US Operator CEOs Face the 5G Music

CEOs leading the trio of nationwide U.S. mobile operators faced the 5G music this week at a financial analyst conference.

Nutanix CEO Talks Layoffs, Wins Against VMware

Nutanix posted earnings and revenue beats during the third quarter of fiscal 2021, and on a conference call with investors CEO Rajiv Ramaswami touted his company’s “healthy, year-over-year increase in our win rate against our largest competitor.”

Telefónica validates AWS as 5G SA core option in Brazil

Telefónica on Friday said it reached a clear milestone for cloud-native 5G plans in Brazil, validating Amazon Web Services (AWS) Outposts as “an effective infrastructure option” to deploy core technology for standalone (SA) services in the country.  

T-Mobile swinging for the fences — Industry Voices: Moore

We have a winner in the battle of competing 5G claims. It’s T-Mobile.  And T-Mobile wants you to know this.  The underpinnings for such claims have changed greatly since last fall.  And as of 2021, Verizon and AT&T seem not to have a good answer for T-Mobile’s claims that it has the “largest and fastest 5G network,” and now “most reliable” 5G network.

Mavenir, AWS deliver cloud-based 5G functions to telcos

Mavenir is collaborating with Amazon Web Services to offer cloud-based network functions to telcos. The partners will combine Mavenir’s cloud-native functions for 4G and 5G together with AWS’s computing infrastructure, container technologies and big data analytics.

VMware boosts fiscal 2022 guidance, talks post spin-off strategy

VMware increased its guidance for its fiscal 2022 following strong Q1 performance that yielded double-digit growth in net income.

Amazon mental health initiative backfires

Tech giant Amazon is so concerned about its warehouse workers’ mental health that it’s providing capsules in which they can sit and sort their heads out.

Orange invests €30 million in worthy start-ups

Orange Ventures has set up a new investment vehicle to back what could probably best be described as ‘worthy cause’ start-ups, giving it €30 million of funding to dole out.

Openreach announces plan to fibre-up three million more premises

UK fixed line wholesaler Openreach has outlined plans to extend its fibre rollout to three million rural premises.

O2 speeds ahead on 4G but EE is in the driving seat for 5G

With the spring bank holiday weekend looming in the UK many will be hitting the road for a quick getaway, and O2 is using this to its advantage, trumpeting the strength of its 4G network coverage along the country’s major arteries.

Colt to deploy Cisco's Silicon One, 400G OpenZR+

Colt Technology Services is set to deploy Cisco Systems’ Silicon One switches, 400G OpenZR + pluggable optical technology from Cisco subsidiary Acacia and Segment Routing MPLS software as the carrier tackles a transformation of its five-year-old global IQ Packet Network.

Daily Roundup: Dell Technologies Faces Supply Chain Crunch

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Dell Technologies Faces Supply Chain Crunch

Dell Technologies reported record-high revenue during the first quarter of its fiscal year 2022, but warned analysts that ongoing supply chain challenges will impact its outlook for the remainder of the year. 

Danielle Royston invests $100M in Totogi, a telco charging firm

Danielle Royston has gained notability in the telco world because she purchased the huge space that Ericsson vacated for Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this summer. Now, Royston is making news because her company TelcoDR has invested $100 million in a startup, Totogi, which creates charging software.

Movandi demos 5G mmWave repeater tech for C-V2X

Startup Movandi completed a successful demo on Verizon’s 5G network, showcasing how its repeater technology can expand millimeter wave for connected vehicles and C-V2X applications.

MetroNet poaches Shentel COO as it plots rapid growth

Privately held fiber provider MetroNet appointed Shenandoah Telecommunications (Shentel) executive Dave Heimbach as its new COO, tapping him for the role as it targets an aggressive expansion of its footprint.

BT’s Openreach raises fiber goal to 25M premises by 2026

Openreach, BT’s fixed line subsidiary, said it can build its fiber footprint faster and at a lower cost than previously expected so it’s accelerating its original goal announced in March by five million. The company in March said it was planning to build fiber to 20 million homes by 2026. However, it has now raised that number to 25 million homes by 2026.

CBRS networks for schools will outlast the pandemic

The reopening of schools and businesses may not mean the end of online learning, and this could have implications for private wireless. 

Lumen chases small business gains

Lumen Technologies executive Maxine Moreau revealed the company is pushing to serve more small business customers in and near its footprint, chasing what she characterized as “tremendous upside” from gains in the segment.

Nutanix hails partnership progress

Executives at cloud software company Nutanix talked up growth generated by key partnerships with Lenovo and HPE as the company posted strong results for its fiscal Q3 (ended April 30, 2021).

Verizon Ventures leads $20M funding for security startup SAM

Verizon Ventures and Blackberry led a $20 million series B round of funding to invest in SAM Seamless Networks, a network security company focused on safeguarding the growing number of connected devices.

It’s now or never for vRAN: Madden

In 2013 through 2015, Mobile Experts published some cost-benefit analysis on “Cloud RAN” (including the impacts of both centralization and virtualization) that showed remarkable savings in costs and the benefits of flexibility. But we did not publish a forecast for LTE to adopt virtualization at that time because the big LTE networks had already been built, and none of the top 20 global operators were considering a "rip and replace" project to take out dedicated hardware to install COTS servers.

Oppo and Thales claim 5G SA eSIM first

Chinese smartphone vendor Oppo has launched a new phone that contains the first eSIM compatible with standalone 5G.

Singtel sells broad range of assets as earnings plummet

Singtel distracted the industry from a weak set of full-year results with the publication of a new strategy that includes the planned sale of a broad swathe of infrastructure assets.

AT&T snags $306M DHS contract to replace Verizon, Lumen

AT&T landed four more government contracts, securing awards collectively worth $306 million to help four divisions within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) upgrade their network infrastructure.

Facebook doubles down on ‘good’ censorship

Social media giant Facebook has announced it will be shadow-banning accounts that repeatedly share stuff it doesn’t approve of.

Xiaomi confirms US reprieve as revenue rockets

It’s a good day for China’s Xiaomi, which has confirmed reports that it is no longer blacklisted in the US and shared first-quarter numbers that show pretty stellar growth.

Boost Mobile bets on DraftKings as a partner

Boost Mobile is betting that online betting will boost its appeal to new customers. The Dish Network-owned reseller of T-Mobile’s service announced a partnership Thursday with DraftKings that will spot Boost subscribers in the right states a little extra money to gamble on sports.

VMware’s New CEO Turbo Charges Multi-Cloud Push

On his first quarterly earnings call as VMware’s incoming CEO, Raghu Raghuram, who will move into the role on June 1, signaled his intent to turbo charge the company’s multi-cloud strategy.

Daily Roundup: AT&T Lands $306M Homeland Security Contract

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Cisco Exec Flags 3 Critical Investment Vehicles for 5G Operators

Mobile network operators are confronting three critical investment decisions in the early stages of 5G, Jonathan Davidson, SVP and GM of Cisco’s Mass-Scale Infrastructure Group, said this week at a JP Morgan event.

Colt Taps Cisco's Acacia for Network Overhaul

Cisco will power Colt Technology Services’ transition to 400 Gb/s optics. The London-based service provider today announced plans to deploy Cisco’s Silicon One switching and routing portfolio including the vendor’s Acacia 400ZR pluggable optics and segment routing MPLS software.

Stacklet Launches Cloud Custodian-Based Platform

Stacklet this week launched its platform, based on the open source Cloud Custodian project, that lets cloud engineering and security teams codify and automate cloud governance.

Gaming, Data Centers Boost Nvidia Q1 to Record High

Nvidia ended its first quarter of fiscal 2022 on a high note, posting revenues of $5.66 billion in the run-up to a pending four-for-one stock split.

AT&T Lands $306M Homeland Security Contract

AT&T is on a roll with the federal government. The network operator today landed a $306 million contract to upgrade the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s telecommunications infrastructure and IP-based networking services.

AT&T completes OpenRoaming Wi-Fi trial

AT&T successfully completed a proof-of-concept trial of its Wi-Fi network with the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) OpenRoaming initiative in areas of downtown Austin, Texas.

Nokia adds C-band support in new 5G small cell lineup

Nokia expanded its 5G small cell portfolio, adding products that support C-band spectrum for indoor and outdoor deployments in the U.S.

Verizon’s Visible names Angie Klein as CEO

Verizon’s all-digital prepaid brand Visible is getting a new leader with the appointment of industry veteran Angie Klein as the company’s new CEO.

T-Mobile CEO talks up value, network in 5G era

T-Mobile has been touting the same company line for months, and it’s not deviating from that. During an investor event Tuesday, CEO Mike Sievert reiterated the company’s plan to succeed as the carrier offering the best value and best 5G network, and “we’ve caught up with the other guys on LTE,” where most customers are today.

Verizon CEO renews call for broadband subsidy boost

As U.S. politicians sort out the details of a massive infrastructure investment package, Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg argued they should focus broadband funding more on promoting affordability rather than accessibility.

‘We’re already doing it’ Verizon CEO says of monetizing 5G

Verizon is already monetizing 5G, according to CEO Hans Vestberg, citing the adoption of 5G and increasing wireless service revenues as the the carrier targets faster growth over the next couple of years.

Celona introduces the edgeless enterprise — Kerravala

Last week, Celona, a private 5G networking company unveiled its edgeless enterprise architecture, which enables companies to build a scalable, agile and high-performance network to power its “edge.”  I find the term “edgeless” interesting as it could appear to be in opposition to all the hype currently around edge computing. Definitionally, the concept of edgeless is akin to having the edge everywhere.

Nokia’s head of network infrastructure eyes PON opportunity

Federico Guillén has been president of Nokia’s network infrastructure business group for about five months. He’s fortunate because the business unit is having a great run. In Nokia’s most recent earnings, his group reported that net sales increased 22% year over year. The major contributors to its growth were submarine and fixed, followed by the IP routing and optical businesses.

Nokia, Proximus claim first with 25G fiber network

Belgian operator Proximus claimed to have achieved a world-first in collaboration with Nokia, lighting up a symmetrical 25G passive optical network (PON) in the city of Antwerp.

Tame 5G Complexity and Reap the Rewards

The notion of private cellular networks, or non-public networks (NPN), has accelerated with cellular standards evolution. The recently awarded spectrum gave the latest boost.  With it, enterprises have a potential means to deliver performance, security, coverage, and overall reliability guarantees for applications and use cases with exceedingly diverse requirements. Current and new enterprise customers now have a number of deployment models, whether LTE or 5G, to consider—from full turnkey via a mobile network operator (MNO) to fully owned and controlled private cellular network and all the options in between. In many use cases, especially those that require low latency such as robotics in an Industry 4.0 scenario, an MNO is the logical choice to deploy edge computing. In all cases, the service provider B2B2X private networking opportunities bring complexity.

Amazon buys MGM for $8.45 billion

As rumoured a week ago, etail and cloud giant Amazon is buying movie studio MGM to augment its Amazon Prime SVoD offering.

Vodafone Germany launches a network offensive

Vodafone Germany is expanding what it terms its “network offensive,” building out new base stations and 5G masts at a time of increasing network traffic.

WhatsApp resists Indian mass surveillance demands

The Indian government is increasingly unhappy about its inability to intercept private communications.

Vodafone has minimal involvement in Ethiopian consortium

Vodafone was part of the consortium that won a new Ethiopian telecoms operating licence, but its direct involvement is minimal and will come solely through its existing African shareholdings.

Daily Round Up: Will XDR Kill SIEM?

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Google Cloud Data Focus Gains Value Clarity

Google Cloud increased the clarity of its database and data analytics platforms, rolling out new features targeted at helping enterprises glean more value from the mounds of data most are just sitting on.

Fortinet, Versa Tap Google Cloud for SASE Networking

Fortinet and Versa Networks customers can now take advantage of Google Cloud Platform’s (GCP)’s private backbone as an on-demand underlay. The two companies separately announced support for Google’s Network Connectivity Center (NCC) today, which enables users to automatically route of branch-to-branch and/or branch-to-cloud traffic over the public cloud provider’s network.

Aruba Claims First Enterprise WiFi 6E APs

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) subsidiary Aruba this week revealed what it claims to be the first WiFi 6E access points for enterprises.

Will XDR Kill SIEM?

Security analytics company Exabeam recently made its extended detection and response (XDR) debut official. And while it’s just the latest in a string of other security vendors to move into the buzzy new segment, Exabeam is notable because it’s the first security information event management (SIEM) vendor to plant its flag in XDR.

Extreme’s CoPilot AIOps Platform Takes Off

Extreme Networks today announced CoPilot, an artificial intelligence operations (AIOps) product, destined for its ExtremeCloud IQ management platform.

Lynk files for FCC license to use ‘cell towers in space’

Lynk Global claims to have a plan to make smartphones more intelligent when they’re at their dumbest, and it involves partnerships with mobile network operators (MNOs) around the world.

The fight back against digital censorship gathers momentum

There are signs that bulk censorship and state surveillance may have reached their high-water mark, at least in the West.

European operators play the green card with smartphones

Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Telefónica, Telia, and Vodafone jointly start Eco Rating labelling scheme to score how sustainable mobile phones are, aiming to encourage device makers and device buyers to be more environmentally minded.

AT&T is becoming a telco – it’s crazy but it might just work

AT&T this week shared a groundbreaking new strategy: to focus on being a telco.

Leaked Huawei memo reveals plan for global software domination

Chinese tech vendor Huawei has been forced out of much of its hardware business by unilateral US restrictions, so it plans to return the favour in software.

Betacom secures $15M, launches private 5G service

Betacom, a longtime design and deployment partner for the biggest U.S. carriers, announced it has secured $15 million in funding from private investors, including former T-Mobile executive Braxton Carter, who retired as CFO last year.  

Aruba unveils enterprise-grade Wi-Fi 6E access points

Aruba is making a big claim for the Wi-Fi space: the first vendor to bring enterprise-grade Wi-Fi 6E solutions to market.

French rail operator latest to get into fibre

French rail network operator SNCF has officially launched a new subsidiary that will see it break into the market for wholesale fibre connectivity.

Juniper's Apstra 4.0 release eases enterprise connectivity

Juniper Networks unveiled Version 4.0 of its Apstra software for managing intent-based networking, a move which comes about four months after Juniper closed its deal to acquire Apstra.

Daily Roundup: Microsoft Adds Azure Arc Developer Depth

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Microsoft Adds Azure Arc Developer Depth

Microsoft expanded the depth of its Azure Arc platform with new capabilities that can expand user management and developer efficiency to rival cloud offerings from Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and continuing to develop a service mesh platform offering an alternative to the oversight-confused Istio platform.

Oracle, Ampere Launch Penny-Per-Core Arm VPCs

Oracle, in collaboration with chipmaker Ampere Computing, became the latest public cloud provider to launch Arm-based compute instances, joining rivals Amazon and Microsoft.

Juniper’s Apstra Deepens Ties to VMware NSX-T, SONiC

Juniper Networks released a bevy of updates to its recently acquired intent-based network platform today with the launch of Apstra 4.0.

Juniper CEO: Our AI-driven enterprise strategy sets us apart

Juniper Networks executives say the company’s artificial-intelligence (AI) focused enterprise strategy is what is behind much of the positive momentum the company is experiencing.  Speaking at the JP Morgan 49th Annual Global Technology, Media and Communications conference today, CEO Rami Rahim said that the company’s enterprise business has never been as strong as it is today and he attributes much of that strength to the company’s AI-driven enterprise strategy. “AI-driven enterprise is not just a marketing slogan,” Rahim said. “There is technical substance. We have an AI engine that drives the solutions that we are offering customers today.”

Is it time for open fixed wireless access? — Paolini

The future of wireless is open. We have OpenRAN, OpenRoaming and more recently, OpenWi-Fi, and I am sure there are other initiatives to open wireless networks that I am forgetting. Should we consider opening fixed wireless access (FWA) too?

U.S. carrier activity trending towards 'record levels' - AMT

American Tower is excited about the U.S. market as carrier activity continues to pick up pace and looks set to accelerate through 2022, according to CFO Rod Smith.

Cogent sees SD-WAN upgrades resume amid return to office

The pandemic stopped many companies’ network upgrade plans dead in their tracks last year, but Cogent Communications CEO and Chairman Dave Schaeffer said sales activity has picked back up over the past eight weeks as more organizations planned for a return to the office.

Charter sees path to nearly 15M mobile subs

Charter Communications CFO Christopher Winfrey charted a long subscriber growth trajectory for the operator’s wireless MVNO product, explaining it believes the service will perform as good or better than its legacy voice offering.

Redzone flags $500,000 RDOF funding mix up

Maine-based fixed wireless access (FWA) provider Redzone Wireless followed Charter Communications in seeking a waiver from commitments made in the Federal Communication Commission’s (FCC) recent Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) auction on the grounds its promised deployments would be redundant.

AT&T CEO pegs 2023 timeline for broad fixed wireless coverage

As AT&T plans to increase broadband investment after the recent decision to spin out its WarnerMedia business, CEO John Stankey expects fixed wireless to be part of the picture but broad coverage is still a few years out.

Snapdragon 778G reinforces Qualcomm’s confidence in mmWave

Against the backdrop of accelerating global adoption of 5G smartphones, with CCS Insight forecasting over half a billion shipments in 2021 (more than double those in 2020), Qualcomm announced its latest premium Snapdragon 778G 5G chipset at its 5G Summit.

AT&T CEO eyes higher fiber target and FWA as DSL replacement

AT&T CEO John Stankey conceded the operator’s plans for fixed wireless access (FWA) technology may not be as ambitious as those of its competitors, but he noted the technology could end up being a good replacement for legacy DSL connections.

Ericsson warns again about losing market share in China

Ericsson is once again sounding the alarm bells over Sweden’s plans to exclude Chinese vendors from the 5G buildout, saying it may “adversely impact” the economic interests of Sweden and specifically, Ericsson.

Google and Samsung hope two wrongs make a wearable right

Last week Google almost apologetically slipped out the news that it’s merging its wearable device OS with Samsung’s one.

Top takeaways from Cisco’s Q3 fiscal 2021 results — Kerravala

Last week Cisco announced its quarterly results. I won’t rehash the numbers as Diana Goovaerts covered it in this post. Cisco did report a solid beat on the top and bottom lines, which I believe was its 10th consecutive quarter of beating on both metrics. The company did guide up on revenue for its Q4, but EPS was light based on margins being squeezed on near term supply chain issues from the on-going chip shortage. Without this last hiccup, this would have been one of the cleanest quarters for Cisco in quite some time.  

Telefonica, 1&1 Drillisch finalise Germany roaming deal

Telefonica and 1&1 Drillisch appear to have finally made friends in Germany, sorting out the finer details of a deal that should end their dispute on the cost of national roaming.

Ericsson is increasingly pessimistic about its Chinese prospects

In the process of trying to raise half a billion euros, Swedish kit vendor Ericsson warned it’s increasingly unlikely it will get much more work in China.

Vodafone et al win Ethiopia licence, but it’s not over yet

A consortium including major players Vodafone, Vodacom and Safaricom has won a licence to offer telecoms services in Ethiopia, but the opening up of the country is unlikely to end here.

Exabeam Moves Into XDR. Will Other SIEMs Follow Suit?

Exabeam recently became the latest security vendor to pivot to extended detection and response (XDR) with its Fusion XDR product.

Daily Round Up: CrowdStrike, EY Wage War on Ransomware

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SUSE Corrals Rancher Labs Into Latest Updates

Rancher Labs headlined SUSE’s recent SUSECON Digital 2021 event, with the recently acquired company a big part of SUSE’s updates to its edge, cloud, and cloud-native products.

CrowdStrike, EY Take On Ransomware, Zero Trust

CrowdStrike teamed up with Ernst & Young (EY) on anti-ransomware and zero-trust services with three new, joint offerings that build on an earlier partnership between the two companies.