Saturday, March 14, 2020

Friday, March 13, 2020

Dish lets T-Mobile tap its 600 MHz spectrum for COVID-19 aid

Dish Network announced that it is providing its entire portfolio of 600 MHz spectrum to T-Mobile at no cost for 60 days in order to bolster wireless capacity during the coronavirus pandemic. A Dish spokesperson said the additional spectrum would help T-Mobile add extra capacity in its existing footprint.

Digital Realty closes $8.4 billion deal to buy Interxion

Digital Realty announced on Friday that it has closed its $8.4 billion deal to buy European data center operator Interxion. The deal, which was announced last October, gives colocation giant Digital Realty a much larger footprint in Europe. Digital Realty now counts 267 data centers in 44 metro areas in 20 countries across six continents.

Coronavirus stalls FCC summit on 5G, vRAN

Events planned by federal agencies focused on 5G and next-generation approaches to wireless networks are now on the backburner as the country appears to be bunkering down in an effort to slow the spread of COVID-19.

CommScope, AT&T to demo O-RAN, ONAP at digital forum

CommScope is putting on a Digital Forum next week in lieu of what it would have shown at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Among its demonstrations, it will show how it is enabling the management of small cells under the Linux Foundation’s Open Network Automation Platform (ONAP). CommScope has developed this in partnership with AT&T, Intel and others in the industry.

Turns out 5G is safe – yay

Updated guidelines from experts on this sort of thing show that, even at millimetre wave, 5G in its current form poses no additional risk to health.

Thursday, March 12, 2020

T-Mobile’s Post-Merger Executive Team Takes Shape

Now that the merger of T-Mobile US and Sprint is inching closer to completion, the long awaited executive shuffle has taken shape. The company detailed the makeup of its senior leadership team in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

WISPA cancels Dallas convention

Just two days after the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association (WISPA) confirmed the show would go on, the organization said that's not going to happen after all: WISPAMERICA 2020 has been cancelled due to the coronavirus.

BT bolsters security with new security advisory practice

BT is adding another layer to its security threat detection via its Security Advisory Services practice. BT Security Advisory Services, which was announced on Thursday, offers organizations of all sizes security guidance and solutions in the face of evolving cybersecurity threats.

WSJ: AT&T CEO's salary jumps to $32M after hedge fund dustup

AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson pulled in $32 million in compensation last year after AT&T's dustup with Elliott Management boosted the company's stock. The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that Stephenson's overall compensation increased by 10% in 2019, mainly due to the telco and media company's stock appreciation.

Wednesday, March 11, 2020

Splunk Makes Security Hygiene Sexy Again

Russian state-sponsored hackers and zero-day attacks sound infinity more exciting than, say, multi-factor authentication and patch management. But these seemingly boring security basics should be top of mind, says Monzy Merza, VP and head of security research at Splunk.

Daily Roundup: AT&T Touts 5G Lead

In case you’ve been stuck in meetings all day, here are today’s top stories from SDxCentral. Also, make sure to subscribe to our daily newsletter to get these stories in your inbox.

California AG reaches settlement with T-Mobile

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra announced Wednesday that his office reached a settlement with T-Mobile and his state won’t appeal a district court judge’s decision to allow the T-Mobile/Sprint combination to transpire.

Nokia lands air traffic control deal with Irish Aviation

Nokia announced on Wednesday that the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) has deployed its IP and MPLS networking products as part an upgrade from legacy services to a next-gen network. The high-bandwidth IP/MPLS network, which went live last year, increased IAA's capacity to help ensure the operation of new, more demanding air traffic control (ATC) applications.

BT lines up 1-Gig home broadband service across the U.K.

Later this month, BT will launch a fiber-based broadband service with speeds of 1 Gigabit to hundreds of homes across the U.K. The service, which is called Full Fibre, will eventually be available to more than 200 million homes. BT plans to reach half of those homes by 2025. Full Fibre is up to 25 times faster than BT's Superfast Fibre service.

CenturyLink rings up more fiber in Tennessee

CenturyLink's fiber march continues in Tennessee with the addition of a 59-mile ring in a growing area southeast of Memphis. The new fiber ring, which is slated to be finished in the fall, will bring faster speeds and more data capacity to the Collierville area of Tennessee. The network expansion will tie in existing CenturyLink fiber routes to create a new metro fiber ring that connects Collierville to the Memphis metro area and Olive Branch, Mississippi. 

Coronavirus: The dawning of a new IT spending era

The impact of the coronavirus has rippled across the IT sector for both buyers and vendors as they face a new set of assumptions and a new global economy, according to recent research. The condensed version of International Data Corporation's most recent data is: "Things could get worse, but hopefully not."

Entner: Is U.S. missing a big 5G opportunity at 6 GHz?

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is on a rampage trying to make as much spectrum available for 5G as it can. But in so doing, is it creating an imbalance in spectrum allocations in the U.S.? If so, what will that mean for the mobile industry in the U.S.?

Tuesday, March 10, 2020

Coronavirus Wreaks Havoc on Tech Industry

As the COVID-19 outbreak widens it is spreading fear and a level of uncertainty that the mobile and technology industry at large hasn’t faced in decades. The most valuable companies in the world — Amazon, Apple, Google, and Microsoft — are assembling with U.S. CTO Michael Kratsios at the White House today to coordinate a response to the coronavirus, according to Reuters and other news outlets.

Hitachi Vantara Skims Containership’s Kubernetes Assets

Hitachi Vantara scooped up the debris of Containership’s disastrous Kubernetes cruise, announcing that it has acquired the assets of the failed startup for an undisclosed amount. The deal comes six months after Containership permanently docked its operations.

Microsoft Leads Massive Necurs Botnet Takedown

Microsoft said it led the effort to take down Necurs, a malware botnet that infected more than 9 million computers globally, working with partners in 35 countries including cybersecurity ratings company BitSight.

Money Moves: February 2020

Here are some of the most prominent venture capital and merger and acquisition news items from the past month. If you’d like SDxCentral to report on your company’s VC or M&A activity, or if you have any tips on that activity, please send the information to Sydney Sawaya (ssawaya@sdxcentral.com).

Data center switch revenue growth anemic in Q4

According to a recent report by Dell'Oro Group, the worldwide data center switch market grew by a measly 1% year over year in Q4, which marked the slowest growth rate in six years. While data center switch revenue was down in North America and Europe, China's revenues grew by double digits year over year in the fourth quarter.

Where will AT&T launch 5G next?

Since launching last December, AT&T’s low-band flavor of 5G is now available in 80 markets, and Opensignal knows what locations may get it next, based on cities where the carrier has already retired some of its 4G spectrum to repurpose for 5G.

Silver Peak's SD-WAN garners federal stamp of approval

Silver Peak announced on Tuesday that its Unity EdgeConnect SD-WAN platform has completed a federal approval process. Through the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Silver Peak has completed Federal Information Processing Standard 140-2 (FIPS-2) validation testing for its SD-WAN offering.

Monday, March 09, 2020

HPE Reveals Cloud Native Software for 5G Core

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) today revealed a software stack for the 5G core that will be available in the second half of this year. With the HPE 5G Core Stack the company is trying to straddle the benefits of pairing software with its HPE GreenLake platform while also embracing an open, disaggregated approach that will allow operators to use the platform with services or hardware provided by other vendors.

Daily Roundup: Cisco Dreams of 5G WAN

In case you’ve been stuck in meetings all day, here are today’s top stories from SDxCentral. Also, make sure to subscribe to our daily newsletter to get these stories in your inbox.

NetFoundry CEO: The Edge Is ‘Not a Walk in the Park’

NetFoundry’s embedded networking service for edge compute is now commercially available. The company, which uses SDN to create private overlay networks, has partnered with Supermicro, IMS Evolve, Micron, NodeWeaver, and others to build a platform for edge computing with zero-trust networking.

COVID-19 Trade Show Impact

Trade shows are evolving rapidly in the wake of the COVID-19 virus. Many have been altered to a virtualized existence and some outright cancelled.

Cisco Dreams of a 5G WAN

Cisco envisions a future in which enterprise’s WANs are connected not by MPLS or broadband, but instead by high-speed, low-latency cellular networks, or what it calls the wireless WAN.

Rakuten Mobile Plays the (Vendor) Field

Rakuten Mobile has generally downplayed the need to rely on legacy equipment vendors and traditional technology for its greenfield network in Japan, but the operator is inking deals with some familiar names in telecom all the same.

Greenblatt: Customer care ante being raised for MVNOs

When a company doesn't own or control the underlying infrastructure of a service, it can differentiate itself through customer service. That is why we have seen most mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) do such a good job of keeping pace with the networks they ride on, in terms of delivering improved levels of customer service for the past several years. To MVNOs, the adage “never miss an opportunity to delight your customer” is foundational to their continued success.

Charter offers 5G for unlimited data plan users

With the launch of Samsung’s new 5G-enabled phones last week, Charter Communications announced that Spectrum Mobile customers on its $45 monthly unlimited data plan can use the phones to access 5G at no additional cost in select cities.

Zayo completes transition to being a private company

Zayo Group Holdings has returned to the privately-held ranks now that its $14.3 billion acquisition is complete. Affiliates of Digital Colony Partners and the EQT Infrastructure IV fund announced on Monday that they have completed their deal to buy Zayo, which was first announced in May of last year.

5G Future Forum or Telco Edge Forum — What’s the difference?

Now that the industry has debated the importance of a virtualized core and the cost-effectiveness of an open radio access network (RAN), mobile operators are turning their attention to the network edge. In fact, you don’t have to look very far to see that wireless operators like Verizon are already using the network edge as a competitive differentiator with its “Intelligent Edge” marketing campaign.

Get instant estimates of your company’s IoT data costs

What if you could estimate – instantly and painlessly – the data costs of your company’s IoT initiative? With the Sprint IoT Estimation Tool you can configure the data plan you need in seconds. It doesn’t matter what stage you are in your IoT planning.  The tool is your personal ‘what-if’ scenario planner, giving you the flexibility to add any number of devices and services – and see the cost implications of your decisions immediately.

Sunday, March 08, 2020

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