Headcount: Firings, Hirings, and Retirings — October 2020

Here are some of the latest executive hirings, promotions, and staff changes that happened in August. If you’d like SDxCentral to report on your company’s movers and shakers, or if you’ve got a tip about layoffs and restructuring, please send the information to Sydney Sawaya (ssawaya@sdxcentral.com) for inclusion in the monthly headcount column.

Cable One isn't worried about T-Mobile's fixed wireless plans

Cable One CEO Julia Laulis isn't losing any sleep over T-Mobile's plan to expand its fixed wireless home internet service to new locations that overlap Cable One's footprint.

Dish won’t have major 5G market up until Q3 of 2021

Dish Network is no longer expecting to have 5G running in a market by the end of this year. Instead, it expects to have its first major 5G market by the third quarter of 2021 as it waits to receive more radios from Fujitsu.

AT&T puts some diversity at head of its board: Editor’s Corner

Today, AT&T’s board of directors named William Kennard to serve as its new chairman, replacing Randall Stephenson as chairman effective January 2021. Kennard will serve as an independent chairman, which means he’s not also the CEO of the company. Kennard’s been on AT&T’s board of directors since 2014, where he currently serves on the corporate governance and nominating committee and the public policy and corporate reputation committee.

UScellular not changing tune on value of owning towers

UScellular hasn’t changed its view that owning towers is the way to go, and will focus on increasing revenues from those strategic assets near-term, executives said on the carrier’s third quarter earnings call.

OpenVault: Election night drives 7% spike in broadband usage

As the 2020 elections played out Tuesday night, OpenVault said intense interest in the results likely led to significant increases in broadband usage. Using the central time zone, there was a 7% increase from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday night when compared to the previous four Tuesdays.

Nokia’s CMO to depart at end of 2020

Nokia’s new CEO Pekka Lundmark posted on LinkedIn today that the company’s Chief Marketing Office Barry French will be stepping down at the end of 2020.

Windstream names former Lightower CEO to its board

Windstream has added in-depth institutional fiber knowledge to its board of directors with the recent appointment Rob Shanahan. Shanahan was president and CEO of Lightower Fiber Networks for 17 years before it was sold to Crown Castle for $7.1 billion in cash three years ago.

AWS tees up $2.8 billion cloud region in India

Amazon Web Services will invest $2.8 billion to build a new AWS Cloud region in the Indian state of Telangana. The new region will be located in Hyderabad, which is the capital and the largest city in Telangana.

T-Mobile US ups guidance as subs top 100m

Thanks primarily to the addition of Sprint, the self-styled Uncarrier has turned in a particularly strong set of third quarter results.

Huawei challenges Swedish ban

Chinese vendor Huawei has continued its fight back against its exclusion from European markets by launching a legal challenge to the Swedish decision.

Emerging technologies win big at the 2020 Glotel Awards

The spoils were shared evenly at this year’s Global Telecoms Awards, but emerging technologies such as OpenRAN caught the eyes of the judges. You can see the full list of winners below and find that only one company one more than once – last year’s big winner SK Telecom – which grabbed the ‘best operator’ […]

American Tower splurges $3.5bn on rival InSite Wireless

Coronavirus means the US-Canadian border remains closed, unless of course you’re in a position to spend billions on a couple of hundred phone towers there.

NTT CMO: How to 'adjust and be agile' during a rebranding

In part two of this series, Ruth Rowan emphasizes the importance of keeping the "why" for a rebranding front and center, as well as how to minimize confusion and improve the employee and customer experience.

Infinera in optimistic mood after solid Q3

Optical/IP technology specialist beats analyst estimates with Q3 results.

Angry investors sue Apple over earnings call

Apple faces a federal class action suit arguing it hid shrinking Chinese iPhone demand, costing pensions funds and other investors billions.

Dish pushes first live 5G network to Q1 2021

Dish now expects to have some small, preliminary markets deployed in Q1 2021, and a major market up and running by Q3 2021, and remains 'on track' to meet its FCC buildout obligations.

Nokia breaks the French connection as CMO quits

Barry French will leave his job as chief marketing officer at the end of the year, he reveals in a LinkedIn update.

Dish Network's 5G Aspirations Run Into Reality

Dish Network’s executive team faced what has become a quarterly barrage of skepticism and pointed questions about its 5G strategy during its third-quarter 2020 earnings call. 

AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile exceed expectations amid pandemic

T-Mobile reported 689,000 postpaid phone net customer additions during the third quarter, while AT&T notched 452,000 and Verizon posted 283,000.

Daily Roundup: Silver Peak SD-WAN Gains Aruba ClearPass Boost

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Vodafone, Orange Top Forrester SD-WAN Services Report

Vodafone and Orange Business Services topped the leaderboards of Forester Research’s Q4 2020 SD-WAN Services report this week, narrowly beating out Colt Technology Services and Tata Communications to claim the leadership spot.

KT sees operating profit fall on flat revenue, higher costs

South Korean telco KT Corp has recorded a sharp fall in operating profit in a quarterly result salvaged only by an accounting change.

If elected, Biden should keep net neutrality in its coffin

An attempt to resurrect the issue would be fantastic for lawyers and rule makers but an expensive distraction for everyone else.

Viavi fiscal Q1 delivers 'all-time record' in OSP segment

Optical security and performance products buoyed by strong 3D sensing demand star performer, field instrument recovery anticipated as 5G rollout accelerates.

WiCipedia: How to be a better ally

This week in our WiC roundup: Black and Latina women create pipelines to break into tech; trans workers flock to the tech industry; how to level up your allyship practice; and more.

Silver Peak SD-WAN Collects Aruba's ClearPass Treatment

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) is wasting no time integrating Silver Peak with its Aruba Networks branch offering. This week, the company said it was rolling its Clear Pass artificial intelligence (AI)-enhanced security platform into Silver Peak’s SD-WAN.

Locast has achieved operational sustainability, chairman says

The non-profit broadcast TV streaming service has reached 1.7 million users nationwide, with enough donors on board to pay the bills, pay down debt and to help fund expansion, David Goodfriend says.

T-Mobile’s 5G Network Advantage Grows as 2020 Closes

T-Mobile US continued to position itself as the country’s leader on 5G, boosted by strong third-quarter 2020 earnings and a faster-than-expected network upgrade cycle following its merger with Sprint. 

Eurobites: Huawei cranks up European propaganda push

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: MTS chooses Canonical's Charmed OpenStack; ETNO doesn't like German proposals on metadata use; Swisscom's eSIM tech makes damn fine cups of coffee.

Cisco Discloses Zero-Day VPN Bug Without a Fix

Cisco doesn’t yet have a fix for a zero-day vulnerability in the Linux, MacOS, and Windows versions of its virtual private network (VPN) software, AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client.

T-Mobile reports record 1.9M net adds in Q3

During a quarter where there wasn’t a lot of customer switching going on between carriers – and there’s an international pandemic – T-Mobile reported its highest ever number of postpaid net additions, coming in at 1,979,000. Total net additions were just over 2 million.

UScellular reports uptick in connected devices in Q3

Regional carrier UScellular added 28,000 connected devices in the third quarter, but didn’t report any net postpaid phone subscribers as a loss of feature phone connections canceled out the same number of modest net smartphone gains.

T-Mobile told to tone down some post-merger claims

Some of T-Mobile’s claims about network prowess due to its merger with Sprint are OK in the eyes of the National Advertising Division (NAD), but the organization recommended T-Mobile modify other claims that made it sound as if certain benefits were imminent for most customers.

Colt, Atos partner up on contact center-as-a-solution offering

Colt announced a partnership with France-based IT vendor Atos to deliver a contact center-as-a-service (CCaaS) offering to to better engage with their customers.

Greenblatt: Wireless purchase experience improves through Covid

While it is one thing to muddle through and simply meet the minimal demands and expectations of customers through difficult times, the wireless industry has gone several steps beyond this performance in a year like no other. The wireless industry -- as a whole -- has managed to actually elevate the experience of consumers who have purchased new phones and subscribed to new services through the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Samsung, KT deploy 5G common core in South Korea

Mobile operator KT is preparing for commercialization of 5G standalone (SA) with help from Samsung, deploying 5G SA and non-standalone (NSA) common core network in South Korea.

Big Blue reaches for hybrid cloud to target 5G telcos

IBM has thrown its hat into the telco ring with the launch of new hybrid cloud platform that draws a bead on 5G.

American Tower buys InSite Wireless for $3.5B

American Tower plans to acquire InSite Wireless Group for about $3.5 billion, including cash acquired and assumption of InSite debt.

NTT Docomo selects NEC for 5G standalone core, edge computing

Japan’s NTT Docomo chose NEC as the vendor for its 5G standalone (SA) mobile core network, which it plans to launch in 2021.

Lumen turns up the first block of its cloud edge nodes in Q3

In Q3, Lumen Technologies turned up its first block of cloud edge nodes and additional node blocks are well under way, according to Lumen CEO Jeff Storey.

ZTE launches new Bug Bounty Programs

23 October 2020, Shenzhen, China - ZTE Corporation (0763.HK / 000063.SZ), a major international provider of telecommunications, enterprise and consumer technology solutions for the Mobile Internet, today has launched new Bug Bounty Programs to encourage security researchers and organizations worldwide to identify vulnerabilities in ZTE’s products and services. ZTE Bug Bounty Programs cover four categories of products, specifically, the web application system including core applications and general applications, the wireline, the wireless, as well as the terminal such as mobile internet products.  The wireline refers to fixed network optical access products, fixed network multi-service access networks (MSAN), fixed network terminals, and multi-media products while the wireless includes cloud core networks and wireless networks.  In case that there is a potential security vulnerability with  ZTE’s product or service as listed above, researchers or organizations can submit a report via email to ZTE PSIRT (Product Security Incident Response Team) at psirt@zte.com.cn.  If the submitted vulnerability meets the awarding criteria specified in the bug bounty programs, the reporter may receive a bounty award in accordance with the program terms. As an advocate for transparency and openness, ZTE has been committed to continuously improving the security of products and services, so as to provide users with a secure and reliable service experience.  For further details, please check here.

Qualcomm posts ‘exceptional’ Q4, rides 5G wave

Qualcomm shares rose after the market closed on Wednesday, shooting up more than 14% at one point to $147.21, as investors reacted to good news in its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings.

CityFibre chucks another £1.5 billion at UK fibre rollout

UK fibre network specialist CityFibre has awarded the contracts for building out fibre across 27 towns and cities.

T-Mobile US fined $200m for subsidy fraud

The FCC has slapped T-Mobile US with a $200 million fine for fraudulently collecting millions of dollars in government subsidies designed to help low-income phone customers.

Virgin Media heralds London and Northern Ireland Giga-switch-on

Liberty-owned cableco Virgin Media has enabled 1-Gbps services for a further 6 million premises.

Qualcomm benefits from 5G momentum and gives bullish outlook

Chip giant Qualcomm reported strong quarterly and annual revenues, and profits, on the back of strong market enthusiasm for 5G products.

Cable One targets AT&T's DSL pullback

Cable op also notes that CBRS spectrum won at auction is for Wisper Internet, a Cable One-backed fixed wireless ISP.

T-Mobile eyed as 'the next big thing'

T-Mobile's financial results exceeded Wall Street expectations 'by a mile,' according to some financial analysts. The situation may position T-Mobile to take a commanding lead in 5G.

Comcast to test mobile, fixed operations in C-band ahead of auction

Comcast said it wants to 'evaluate coverage, throughput and mobility of equipment and facilities' in C-band spectrum ahead of the FCC's December auction of licenses in the band.

Blank-check company circles AT&T's struggling DirecTV – report

A special purpose acquisition company run by former Citigroup banker Michael Klein is reportedly interested in buying a stake in AT&T's satellite TV business.

Gunslinging Liberty Global counts on takeovers for revival

Saddled with debt, the cable company is still losing customers in two markets and faces mounting infrastructure rivalry in the UK.

Three eyes €10B towers sale to Cellnex in risky move

The full divestment of its infrastructure assets would turn the service provider from landlord into tenant.

Daily Roundup: Will Extreme Unseat Cisco, HPE?

In case you’ve been stuck in video conference 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.

Oracle Flies Overall Leader Flag Over AWS Camp

Oracle gained new bragging rights in its ongoing cloud war against Amazon Web Services (AWS). The latest KuppingerCole Analysts report, Leadership Compass: Enterprise Databases in the Cloud, ranks Oracle Autonomous Database the “overall leader” in product and innovation. However, AWS maintains market leadership.

Eurobites: TIM, Inwit combine on small cells for 5G boost

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: CityFibre announces £1.5 billion investment; Telefónica spins out digital mental healthcare provider; Arcep's 5G observatory.

Heavy Reading's Gabriel Brown on open RAN and network slicing

Light Reading's Mike Dano and Heavy Reading's Gabriel Brown recap the first day of the 5G Transport & Networking Strategies symposium and discuss topics including network slicing and open RAN.

Discovery CEO gives TVision some static

David Zaslav questions whether T-Mobile's new service has the right to package Discovery's top channels in TVision's $10 per month 'Vibe' streaming service.

American Tower's $3.5B InSite purchase highlights sky-high tower values

American Tower's new deal comes with 'high sticker shock,' but it reflects the long-term value investors see in the ownership of towers amid a 5G rollout.

IBM assembles telco gang to go after 5G cloud biz

IBM assembled 35 companies, ranging from Nokia to Cisco, to underpin its new 'Cloud for Telecommunications' offering for 5G network operators.

NTT CMO: Rebranding a telco requires cultural sensitivity

In this Women in Comms mentor spotlight, CMO Ruth Rowan shares the challenges and lessons learned as she led the charge in rebranding dozens of tech companies across multiple countries.

A closer look at Verizon's curious CBRS spectrum purchases

Verizon's CBRS spectrum purchases stretch across a variety of US markets. But the operator did not purchase spectrum in its most congested markets, according to Tutela.

SKT earnings soar 44% on back of media, security businesses

South Korea mobile leader SK Telecom has posted a 44% spike in third-quarter earnings, driven once again by non-core businesses.

New CommScope CEO gets loads of time to formulate a 'reset'

Chuck Treadway, who took the reins last month, has until Q3 2021 to assess and present his long-term plan for the company, board chairman says.

Apple wrestles with pre-Christmas iPhone chip shortage

With Christmas stockings to fill with iPhone 12s, Apple wrestles with coronavirus-disrupted supply chains, plus Huawei hoarding, in the scarce chip market.

India's Jio attracts $1B investment in its fiber assets

The attention may be shifting from mobile to fixed broadband in India's telecom sector.

Qualcomm surges on 5G hopes

Chipset manufacturer said its investments in 5G 'are coming to fruition.'

IBM Managed Security Services Tops Global Market Rankings

IBM won the coveted “leader” title in IDC and Forrester’s latest global managed security services market reports, narrowly coming out on top of Accenture in IDC’s MarketScape and beating several tier-one operators’ managed security arms including AT&T Cybersecurity, CenturyLink, NTT, and Telefónica’s ElevenPaths.

IBM Hoists Umbrella Cloud Platform for 5G Operators

IBM today hoisted a new umbrella for its open, hybrid cloud technology targeting 5G network operators. IBM Cloud for Telecommunications organizes and repackages multiple IBM services — Red Hat OpenShift, IBM Cloud, IBM Edge Application Manager, and IBM Telco Network Cloud Manager — into what IBM describes as a more “holistic hybrid cloud offering” for mobile carriers. 

VEON extends decentralized strategy to CTO role

Emerging-markets operator has appointed CTOs at individual country level to drive market-specific digital strategies.

Ciena makes waves on Australian submarine cable

SUB.CO, along with its Australian entity APX Partners, has tapped Ciena for an upgrade to its Indigo submarine cable that connects Perth and Sydney to Singapore.

T-Mobile settles Sprint Lifeline investigation for $200M

The FCC on Wednesday announced that T-Mobile will pay a $200 million penalty to the U.S. Treasury to settle an investigation into Sprint’s misuse of the federal Lifeline program for collecting federal subsidies for inactive users. According to the FCC, the penalty is the largest ever fixed-amount settlement it has secured to resolve an investigation.

Colt starts production pilot of Lean NFV for internet on demand

After 18 months of kicking the tires, Colt Technology Services has taken Lean NFV into a production pilot for its IP Access on demand service that uses a virtual router.

CCA, others urge FCC to take new look at 12 GHz band

They’ve said it before and they’re saying it again. A group of diverse stakeholders, including the Competitive Carriers Association (CCA) and Public Knowledge, is urging the FCC to move forward with a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to consider making 500 megahertz of spectrum available in the 12 GHz band for 5G.

BT Group hits 100% renewable electricity milestone globally

BT Group announced that its network, offices and shops worldwide are now powered by 100% renewable electricity. BT, which says it's the joint-largest purchaser of electricity in the U.K, plans to run its global operations on renewable energy wherever markets allow, and purchase the remainder from nearby markets until local solutions can be sourced.

Rakuten Mobile signs on to O-RAN Alliance, unveils fee cuts

Rakuten Mobile unveiled new fee cuts Wednesday and CEO Mickey Mikitani, speaking at a virtual press conference, reiterated the operator’s aim to disrupt the mobile industry in Japan and redefine customer expectations for wireless service.

Etheric Networks plans use of CBRS spectrum for fixed wireless

Etheric Networks, a provider of fixed wireless access (FWA) in the San Francisco Bay Area, secured 21 priority access licenses (PALs) in the recent FCC auction of CBRS spectrum. It got licenses in seven counties that span a mix from rural regions to upscale areas near San Jose and the Los Altos hills. The company spent about $367,000 for its PALs.

CK Hutchison and Cellnex edge closer to €10bn towers deal

Three UK parent CK Hutchison is keen to monetise its mobile infrastructure, and to that end it has hammered out an agreement with Spain-based towerco Cellnex.

Uber and Lyft win big in California

While California may be resolutely Democrat when it comes to politics, its electorate has voted to keep the state out of the lives of rideshare drivers.

AT&T edges closer to TV asset stake sale

Private equity firms are said to be in talks to acquire large minority stakes in the US telco’s DirecTV, AT&T Now, and U-Verse units.

Rakuten becomes a member of the O-RAN Alliance, at last

Disruptive MNO Rakuten Mobile announced that it has joined OpenRAN standardisation body, the O-RAN Alliance, and the company’s CTO has been appointed to the board.

Stressing out about the network

How are the carriers adapting to address the network stressors brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic? They are simplifying, automating and aiming for the fully virtualized, cloud-native network.

Intel's AI Passion Erupts in Buying Spree

The fires of Intel’s AI ambition were stoked once again today with the acquisition of Israeli machine learning startup Cnvrg.io. The news comes less than a week after Intel signaled its intent to acquire U.S.-based artificial intelligence (AI) modeling company SigOpt.

Race update: For every ten US 5G customers, there's one Chinese 5G basestation

China's telecoms regulator counts fully 600,000 5G basestations in the country. Meantime, one analyst firm has recorded sales of just 6 million 5G phones in the US this year.

Daily Roundup: Dish Sidesteps 5G Timeline

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SoftBank chief warns of industry resistance over DoCoMo merger

The company is heavily reliant on NTT's optical fiber network and worried competition may be distorted.

Amazon Teases Image Registry to Duck Docker

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is set to circumvent a recently instituted fee structure put in place by Docker Inc. that will allow developers to share and deploy container images publicly to construct their applications.

Extreme Bets On Cloud to Unseat Cisco, Aruba

With yet another strong quarter of sequential growth under its belt, Extreme Networks has its sights set on unseating rivals Cisco and Aruba in the wireless and LAN switching market.

Dish Network Sidesteps 2020 5G Timeline

Dish Network is making progress on the build out of its network, but it’s no longer claiming it will have 5G service deployed in a single U.S. market before the end of the year. 

Rakuten Mobile tries to woo customers with more price cuts

Virtualized network operator scraps fees for contract sign-up and number portability in a bid to stimulate demand.

Eurobites: O2 fortifies London's 4G network

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Enea touts network data layer breakthrough; Inmarsat moves billing to the cloud with CSG; Cambridge Consultants takes to the skies.

Cellnex towers over European telecom as net loss widens

The Spanish company's footprint has grown tenfold since 2014 and its buying spree goes on, but investors look happy.

Kuwait's telco Zain sees Iraq and Sudan fortunes improve

Middle Eastern telco giant Zain expands its Kuwait and Saudi Arabia 5G coverage and unveils a data park to build cloud business.

Jio faces Airtel battle as Vodafone Idea struggles

Two of India's operators are scrapping over customers while its third private-sector player remains in the doldrums.

Is open RAN a protectionist scam?

A pick-the-winners approach seems to be taking shape in several big markets. That and some questionable operator interventions could work out badly.

SBA sees T-Mobile uptick in Q3 as C-band, Dish remain wildcards

As SBA Communications reported third quarter earnings on Monday, the sentiment “bodes well” appeared to be the main theme for the tower company going forward.  

Boingo wins DAS contract with SDSU

San Diego State University (SDSU) awarded 15-year distributed antenna system (DAS) rights to Boingo Wireless to build, operate and maintain a 5G-ready, neutral host cellular DAS network for the university’s new Aztec Stadium, which is due to be completed for the 2022 football season.

Huawei’s European legal challenge gathers momentum

It has emerged that Chinese telecoms vendor Huawei is challenging the EU legality draft security laws in Poland and Romania.

Deutsche Telekom strikes up a connection with Zoom

Deutsche Telekom became the latest service provider to strike up a partnership with Zoom Video Communications.

Alaska Communications enters into agreement to be sold for $300M

Alaska Communications has entered into a definitive agreement to be bought by an affiliate of Macquarie and GCM in an all-cash transaction deal at $300 million, including debt.

DT-backed venture seeks to replace 5G masts with aircraft

Cambridge Consultants and its partner Stratospheric Platforms Limited (SPL) are claiming a breakthrough in the antenna technology that Cambridge developed for SPL’s system for replacing 5G infrastructure on the ground with airborne cell towers.

Cato Networks CMO Yovel on what is and what isn't SASE

In a year of overall weirdness and confusion, secure access service edge (SASE) has been one of the hottest topics in the telecoms industry. Gartner introduced and defined SASE over a year ago, and since then the SASE bandwagon is close to overflowing with vendors.

Blow for Nokia as it misses out on Telia Lithuania 5G RAN work

There was hope for Nokia when Lithuania was left out of the 5G RAN announcement between Telia and Ericsson, but it has proved forlorn.

Sky targets UK fast broadband space with FTTP offer

Sky is making a big play for a slice of the UK broadband market, launching a fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) offer based on Openreach’s network.

Major US cableco sold for $8 billion in private equity game of pass-the-parcel

Astound Broadband is changing ownership via an US$8.1 billion deal, including debt, between a pair of private equity investors.

Even when the UK got its COVID app right, it still got it wrong

A report claims the UK’s contact tracing app is largely failing even in its core function of notifying people who may have caught COVID-19.

Standalone security: MEC and DDoS implications

SPONSORED: Successful investment and execution strategies in this distributed world will hinge on the ability to integrate a flexible mix of fixed, virtualized and containerized multi-interface solutions at the edge.

Comcast, Walmart in smart TV talks – report

Per the terms being discussed, Walmart would promote smart TVs running Comcast software and get a cut of recurring revenue, the WSJ says.

SpaceMobile's 5G from space touted as 'a game changer'

NASA, T-Mobile and Verizon are among the companies fretting over SpaceMobile's plans to beam 5G from satellites. But AT&T thinks the whole thing could be 'a game changer.'

Hopes fade for a cell tower boom

Companies like Crown Castle and SBA Communications still expect to derive growth from catalysts like Dish Network's 5G plans and the C-band auction. But the timing remains somewhat unclear.

AT&T mulls selling big stake of its entire pay-TV biz – report

Following recent reports of low-ball bids for its satellite TV unit, AT&T is looking to sell off a sizable minority stake of its DirecTV, U-verse and streaming pay-TV operations.

Charter to hike fees for broadband-only and broadband/streaming subs

Increase of $5 per month won't apply to Charter customers who bundle broadband with the operator's traditional pay-TV service.

Does Your Company Need Deception? Illusive CEO Says Yes

Reactive security doesn’t do enough to protect corporate assets and data, says Illusive Networks CEO and founder Ofer Israeli. Instead, organizations should use deception technology to actively defend their environments.

Daily Roundup: Arista Aims for Cisco

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Podcast: Vonage on unified communications in a 'contactless world'

Vonage's Jay Patel shares UC customer use cases where Domino's Pizza and Siemens are utilizing capabilities such as Vonage's Voice and Video APIs.

LF Energy Blueprints the Internet of Energy

LF Energy launched a project to create an open source tool for managing energy demand across the electrical grid.

Amazon Amps Up Cloud With Nvidia A100s

Nvidia’s top-shelf GPUs have arrived on Amazon Web Services (AWS). The cloud provider announced this week the general availability of its P4d instances, powered by Nvidia’s Ampere-based A100 GPUs.

Intel Wins Dish Open RAN Deal

Intel this week won its first open radio access network (RAN) compliant deal, landing an agreement with Dish Network to provide multiple pieces of hardware and its FlexRAN software reference architecture to the greenfield 5G network operator. 

Huawei says Romania and Poland bans violate EU law

Huawei argues moves by Romania and Poland to exclude it from their 5G infrastructures breach EU guidelines, hinting at a possible legal challenge.

Casa Systems charges into uncharted territory

Network vendor reached a 'major turning point' in Q3 2020 as revenues from Casa's fixed telco and wireless business overtook its core cable business for the first time, CEO Jerry Guo says.

KKR wades into Filipino telecoms tower market

Global investment group plans to exploit the newly liberalized telecoms tower market in the Philippines.

Eurobites: Ericsson gets Telia RAN gig in Lithuania

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Ericsson completes Cradlepoint acquisition; BT takes 5G to university; Nokia faces knock-back in patents battle with Lenovo.

China aims to drive down 5G power cost

Tighter price controls, energy reforms and supplying basestations directly from the grid could help to lower expenses.

Cato Silences False Alarms in SASE Update

Cato Network’s secure access service edge (SASE) platform got an upgrade today with the introduction of machine learning-enhanced reputation assessment capabilities.

Paolini: Who wins 6 GHz band: Wi-Fi or 5G NR-U?

The 6 GHz band is on a good course to become the latest and, in many countries, the largest unlicensed band available, giving Wi-Fi and other technologies such as 5G NR-U an unprecedented spectrum base for expansion.

Dish offers DoD a slice of its 5G network

At a time when most of the wireless industry is questioning the intentions behind the Department of Defense’s (DoD) recent Request for Information (RFI) about 5G, Dish Network told the DoD that it’s first-of-a-kind network can offer the DoD a network slice for its domestic operations.

Rakuten Mobile user experience dragged down by roaming

Rakuten Mobile users experienced better quality on the operator’s own network in Japan compared to roaming on others, according to new analysis from Tutela. The report suggests throttling while roaming on au’s network dragged down Rakuten’s consistent quality score.  

AT&T wraps up sale of Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands assets

AT&T announced it has completed the sale of its wireless and wireline operations in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands to Liberty Latin America. The deal, which was first announced over a year ago, gave AT&T's coffers a $1.95 billion cash infusion, which it said would be used to redeem all of the preferred interests in a subsidiary (PR Holdings).

Intel gets a bunch of Dish 5G OpenRAN work

US chip giant Intel is finally gaining some telecoms credibility, having been picked as a partner for Dish’s greenfield 5G network.

Casa takes on network equipment giants in private wireless

Casa Systems has found its foothold in wireless, and now it’s ready to go toe-to-toe with the likes of Ericsson and Nokia. The Massachusetts company has been a longtime supplier of network equipment for cable operators, but as that market has slowed, Casa has turned its attention to wireless network equipment. On its most recent earnings call, the company said wireless revenue now exceeds cable revenue, adding that it recently introduced high-power 5G millimeter wave customer premise equipment. The 5G antenna was developed in partnership with fixed wireless access specialist NetComm, which Casa recently acquired. 

Ericsson closes $1B Cradlepoint purchase with eye on enterprise

Ericsson on Monday completed its purchase of Idaho-based Cradlepoint, as the vendor looks to increase its share of the 5G enterprise market.

AT&T teams up with IBM to connect hybrid cloud to MEC

AT&T and IBM have teamed up to offer hybrid cloud services at the mobile network edge for enterprises in order to give them right-sized solutions. AT&T has turned its network core into a software virtual network function that can work with IBM's Satellite Cloud platform to deliver services and applications to enterprises through AT&T's multi-access edge network (MEC.)

Private equity firm pays $8.1B to buy Wave, RCN, enTouch, Grande

Wave, RCN, Grande and enTouch have passed from one private-equity firm to another with Sunday's news that they were sold for $8.1 billion. The U.S. cable operator group, collectively known as Astound Broadband, was sold by TPG Capital and Patriot Media Management to Stonepeak Infrastructure Partners for $8.1 billion, including debt. The deal appears to be the largest private equity acquisition this year in the U.S.

Dish names Intel as vRAN network supplier

Dish Network announced a partnership with Intel to integrate Intel 5G infrastructure technology into Dish’s buildout of its virtualized, open Radio Access Network (O-RAN) 5G network.

Huawei reportedly starts work on its own chip fab

The US embargo has made it almost impossible for Huawei to buy chips, so it has no alternative but to develop the capability to make them for itself.

Jio under-performs on customer growth

Reliance Jio trumpeted its 400 million customer milestone in its latest quarterly results announcement, but its net additions were actually lower than expected.

Vodafone UK bets the farm on OpenRAN

UK MNO Vodafone has revealed it’s going big on OpenRAN technology in its rural base stations as a major part of its Huawei swap-out strategy.

Optus invests in sub-brand strategy to target value customers

Optus is looking to make itself more attractive to customers at the budget end of the market via both a significant MVNO acquisition and a new sub-brand launch.

TVision is a slick platform, but content mix will need to evolve

T-Mobile's new OTT-TV service is a good start, but will likely need to morph and change if it's to generate mass appeal.

Arista Posts Q3 Beat, Targets Cisco With $200M Campus Goal

Arista Networks’ third-quarter financial results beat Wall Street estimates as CEO Jayshree Ullal forecast even higher Q4 revenue and promised to “disrupt the campus and router incumbency of the last few decades in the next few years.”

Mavenir gets reality check as IPO is delayed

One of the open RAN frontrunners has blamed "market volatility" for the postponement of its IPO plans.

Optus devours MVNO partner Amaysim for $176M

The MVNO acquisition, plus the launch of digital brand Gomo, marks a concerted Optus push into "budget-friendly" markets.

Daily Roundup: Cisco Plots Cloud Domination

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Dish Networks turns on first 5G test site, taps Intel for silicon

Dish Network said it will use Intel's Xeon Scalable Processor, Ethernet 800 Series network adapter, vRAN Dedicated Accelerator ACC100 and FlexRAN software reference architecture.

Arista Tackles WiFi 6 Bottlenecks With Campus Switches

Arista Networks today unveiled a new line of high-throughput campus switches designed to cope with the increased bandwidth demands of WiFi 6 access points and IoT devices.

Dan Whalen snares top spot at ATX Networks

Whalen, an exec late of Adtran and CommScope, succeeds Charlie Vogt as CEO. Whalen takes over as ATX looks to elevate its role in HFC network upgrades.

Which Tech Firms Dropped $83M on 2020 Elections?

The presidential election that’s caused so much anxiety and vitriol is finally here. When the dust settles, hopefully sooner than later, more than $14 billion will have been spent across U.S. presidential and congressional campaigns during this election cycle, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

Dish Network signs up for US military's 5G plans

Dish Network is offering the US Department of Defense a dedicated slice of its planned 5G network, as well as ways for the DoD to deploy services in its own spectrum holdings.

Britain invented the web but lags adopting tech

UK businesses are lagging badly in adopting new tech ranging from 5G to IoT, viewing it as a cost and not an investment, a YouGov and BT survey says.

Ooredoo recovers slightly in Q3; CEO to retire

Operator sees improved performance in most markets during Q3, and announces the appointment of a new group MD.

Open RAN will be mostly rural until 2023 – Comba

The emerging technology lacks the feature set of traditional gear, says one of its developers.

Vodafone UK to swap big part of Huawei for open RAN

A pledge to use open RAN at 2,600 UK sites will present various technical challenges but marks the biggest commitment yet by a brownfield player in a developed market.

Private equity firm snaps up Astound Broadband for $8.1B

Stonepeak Infrastructure Partners is teaming with Patriot Media to nab Astound, a service provider conglomerate includes RCN, Grande Communications, Wave Broadband and enTouch.