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.