.

Eurobites: Tele2 & Telenor Extend 5G Collaboration, Bag 700MHz Spectrum

In today's EMEA regional roundup: Tele2 and Telenor go big on 5G in Sweden; Vodafone takes its 5G network to the street level; Liquid Telecom attracts $180 million investment; and more.

Japan Next in Line to Block Huawei, ZTE

Japanese government has issued guidelines that effectively lock Huawei and ZTE out of the country's public networks and look set to influence 5G network decisions by the country's operators.

Cisco: Fast-Evolving Enterprise Networks Create 'Huge' Telco Opportunities

Until recently, enterprise networks could remain static for years, but now new devices and the cloud require rapid evolution, creating service provider opportunities, says Scott Harrell, Cisco enterprise networking business lead.

Optanix Launches Monitoring Platform From Internal Software Offering

“Most software that’s used for monitoring comes from software companies. We built this software out of operational need and we built it as users of the technology,” said Optanix CSO Edmond Baydian.

Vodafone searches the sewers for missing connectivity

Vodafone UK has announced a new initiative to embed small antennas below street level in a bid to meet data demands in the country’s busiest streets.

China issues injunctions against most Apple iPhone models – that was quick

The week after the US arranged the arrest of a Huawei exec China has granted Qualcomm an injunction prohibiting the sales of most Apple smartphones in the country. Coincidence?

Aussies question whether Google and Facebook are overstepping boundaries

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is shining the light of concern on Google and Facebook, seemingly one of the first steps towards regulatory overhaul.

VMware adds Istio to NSX platform

VMware has added open source Istio software to its NSX networking platform to better manage containers and microservices.

White box vendors lose share in data center switching market

White box vendors have taken a hit this year in the 100 Gigabit Ethernet data center switching market, according to Dell'Oro Group.

Report makes case for Wi-Fi in competitive analysis

A new report appears to bolster the T-Mobile/Sprint merger, arguing that any analysis of market conditions for wireless services should include Wi-Fi.

China issues 5G spectrum licenses amid iPhone ban

Significant and dramatic developments involving the wireless industry in China continue to roll over the globe’s business markets.

Huawei CFO charged with hiding connection to Skycom, which worked with Iran

The bail hearing for Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou has revealed she is charged with concealing ties between her company and another that violated US trade sanctions.

Ericsson facing £100 million damages bill for network outage – report

With smartphones around the world being reduced to doorstops thanks to Ericsson’s software issues, the vendor is potentially facing a damages bill in excess of £100 million.

Deutsche Telekom Launches 5G Network in Poland With Huawei Equipment

Things aren’t all bad news for Huawei. T-Mobile Poland confirmed that Huawei is the sole vendor supporting its 5G network.

The 28 GHz spectrum auction could end soon

Action in the FCC’s 28 GHz spectrum auction, dubbed Auction 101, appears to be winding down, and the event could end soon.

Midsize businesses boost digital transformation efforts

Midsize businesses are starting to embrace their own digital transformations, according to a survey commissioned by CenturyLink.

VMware Rolls Out NSX Service Mesh Based on Istio

The NSX Service Mesh beta will initially support Cloud PKS (formerly known as VMware Kubernetes Engine or VKE), but VMware plans to extend it to any Kubernetes environment.

Lenovo Works With Cumulus to Offer Disaggregated Switch Hardware, Software

Cumulus already offers its NOS on lots of different hardware. But this is Lenovo’s first foray into the disaggregated switch model.

SD-WAN Will Be Fueled By Collaboration Between Cloud Providers and Vendors

The latest numbers from IHS Markit show that SD-WAN revenue grew 23 percent from the previous quarter to $284 million. VMware continues to hold the No. 1 spot.

Verizon says goodbye to almost 7% of workers

Verizon announced this morning that 10,400 of its 152,300 employees agreed to leave the company as part of Verizon’s cost-cutting efforts.

Facebook hit with Italian fine as share buy-back ramps up

The Italian watchdog is the latest to slap a fine on Facebook for misleading and abusing consumer confidence.

CBA slams T-Mobile's 3.7-4.2 GHz plan

In a new set of filings on Friday, the C-Band Alliance slammed T-Mobile’s proposal for the 3.7-4.2 GHz band, saying T-Mobile’s “convoluted proposal” would…

Pivotal Picks Kubernetes, Knative to Bust Serverless Siloes

The Pivotal Function Service is the first multi-cloud packaging of the Kubernetes-based Knative project and operates alongside the Pivotal Application Service and Pivotal Container Service.

Going under the hood of Qualcomm Snapdragon 855: plenty to like

More details of Qualcomm’s first 5G chipset have been released, bringing all-round improvements. 5G chipset for PCs was also announced.

Verizon: Include RCS in SMS, MMS ruling

Verizon is urging the FCC to include Rich Communication Services (RCS) in its declaratory ruling to make SMS and MMS "information services."

Nokia prepares for broader vRAN in 2019

The industry can expect more substantial action in the virtual Radio Access Network, or vRAN, space next year.

Australia's 5G Auction Nets More than $600M for Govt

Spending values mid-band airwaves at a higher level than in any country bar Italy, with the three existing operators and a new entrant picking up 5G licenses.

Qualcomm v. Apple: Court Ruling in China Could Block iPhone Sales

A court in China has told Apple to stop infringing on Qualcomm patents and, in doing so, it called for Apple's subsidiaries to halt sales of the iPhone 6S, iPhone 6S Plus, iPhone 7, iPhone 7 Plus, iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X.

PCCW Global on the Need to Monetize the Edge

On the sidelines of Light Reading's 2020 Vision executive summit in Lisbon, PCCW Global's Shahar Steiff talks about the key challenges facing network operators as they figure out their edge computing strategies.

How the West Can Hurt Huawei

The arrest of Huawei's CFO on charges of fraud dominates headlines, but US hawks could seek to cripple Huawei in several ways.

Eurobites: Telefónica Seeks Outage Compensation from Ericsson

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Nokia and friends deploy liquid-based basestation cooling in Helsinki; Liquid Telecom invests in Egypt; Deutsche Telekom launches 5G in Warsaw.

VMware Climbs on the Istio Train for Kubernetes Management

Updates NSX to manage and secure containerized, microservices native cloud apps anywhere.

The FCC's 5G Auction Rolls On

The FCC's first 5G millimeter wave auction is nearly a month into active rounds of bidding.

Verizon Buyout Offer Will Cull More Than 6% of Employees by July 2019

CEO Vestberg said the loss of more than 10,000 employees will be seamless to customers.

Cisco: Here's How 5G Accelerates Service Provider Opportunities

Michael Glickman, SVP of Cisco's service provider business, talks with Light Reading's Mitch Wagner about the range of opportunities for service providers -- and Cisco -- to reinvent their business.

Open RAN, Open Interfaces

We spoke with leading global operators to find out how Open RAN initiatives can accelerate deployment of innovative radio technology in mobile networks.

Huawei caves to UK security demands with empire under siege

After a meeting with the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), Huawei has agreed to address the serious security risks believed to exist within the firm’s equipment and software.

Dell’Oro: SD-WAN Market Consolidation Led to a Resurgence in Access Router Market

As the uncertainty around Cisco’s Viptela integration lifted last quarter, the enterprise access router market saw its first quarter of growth in five quarters.

Madden: CBRS can prevent forest fires

CBRS can make a difference. Soon, PG&E will be able to buy a PAL license to keep tabs on the grid.

With jailed CFO, Huawei's future darkens

Huawei’s chief financial officer—the daughter of the company’s founder—is scheduled to appear today in a Canadian court for a bail hearing.

Nokia has a great week by simply not screwing anything up

Christmas has come early for Finnish kit vendor Nokia, with its competitors bestowing it with presents of breath-taking generosity.

Ampere Targets Hyperscalers, Challenges Intel With Arm-Based Chips

The year-old startup, founded by former Intel president Renee James, is also partnering with Packet, Cloudflare, and other companies on 5G and edge computing proof of concepts.

SDxCentral's Weekly Roundup — December 7, 2018

Sprint names its first 5G markets for 2019; Telco Systems and Arm work on uCPE; and IBM sells software assets to HCL Technologies for $1.8 billion.

O2 up and running but how much damage has been done to them and Ericsson?

With O2’s UK network back up and running, the 32 million Brits who depend on it have been returned to the digital era, but you have to wonder how big the fallout from this disaster will be.

AT&T Taps Synergies Between Its 5G and FirstNet Build-Outs

Both FirstNet and 5G require the company to "touch the towers," so a lot of the network upgrades help both initiatives.

USA declares war on Huawei, with a bit of help from ZTE

The arrest of Huawei’s CFO was the culmination of years of investigation by the American government and judiciary, with an apparent helping hand from ZTE.

5G questions hover over T-Mobile, but company promises surprises

Qualcomm’s initial batch of 5G chips won’t support 5G operations in the 600 MHz spectrum that T-Mobile plans to use for 5G.

Report: Major reset needed in botnet strategy

Botnets are being fought the wrong way, according to the Council to Secure the Digital Economy. That's bad news because the threat is growing.

Wireless industry ad spending jumps in November

The top advertisers in the wireless industry significantly raised their collective spending on TV advertisements during the month of November.

Managed SD-WAN services market tops $282M in U.S.

Managed SD-WAN services in the U.S. picked up the pace in the second half of this year to the tune of more than $282 million in revenue in 2018.

FCC 5G mmWave Auction Hits $677.4M

Interest heats up as remaining available 28GHz licenses dwindle.

Huawei CFO Committed Sanctions Fraud, US Alleges – Reports

Huawei, with Meng Wazhou's involvement, allegedly used an 'unofficial' Hong Kong-based subsidiary called Skycom to trick US banks into clearing transactions for Huawei linked to companies in Iran.

Comcast Finds More Work for X1

Cloud-powered video platform is in 'extended trial period' with hotels, with more business- and sports-venue deployment models in the works.

Eurobites: Nokia & China Mobile Seek 'More Open' 5G Ecosystem

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Montreal startup wins Nokia's IoT challenge; Tele2 and Deutsche Telekom strike roaming agreement; Ericsson fixes Telefónica's extended outage.

Huawei: The Signs Were There

The US is ratcheting up the pressure on China with the arrest of one of its most senior technology executives.

Can Telecom Ward Off Robocall Regs?

As the volume of annoying robocalls continues to rise, an industry-wide effort to authenticate calls across carriers hopes to satisfy regulators.

Red Hat Simplifies Kubernetes on AWS, Cuts Prices

Users can bring their own AWS accounts to reduce hassles deploying OpenShift Direct in the public clouds, and enjoy price cuts starting at 25%.

WiCipedia: 'Bull in a China Closet' Spirit & Unconscious Bias Is No Excuse

This week in our WiC roundup: Girl Scouts make STEM their mission; Forbes' list of 50 women in tech; unconscious bias is no excuse; and more.

Nokia Sitting Pretty After Week of Turmoil for Huawei, Ericsson

A backlash against China's biggest vendor and problems with Ericsson's software could translate into a glorious opportunity for the Finnish firm.

CommScope Still Hazy on Arris's CPE Biz

CFO Alex Pease says broadband CPE is viewed as a 'strategic differentiator,' and struggles in the video set-top sector can be cost-managed.

The Telecoms.com Podcast: Cloud, Huawei, 5G Phones & Orange

Live from a shiny hotel in Lisbon, the podders hint at what's been discussed at LR's hush-hush 2020 Vision event, before moving on to Huawei's horrorshow, 5G smartphones and Iain's lunch.

Google bids adieu to Allo

Google has finally called it a day on Allo, its attempt to compete with WhatsApp, to focus on its Messages product.

28 GHz auction action jumps in Stage 2

The FCC’s 28 GHz spectrum auction climbed past the $600 million mark in terms of total provisionally winning bids.

Packet and Wasabi Take On Amazon, Provide Cloud Compute and Storage

“Nobody gets to keep a lock on cloud computing,” Wasabi CEO David Friend said. “As much as Amazon would like to, it’s going to be a multi-cloud world.”

Cuba enters mobile internet age with 3G few can afford

Cuba’s telecom operator will offer 3G data service to prepaid users, but the package prices are too high for most locals.

UK Gov pulls back the curtain on Facebook data policies

With pressure mounting against Facebook over the last few months it was only a matter of time before a treasure trove of treachery was unveiled; the UK government has done just that.

JMA Wireless acquires 5G radio solutions provider Phazr

JMA Wireless just acquired Phazr, the Allen, Texas-based provider of 5G RAN technology that supports spectrum from 600 MHz all the way up to 47 GHz.

Comcast Leads Trellis, an Open Source Data Center Switching Fabric

In working with the ONF, Comcast is breaking with a long cable tradition of not sharing technology and innovation ideas with competitors.

Ericsson rumoured to be behind O2 and Softbank outages

With O2 and Softbank customers being thrown back to the 90s after a network outage, reports have emerged suggesting Ericsson is the root cause.

Apple eSIM: AT&T supports now, Verizon to support tomorrow

The nation’s wireless network operators are switching on support for Apple's eSIM implementation.

EE has a 5G smartphone announcement of its own

With Verizon and AT&T scrapping for attention with Samsung 5G smartphone announcements, EE is clamouring to prove its worth with its own OnePlus 5G declaration.

Facebook, Google, and Uber Join Open Source Compliance Project OpenChain

The Linux Foundation project OpenChain is developing an overarching standard for creating a quality compliance program that companies can apply across the supply chain.

Big Switch Brings Big Monitoring Fabric to AWS

The company has a similar product for Microsoft Azure that is slated to enter beta next year. Google Cloud is on the roadmap for future support.

Cloud service providers are jumping into SD-WAN

The lucrative and growing SD-WAN space is attracting the attention of the big cloud service providers, according to an IHS Markit report.

SON provider Cellwize scores more funding

In an effort to support the growth of 5G, Cellwize announced a series B round of funding from Deutsche Telekom Capital Partners.

Huawei CFO arrested in Canada, facing extradition to US

Meng Wanzhou, Huawei CFO, was arrested in Canada at the request of the US judiciary, with suspicions the company violated trade sanctions placed on Iran by the US.

Microsoft suggests FCC is telling Porky Pai’s

New Microsoft research suggests the digital divide in the US is much more prominent than any of the politicians, who are supposedly fixing the problem, would let you believe.

Google banks on SDN for velocity and availability of its network

Google would not be Google if not for software-defined networking, according to a keynote address at ONF Connect by Google Fellow Amin Vahdat.

BT Excludes Huawei From Its 5G Core, Huawei’s CFO Is Arrested in Canada

Huawei's' chief financial officer who is also the daughter of the founder of Huawei, was arrested in Canada at the request of the United States. The reason for the arrest has not been disclosed.

Vendors Ramp Up 5G Momentum With NSA 5G NR Tests in mmWave Spectrum

Ericsson, Nokia, Qualcomm, and Samsung have all recently conducted tests of 5G networks based on the Non-Standalone 5G New Radio (NSA 5G NR) standard.

SCF pushes new standards for 5G

The Small Cell Forum (SCF) is calling for the cellular industry to adopt open air interface and networking standards to ensure interoperability in 5G.

Snapdragon 855 supports 60 GHz Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0

The 855 Mobile Platform includes support for Wi-Fi at 60 GHz, 802.11ay, 802.11ad and it’s Wi-Fi 6/802.11ax-ready.

Eurobites: Swisscom Rolls Into Private Blockchain

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Huawei finds solace in Portugal; French fiber pushes on; Colt expands in central and eastern Europe; VEON's new man in Ukraine; Nokia gets busy in China and Brazil.

Ciena Positioned to Profit From Huawei Backlash – Analyst

NeoPhotonics' exposure to China and Huawei is at 50%-plus of sales, Raymond James analyst says.

China Slams Huawei CFO's Arrest, Huawei 'Not Aware of Any Wrongdoing'

China and Huawei respond with anger and denials after one of the Chinese company's most senior executives, the daughter of Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei, is arrested on North American soil.

Comcast Is First Major Pay-TV Player to Support 'Movies Anywhere'

Move puts Comcast on platform that's also supported by major digital distributors that include Apple iTunes, Microsoft, Vudu, FandangoNOW, Google Play and Amazon Prime Video.

How AI Is Being Put to Work at Vodafone

Jayshree Kottapalli, group head of Analytics CoE (AI, Automation and Analytics) at Vodafone, talks about how Vodafone is using AI tools to mine the enormous volumes of data the operator collects.

5G Demos Show the Tech's Spectrum Achilles Heel

For 5G, the bigger the bandwith the better!

Adtran Buy Adds On-Prem Visibility

New end-to-end view of customer network, including in-home WiFi, will speed troubleshooting and offer proactive service and sales potential, vendor says.

Cisco, Open RAN & Multivendor 5G Networks

Heavy Reading's Gabriel Brown discusses multivendor interoperability, x-haul transport and xRAN management interfaces for 5G with Cisco's global director of mobility.

IBM Sells Off Notes & Other Software You Barely Remember, for $1.8B

IBM bought Lotus Notes to help turn around its company culture; now it's looking to Red Hat for the same.

Here's How CenturyLink Is Cutting Capex

'Robust' spending scrutiny combined with synergies from its Level 3 merger is helping CenturyLink significantly reduce capital expenditure, its CFO says.

Ericsson Problem Leaves Millions Without Smartphone Services

Swedish vendor says it is working with customers to identify root causes and solve the problem.

Huawei’s CFO arrested

Huawei’s CFO was arrested in Canada, according to a new report in The Wall Street Journal.

Comcast's Howald on the importance of open source—Q&A

Comcast's Rob Howald says service providers need to collaborate through open source groups such as ONF in order to be successful.

EU passed new telecom rules to promote 5G

The telecom ministers gave final approval to the new European Electronic Communications Code to encourage competition, promote new technologies, as well as protect consumer interests.

Ericsson and Telia hit go button on Sweden’s first 5G network

Telia and Ericsson jointly switched on the first 5G network at KTH the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, with plans for a commercial launch across Sweden in 2020.

Legislators raise worries about cancer from 5G

Two federal lawmakers are raising concerns about whether new 5G technologies could cause cancer.

VMware CEO Lists Top 3 Priorities for 2019: NSX, Cloud, and Containers

“Obviously I love my vSAN child. It’s not as important as my NSX child,” VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger said, referring to VMware’s software-defined storage and networking platform, respectively.

BT to cut Huawei out of the mobile mix

BT has confirmed it will be stripping Huawei equipment from its core 4G network, while it will also face a ban from any DWDM optical transport network and mobile edge compute rollout.

Bose joins the connected craze

Premium audio brand Bose has become the latest business to attempt to cash in on the promised, but yet to be realised, riches of the augmented and virtual reality world.

Lowenstein's View: What should be on agenda at White House Roundtable?

On Thursday, the White House will hold a roundtable with tech executives, including the CEOs of Google, Microsoft, Oracle, and Qualcomm.

Dish, C Spire rally final push against T-Mobile, Sprint merger

As the public comment period closes on the FCC’s review of the proposed merger of Sprint and T-Mobile, opponents are getting in their last shots.

Qualcomm pumps Snapdragon 855 in Hawaii

The chipset company Qualcomm just unveiled the newest Snapdragon SoC product to power 5G mobile devices.

France and Germany give OTTs early Xmas gift in digital tax saga

Europe ambitious plans to hold the internet giants accountable to fair and reasonable taxation have been temporarily scuppered after resistance from several nations, most notably France and Germany.

ETSI Open Source MANO’s Latest Release Equips for 5G

OSM Release Five adds support for network slicing and employs a microservices architecture to make it a viable choice for 5G use cases.

Ericsson and Telia Switch On Live 5G Network as Key Testbed in Sweden

Swedish carrier Telia Company is the latest carrier to announce it has switched on a 5G network, with the help of Ericsson of course.

Google Relies on SDN, But Worries About the End of Moore’s Law

Google's compute infrastructure is straining to keep up with data demands. The company is looking for "novel ways" to do more data processing. That might include cluster computing.

Verizon continues to pledge interest in edge computing

Verizon’s Bill Stone said that the carrier remains interested in providing edge computing services.

Sprint may tackle market for in-home broadband internet

Sprint executives have said the company doesn't want to get into the in-home broadband market. But that might be changing.

Samsung touts 5G NR data transmission

Samsung Electronics announced a successful 5G NR data connection with Verizon and Qualcomm that used 400 MHz of bandwidth in the 28 GHz band.

Qualcomm unveils Snapdragon 855

A Super Snapdragon? That’s what Qualcomm unveiled with the Snapdragon 855 mobile platform during Day 1 of its Snapdragon Summit in Maui this week.  

ONF pushes its reference designs out for review

The Open Networking Foundation (ONF) is taking another step forward by putting its four reference designs out for review.

Blaber: Qualcomm, partners fire starting gun for mobile 5G

The opening day of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Summit comes as a relief as years of development finally manifests itself in tangible progress.

Inside Secure Puts Up $143M for Verimatrix

Deal brings consolidation to the video and entertainment security market and a combined company that is eyeing opportunities in the IoT and connected cars.

Canada Arrests Huawei CFO – Report

Wanzhou Meng faces extradition to the US on suspicion of violating US trade sanctions against Iran.

Charter Unit Checks In With Up-Market Video Move

Spectrum Enterprise teams with Moviebeam to beef up video offering for hotels.

5G Phone Designers Coping With 'Human Blockage'

Fingers can block signals from the phone antenna, so phone designers will have to work around that.

European Cable Has Reached 'Inflection Point,' Liberty Global CEO Says

Divestitures will enable Liberty Global to be a 'national challenger' in parts of Europe where it has scale.

Sprint CFO: No Rationing on Capex as Merger Looms

Sprint's spend will benefit a combined network with T-Mobile, Sprint's Andrew Davies says.

ADVA Moves In on Small Cell Backhaul

New tinier gateway is hardened for deployment on street furniture to provide backhaul for small cells, WiFi hotspots that will blossom with 5G densification, smart cities and more.

Eurobites: Smart Homes Making Botnets Feel Welcome – Nokia Report

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Ericsson and Telia test 5G in Stockholm; ADVA makes itself small; Safaricom trials tubular basestations; Yandex has a smartphone.

Huawei Cut Out of BT's Mobile Core, Optical & Edge Plans

Following a Financial Times report this morning, the UK telecom incumbent has confirmed it will not use Huawei in multiple parts of its network.

BT Is Stripping Huawei From its Mobile Core Network – FT Report

The UK telecom incumbent is tearing out Huawei equipment in apparent response to growing security concerns about the Chinese vendor.

Altice USA's Mobile Service to Be 'BYOD-Heavy'

But cable operator is still evaluating its pricing and business model for mobile as it prepares to launch service in 1H 2019.

Kubernetes Security Flaw Is a 'Really Big Deal' – Patch Now

Attackers can take over any node running vulnerable Kubernetes version, turning it into a 'zombie sock puppet.'

Kubernetes Discloses Major Security Flaw

It affects all Kubernetes-based products and services, and it gives hackers full administrative privileges on any compute node being run in a Kubernetes cluster.

AT&T’s White Box Cell-Site Routers Go Into Production Carrying Live Traffic

In 2019 the company will deploy these routers at several thousand towers to support its mobile 5G network.

Vestberg gives shoutout for StraightPath acquisition

Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg ended a conversation that was largely focused on 5G with an observation about StraightPath, the company it acquired in 2017.

AT&T deploys white box cell site gateways in live network

AT&T's Andre Fuetsch announced that his company now has white box cell site gateway routers deployed in a large-scale production test.

Europe is missing the tech trick

Technology is constantly being billed as the saviour of sluggish economies, but as the industry continues to grow Europe appears to be struggling to evolve.

AT&T won’t let Verizon have its moment in the 5G limelight

Just a day after Verizon announced plans with Verizon to launch a 5G-compatible device in the H1 2019, AT&T has romped in to steal attention with its own, pretty similar announcement.

Container Adoption Has Nearly Doubled in Last Year, Says Portworx Survey

IT professionals list Microsoft Azure as the best cloud provider in terms of cost effectiveness, having the most advanced tools, reliability, and having the best support for container environments.

Microsoft Resellers Including Dell Win $3.2B Deal With US Navy

Almost 900 vendors competed for the 10-year award. The Navy selected six.

28 GHz auction moves past $500M mark

After 39 rounds of bidding, the 28 GHz auction has reached $536,040,320, with the FCC planning to transition to Stage 2 on Thursday.

Arqiva and CityFibre look to 5G-ready small cell wholesale

Arqiva and CityFibre have unveiled the details of a new partnership which will see the pair create a wholesale, 5G-ready small cell infrastructure for backhaul in the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham.

ONAP drops Casablanca software release

LF Networking is blending new features in to its ONAP and OPNFV projects to enable cross-stack deployments across new and existing use cases.

AT&T to offer Samsung 5G smartphone in first half of 2019

AT&T announced it will offer a 5G smartphone from Samsung in the first half of 2019.

Sprint’s Michel Combes voted the most powerful person in U.S. wireless

After several hundred thousand votes, we have a winner: Sprint CEO Michel Combes is the most powerful person in the U.S. wireless industry.

Google is expanding eSim reach beyond Fi

With connectivity taking a more prominent role, Google has tied more partnerships to support eSim on the Pixel 3, taking the business into international markets.

T-Mobile’s Tele2 acquisition is not a sign of changing attitudes from Europe – Lawyer

While some might view European Commission’s decision for T-Mobile Netherlands acquisition of Tele2’s Dutch business as a softening approach to consolidation, White & Case, one of the law firms working on the deal, warned you shouldn’t get too excited.

VodafoneZiggo Deploys Cisco SON With RAN Automation for 5G

Cisco’s SON technology works in multi-vendor deployments based on any combination of cellular technologies. It supports RAN nodes from any major vendor as well as multiple data-source vendors.

Barefoot Networks Debuts Tofino 2, Using 7nm Technology

This is Barefoot’s second generation release of its P4-programmable Tofino Ethernet switch ASIC family.

Report: U.S. hyperscale cloud capex declines a bit in Q3

U.S. cloud providers have seemingly been printing their own money when it comes to their success in the cloud. That may be changing.

ONAP Casablanca Shows Up in ‘All the Gin Joints’

A bunch of service providers from around the world are starting to implement ONAP code into their networks.

South Korea Launches 5G, But Only for Enterprise Users Initially

South Korea is the first nation in Asia to launch commercial 5G networks as KT, LG UPlus, and SK Telecom, switch on services.

Nokia Threat Report: IoT Botnets Skyrocketed in 2018 and 5G Will Make It Worse

“If you have an IoT device and it has any vulnerability and it’s visible from the Internet, it will be attacked in a number of minutes,” said Kevin McNamee, director of Nokia’s Threat Intelligence Lab and lead author of the report.

Charter takes aim at T-Mobile, Verizon in Spectrum Mobile ads

Charter is working to set its MVNO apart from rivals.

MulteFire completes new specification optimized for IoT

The MulteFire Alliance announced the completion of its Release 1.1 specification that’s optimized for IoT.

Juniper’s ATP Appliance Works With Any Third-Party Firewall or Security Data Source

New capabilities allow security teams to create custom data collectors in the appliance using threat data from any Juniper or third-party firewall. This eliminates the need for custom code or pre-defined integrations.

Now AT&T Promises Samsung 5G Phone in Spring 2019, Too

AT&T horns in on the 5G smartphone game with Samsung too!

Eurobites: Nokia & Qualcomm Trumpet 5G NR 'Milestone'

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: CityFibre teams up with Arqiva on small-cell infrastructure in London; Sky falls in on Skyworth; Deutsche Telekom tops network test in Germany; Amazon Prime lands on TIM set-tops.

RJio Builds Customer Base at Rivals' Cost

RJio's rivals are responding to its aggressive move into lower-income segments, but their strategy could backfire.

How BT Delivers Services at Scale

Rich Oliver, BT's head of IT and managed services, talks with Light Reading's Mitch Wagner about delivering services at scale by leveraging repeatable use cases and complete packages, rather than individual technology.

AT&T CEO: Our SVoD Service Won't Be 'Another Netflix'

Trio of direct-to-consumer services launching next year will center on HBO, not become a content 'warehouse.'

Internal Culture Key to Transformation: Huawei GTS

Internal culture is the most important factor in digital transformation, according to Bill Tang, president of Huawei's Global Technical Services business unit.

Now AT&T Promises Saumsung 5G Phone in Spring 2019, Too

AT&T horns in on the 5G smartphone game with Samsung too!

5 Ways AWS Is Reinventing Itself

AWS is transforming to reach beyond its hardcore developer base, says analyst Zeus Kerravala.

Golly! Linux Code Patched to Replace F-Bombs in Comments With 'Hugs'

Developers complain about gosh-darn censorship.

A 4-Step Plan to Cloudification

If the term 'digital transformation' is to mean anything, it should include this.

5G: Think Things Over

A well-thought, innovative and collaborative approach can make the 5G journey successful, writes Dr. Konstantinos Stavropoulos, Solution Marketing, EXFO.

Comcast CFO: 5G No Threat to Our Broadband Business

'We're staying tuned' to the potential danger, and Comcast itself might use 5G technologies in some instances, CFO says.

We Need to Talk About Prepaid

The emergence of the eSIM will make it easier for customers to change operators and force the industry to have a proper conversation about the largely overlooked prepaid side of the business.

ONAP's Casablanca Focuses on Deployability

No romance here, just a software release with practical features to put this automated orchestration platform into use globally.

Verizon's Vestberg Mum on 2019 Capex but Ebullient on 5G Prospects

Verizon CEO doesn't want to name a 'killer app' for 5G, but he has a few ideas.

Nokia bags €250mn loans from NIB

The Nordic Investment Bank (NIB) has agreed to write Nokia a €250 million cheque in the pursuit of 5G riches.

Samsung set to launch 5G phone with Verizon in early 2019

Verizon and Samsung will unveil a prototype this week of a 5G phone they intend to commercially launch in 1H 2019.

A 5G robot is coming to Helsinki airport

Telia has launched a pre-commercial 5G network at Helsinki airport, and helped the airport authority to introduce a robot to test support for operation and customer service.

Telcos are still misleading consumer in broadband ads – FTTH Council

The FTTH Council Europe has written an open letter to various regulatory bodies bemoaning the care-free attitudes of telco marketers and PR ‘gurus’ when promoting their services.

Qualcomm-NXP deal could be back on

The Chinese president would be open to approving the acquisition of NXP should Qualcomm propose again, according to the White House.

Sprint’s Combes vs. Cisco’s Robbins for most powerful person

After almost a full week of voting, we’ve reached the final match: Sprint’s Michel Combes versus Cisco’s Chuck Robbins.

The UK needs to make a call on Huawei and 5G soon

There is increasing speculation in the UK media about the likelihood of a government intervention over Huawei and 5G kit.

Dell flies through Q3 with 15% revenue growth

Dell Technologies has reported its financials for the third quarter of 2018, with few complaining over 15% revenue growth to $22.5 billion.

Cable players hint at a return of the femtocell

CableLabs recently began discussing the possibility that some cable operators could deploy femtocells.

CenturyLink Dove Into NFV Early Because of a Profitable Business Case

Bill Walker, director of network architecture and innovation with CenturyLink, said there are three business cases for NFV. The worst business case is for new technology that is not directly revenue generating.

Nutanix and Intel Form Hyperconverged Infrastructure Partnership

As part of this partnership, systems integrators and value-added resellers will be able to brand and personalize Intel servers running Nutanix software.

Korea switches on 5G

All three of Korea’s major mobile operators switched on 5G networks simultaneous at midnight on 1 December, offering business FWA based on 3GPP standards.

Pluribus Broadens Support for Edgecore White Box Switches

The partners expanded their support for Pluribus’ network operating system and cloud fabric software on five additional Edgecore white box, top-of-rack switches.

Report: A tsunami of data is building towards 2025

A deluge of data—one that is even greater than what already is upon us—is coming. Are CSPs ready for the onslaught?

SCTE scores its first patent, with more to follow

On the cusp of its 50th anniversary next year, the Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers (SCTE) has scored its first industry patent.

Orange plans banking profitability by 2023

With many commentators expressing doubt over Orange’s banking venture, it might come as somewhat of a surprise the team are planning to be profitable by 2023.

Symantec Shakeup Continues With President, Other Senior Execs Leaving

The executive team shakeup caps a tumultuous year for the company that recently concluded an internal investigation into financial disclosures and announced plans to cut about 8 percent of its global workforce.

Nokia Bolsters 5G R&D Coffers With $283 Million Loan

The new deal comes hot on the heels of a $567 million loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB), bringing the total amount of publicly announced 5G financing to $851 million.

Verizon, Samsung promise 5G smartphone for next year

Samsung and Verizon announced they will release a 5G smartphone sometime in the first half of next year.

Mavenir makes name for itself driving open RAN efforts

Mavenir has emerged as one of the more disruptive vendors in the wireless space, namely in taking on big players in the RAN market while continuing to play in…

Toyota: DSRC not 'failed experiment'

Toyota Motor Corporation is telling the FCC assertions about dedicated short-range communications being a “failed experiment” are simply not true.

Panasonic pushes for entire 5.9 GHz for autos

Citing its relevant technology experience, Panasonic is urging the FCC to preserve the entire 5.9 GHz band for auto safety services.

Arris Flirted With Handful of Potential Suitors

Since early 2017, The Carlyle Group and five other entities pursued M&A discussions with Arris before CommScope deal was consummated last month, filing shows.

FCC 5G Auction Now at $490.7M in Bids

Auction 101 keeps on trucking, with 355 licenses still outstanding.

Cisco's Security GM: Managed Security Services Are a Big Telco Opportunity

Cisco security head Gee Rittenhouse talks with Light Reading's Mitch Wagner about how network operators can use AI, machine learning, blockchain and other emerging technologies to protect against threats.

SMB Mobility: Cable's Next Big Chance?

In this video interview, Independence Research's Matt Davis examines the potential for cable operators to deliver mobile services to small-to-midsized businesses.

South Korea's 5G Lead May Bring Industrial Advantage

All three mobile operators in South Korea have now launched 5G networks, and their focus is on the business rather than the consumer market.

Verizon Plans to Offer Samsung 5G Phone in H1 2019

Verizon adds a fully integrated 5G smartphone to its line-up for 2019.

Nokia Gets €250M 5G R&D Boost From Nordic Lender

Finnish equipment vendor says loan will help to make the Nordic region more competitive in the forthcoming 5G era.

Eurobites: FTTH Council Takes 'Fake Fiber' Fight to Brussels

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Accenture revives Telefónica; Telia's 5G robot; BT tees up new security boss; Deutsche Telekom digitizes breakdown recovery.

Court Upholds Sprint's Victory in Old Patent Spat With TWC

Decision arrives more than a year after a court ordered TWC to pay Sprint almost $140 million.

US, China Agree to Delay Tariffs Hike

A higher, 25% tariff slated to take effect in 2019 is postponed for 90 days as the sides try to iron out a long-term trade arrangement.

Orange Bank Job Is Going Europe-Wide

The French telecom incumbent is taking its AI-powered, digital banking service outside France, with launches planned in Romania and Spain next year.

SK Telecom Opens the New 5G Era

SK Telecom today announced that it has switched on its 5G network at 00:00, December 1, 2018.

Telefónica takes aim at new growth strategy

Telefónica Chairman and CEO José María Álvarez-Pallete rallied the troops on Friday by announcing a new internal program.

The Final Four: Sprint vs. Ericsson and CTIA vs. Cisco

The quarterfinals are over, and boy were there some surprises.

T-Mobile Customer Service Reps Use AWS to Predict Why You’re Calling

The company uses AWS SageMaker Ground Truth to create natural language understanding models for customer service conversations.

CenturyLink CTO Dugan digs into company road map—Q&A

CenturyLink's Andrew Dugan is digging into his new role as the company's CTO.

Huawei’s struggles open $5B opportunity for others: analysts

Growing concerns among governments across the world related to Huawei’s equipment could create a $5 billion opportunity for rivals.

VMware, Dell Tech Report Revenue Surge Ahead of Tracking Stock Vote

The elephant in the room on both earnings calls was the VMware-AWS relationship. The latest offering — AWS branded servers running in customers’ on-premises data centers — could hurt legacy hardware vendors like Dell.

SDxCentral's Weekly Roundup — November 30, 2018

Google Cloud lands in Hong Kong; Infinera adds optical network to its open line system; and plenty of news from AWS re:Invent.

Italy floats the idea of a nationalised broadband network

With a suspiciously positioned government, perhaps we should not be surprised Italy is going against popular trends by proposing a nationalised broadband network.

ZTE may be in trouble with the US yet again

Reports indicate ZTE is suspected of being naughty, yet again, with respect to US government conditions for being able to operate there.

Palo Alto Networks to provide new security product

Palo Alto Networks is upping the ante in the security game, announcing a new product that will be directed at mobile service providers early next year.

Cisco, AT&T, Intel Promote Best Anti-Botnet Practices for Companies

The anti-botnet guide provides best practices for service providers, enterprises, and software and device manufacturers.

Charter files for C-Band tests in Florida

CCO Fiberlink, a subsidiary of Charter Communications, filed an application for Special Temporary Authority to conduct tests in the 3.7-4.2 GHz band.

AT&T Pegs 2019 Capex Guidance in $23B Range, Despite 5G Push

Think 5G is going to blow out 2019 capex? Uh-uh, says AT&T.

Cloud Dynamics Underpin MYCOM OSI's Acquisition

Why would a private equity company buy a telecom network assurance and optimization company? Because the cloud is where the money is.

Broadband Incumbents Should Be 'a Little Bit Nervous' About Starry – Analyst

Starry's millimeter wave-powered fixed wireless technology and biz economics 'appear to be working' as startup prepares to enter several more markets.

Eurobites: Altice Sells Off SFR Fiber Assets for $2.3B

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Telefónica outlines transformation plan; Italy's League party supports state-backed broadband network; Germany scrutinizes Amazon.

Cisco: We'll Partner With Service Providers on Collaboration

The energetic Amy Chang, head of collaboration technology at Cisco, talks with a less energetic Mitch Wagner of Light Reading about the vendor's strategy to partner with service providers to take the stress out of videoconferencing.

WiCipedia: 'Trusting One's Dopeness' & the Happiest Women in Tech

This week in our WiC roundup: Fidelity re-evaluates its gender breakdown; women in India are happiest in tech roles; Apple starts new training program for women in tech; and more.

AT&T Bets Big on OTT to 'Bend the Cost Curve' of TV & Video

Also sets plan to launch a three-tiered SVoD product in Q4 2019.

Europe's Telcos Fret as Walls Close In On Huawei

The tightening of restrictions on China's biggest network equipment maker could deal a major blow to its European customers.

Telcos are missing the AI trick

We’ve spoken about this before, but our bugbear has been renewed at The Great Telco Debate; telcos have too narrow a view on artificial intelligence (AI).

AT&T’s CEO on 5G: ‘Early opportunities are going to be in enterprise’

AT&T’s top wireless executive laid out his vision for 5G, noting that the company’s wireless business contributes fully 39% of AT&T’s revenues.

ZTE Led Q3 Surge in Optical Transport Revenues, Dell’Oro Report Says

Huawei continues to dominate the worldwide market, with Ciena tops in North America.

Three completes 5G outdoor trials in Hong Kong

3HK, the third largest mobile operator in Hong Kong conducted 5G trials on both the 3.5GHz and 26GHz bands

The diversification dilemma; making money and meeting expectations, can it be done?

Diversification is an accepted truth in the telco industry nowadays, but are the telcos resourceful and adaptable enough to chase after new revenues while also achieving their connectivity responsibilities?

T-Mobile/Sprint could face House hearings

With Democrats taking control of the House, a group of unions and others is calling for hearings on the proposed merger between Sprint and T-Mobile.

Juniper Networks buys cloud storage company HTBASE

Juniper Networks is looking to prop up its cloud capabilities by buying enterprise cloud storage vendor HTBASE for an undisclosed sum.

Updated: T-Mobile testing another banking service

T-Mobile said it is headed back into the banking business, albeit on a test basis.

Qualcomm pumps $100mn into AI start-up fund

US mobile chip giant Qualcomm has created a $100 million investment fund to support artificial intelligence (AI) startups in an effort to put mass-market devices, rather than the cloud, at the heart of AI activity.

ETSI publishes new spec and reports on 5G tech

The European Telecommunications Standards Institute, ETSI, released a new specification on packet formatting and forwarding and two reports on transport and network slicing respectively.

The quarterfinals: Vote for the most powerful person in wireless

The results are in from round two, and they’re pretty interesting. Now, in the quarterfinals, things are even more interesting.

AWS goes deep on machine learning

AWS announced a raft of machine learning services at this week's re:Invent 2018 conference in Las Vegas, including new algorithms for SageMaker.