Headcount: Firings, Hirings, and Retirings — July 2021

Here are some of the latest executive hirings, promotions, and staff changes that happened in July. 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 Emma Chervek (echervek@sdxcentral.com) for inclusion in the monthly headcount column.

Cisco Looks to ThousandEyes for WAN-on-Demand Strategy

Cisco over the past 18 month announced a slew of partnerships with colocation vendors and public cloud providers in a bid to extend the reach of its SD-WAN offerings.

TDS Telecom sees urgent need to increase fiber footprint in 2021

TDS Telecom’s leadership said that the company believes that there is a “sense of urgency” around its fiber strategy and it plans to increase its fiber build within its existing wireline footprint and also in expansion markets outside its footprint.

Fiber is all the rage but DOCSIS isn’t dead: CableLabs

It feels as if all eyes are on fiber at the moment, with money pouring in and deployment commitments piling up. Operators playing in this space have largely dismissed cable as obsolete, with Frontier Communications CEO Nick Jeffery stating this week cable won’t be able to keep up with multi-gigabit speeds on fiber. But an expert from CableLabs contended DOCSIS isn’t dead – and won’t be for a while.

American businesses urge Biden to reengage with China

Trade organisations called on the Biden administration to expedite its China policy reviews and to reopen trade talks with its main rival.

Eurobites: Telecom Italia orchestrates quantum comms demo at G20

Also in today’s EMEA regional round-up: Paramount+ streaming service heading for Sky platforms; Saudi Telecom Company’s Q2 impresses; Virgin Media slide-tackles BT and Sky over TV soccer coverage.

Closure of Sprint 4G network probably not a big deal to T-Mobile US

When T-Mobile US published its Q2 results last week it once again talked up the progress it is making in integrating Sprint and upgraded its merger synergies guidance for the second consecutive quarter. But it didn’t think to mention its plans for closing down Sprint’s LTE network next summer; it took the eagle eyes of LightReading to notice it had sneaked that piece of information onto its Website.

Verizon 5G Edge Rides 3 More AWS Wavelength Markets

Verizon expanded the reach of its 5G Edge deployment to three new markets as it expands its reliance on Amazon Web Services’ (AWS) Wavelength edge compute service. The carrier also launched a new onramp for developers to take advantage of that expanded reach.

Federal Security Agency Calls for Help Against Cyberattacks

The U.S. federal government has partnered with Google, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and six more private companies to fight cyberthreats.

Daily Roundup: VMware DPU Collab With Intel, Nvidia Hits Early Access

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Cybersecurity Is the New ‘Great Game’

Building a national cyber-defense plan took center stage at this week’s Black Hat cybersecurity event. “The [Great Game] is playing out in cyberspace right now,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in his closing remarks.

Starlink speeds improve, outpace other U.S. satellite providers

Speeds are improving for Starlink’s low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellite internet service in the U.S., where Ookla Speedtest analysis also found faster median download and upload speeds than other satellite providers. 

Mavenir, Adtran, Nokia show interest in Huawei rip and replace

A public notice from the Federal Communications Commission this week is illustrative in that it shows which vendors expect to reap big rewards from the FCC’s upcoming program to rip and replace Huawei and ZTE equipment from U.S. networks.

Lumen’s path forward remains rocky despite Apollo deal: analysts

Lumen Technologies this week agreed to sell ILEC assets in 20 states to investment firm Apollo Global Management for $7.5 billion, striking its second major divestiture deal in as many months after offloading its Latin America business for $2.7 billion. The operator pitched the former move as a positive, arguing it would allow the company to accelerate investments in fiber deployments in its remaining footprint. But analysts warned the deals aren’t all good news for Lumen.

MTN walks away from Ethiopia despite mobile money permit clause

Ethiopia has formally announced that it will launch the process to award a second new mobile licence later this month, including a permit to offer financial services. But despite the removal of what has been widely seen as a key stumbling block in the liberalisation of the country’s telecoms market, African telco giant MTN is reportedly no longer interested.

CTS and Druid Software partner for private networks

Systems integrator Communications Technology Services (CTS) has formed another partnership around private wireless, announcing plans to enhance its CBRS private network capabilities by integrating Druid Software's Raemis platform. Druid provides core network software which can be deployed at customer premises or in a cloud environment.

Frontier boosts fiber target to 10M locations

Frontier Communications ramped its fiber expansion plan, aiming to reach a total of 10 million locations by the end of 2025 rather than its original target of 6 million.

Boost tries to earn its ‘cool’ back with NCAA athletes

Boost Mobile is taking advantage of the NCAA rule changes that went into effect this summer, signing college athletes to spread the word about Boost’s prepaid phone service.

KPN links €1 billion credit facility to sustainability goals

KPN has secured a €1 billion credit facility that is linked to its own sustainability goals, a further sign that telcos are taking this stuff seriously.

Rakuten to build mobile network for 1&1

Rakuten announced partnership with 1&1 to build “Europe’s first fully virtualised mobile network” for the German greenfield operator. The company also set up a separate unit to drive global expansion.

WOW! eliminates CCO, adds more than 20K broadband subs in Q2

U.S. broadband provider WideOpenWest (WOW!) downsized its C-suite after inking a pair of deals to sell assets in five markets for a total of $1.8 billion, eliminating its chief commercial officer and restructuring its sales and product groups.

Eurobites: BT boosts security offering for homeworker army

Also in today’s EMEA regional round-up: Swisscom on a roll in H1; Brits watching even more telly in lockdown; UK operators get to grips with 5G.

T-Mobile brings 5G to Sarcos industrial robot

T-Mobile is teaming up with Sarcos Robotics to integrate 5G capabilities into the company’s forth-coming industrial robot, to power remote viewing capabilities and teleoperation.

Three UK hails ongoing momentum in H1

Revenue at the UK-based operator increased 5% in the first six months of the year, but prepaid customer growth and roaming remain areas of concern.

Rumours of Vodafone Idea giveaway persist as Birla steps down

Indian billionaire Kumar Mangalam Birla has stepped down as non-executive chairman of Vodafone Idea sending the troubled telco’s shares into freefall as rumours that its main shareholders are prepared to give away their stakes for free continue to swirl.

Vodafone Idea faces tough choices to survive

The options to survive seem to be running out for India's third-largest service provider, Vodafone Idea Limited.

T-Mobile sees 2 categories of fixed wireless opportunity

Both T-Mobile and Verizon appear to have excellent timing in regard to their fixed wireless access (FWA) initiatives. They’re advancing FWA right when the U.S. government is poised to spend billions to close the digital divide in America.

Federated demo combines CBRS, 37 GHz for 1.5 Gbps downloads

Federated Wireless recently led a demonstration for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) using Citizens Broadband Radio Services (CBRS) and millimeter wave spectrum, underscoring the importance of spectrum sharing between government and non-government entities.

Event Showcases a Bright Future for Telecom

Communications service providers recognize that 5G and edge computing represent a ripe opportunity to develop new revenue streams for both consumer and enterprise customers, while significantly reducing costs. They also recognize that to capture this opportunity they must develop and deploy a consistent operating model across their network and operations that adheres to cloud-native principles and is based on infrastructure from an open ecosystem of suppliers. These are among the topics explored in a Dell Technologies Telecom Transformation Event, now available for viewing on demand.Click here to read the full blog post.

Rakuten CTO: We’re done with secrets

With a newly created entity Symphony what’s next for Rakuten and open RAN? According to CTO Tareq Amin, having already quelled much of the earlier uncertainty and doubts around the technology, the next phase of growth is around simple things.

Cisco Security Execs Tout Top 5 Tips

Cisco security executives laid out five real-world tips enterprise incident response (IR) teams should focus on in dealing with potential cyberattacks. The tips included key technologies and processes those teams should have already deployed or have on hand in order to deal with a security incident. 

Daily Roundup: Marvell's Innovium Ingestion to Burn Broadcom

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VMware DPU Collab With Intel, Nvidia Hits Early Access

VMware’s management plane for distributed compute acceleration, Project Monterey, moved into early access this week.

Rakuten creates Symphony, expands RCP ambitions

Rakuten is taking ambitions for exporting its own learnings and platforms to a new level, creating a new business organization, Rakuten Symphony, to incorporate options for telco operators that span digital internet-based platforms, network functions and OSS/BSS automation to cloud infrastructure and more.

RDOF winners defaulted on $78M in bids — much more could follow

The telecom industry rejoiced when the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced last week it was prepared to release the first batch of funding — some $311 million — from the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) Phase I auction. But in the same breath the agency revealed a long list of winning bidders have already defaulted on their obligations and hinted many more could soon follow suit. So, where exactly do things stand?

Mediacom kicks off broadband expansion with work in 20 cities

U.S. operator Mediacom revealed work is well underway on a plan to expand high-speed broadband to 500,000 new locations over the next three years, telling Fierce construction projects are currently in progress in 20 communities.

Rakuten to acquire open RAN vendor Altiostar

After its early investment and collaboration, Rakuten on Wednesday announced plans to acquire Altiostar Networks in a deal that pegs total value of the U.S.-based open RAN vendor at $1 billion.

Corning on fiber momentum: We’ve ‘never seen anything like this’

Joe Jensen, Corning’s Director of FTTH Market Development for the Americas, told Fierce the current state of the broadband market is unlike anything he’s seen over the past two decades, with operator enthusiasm high and money pouring in from all sides. But he noted telecoms still face a number of challenges, among these figuring out how to get a cut of all the new funding and finding the labor force to get their projects done.

Does Google’s Pixel move signal negative tide for Qualcomm?

Qualcomm shares dipped earlier this week after Google revealed its upcoming Pixel 6 and Pro smartphones will use its own in-house chip. The question is: Does this represent a negative changing tide for the San Diego chip-maker?

5G network kit revenues to near $20 billion this year — report

Global 5G network infrastructure revenue is on course for a growth spike this year, but growth will slow in 2022, according to new data published on Wednesday.

Advances in RF front-ends made 5G phones possible: Lam

A decade ago, a fundamental change began in the radio frequency (RF) designs of cellular devices that would pave the way for the current sophistication of the RF front-end — the section of a smartphone between the modem and the antenna. The world was going through a momentous transition from multiple, fractured 3G global cellular technologies to a unified 4G wireless standard that would become known as Long-Term Evolution, or LTE. It was the first step in a long journey of improving cellular communication to make optimal use of radio spectrum.

Eurobites: Amazon’s Prime Air programme enters tailspin in UK – report

Also in today’s EMEA regional round-up: Sparkle turns to Infinera to power 400G services; auctions ahoy in French overseas territories; EE puts on its headphones and Hawaiian shirt in the cause of 5G.

Lumen offloads consumer ops for $7.5 billion

Lumen has brokered a US$7.5 billion deal with Apollo Global Management that will see it part with its legacy consumer operations in 20 states across the Midwest and Southeast of the US.

UK leaning towards blocking Nvidia’s Arm deal — reports

The planned $40bn merger could be in jeopardy over national security concerns.

Rakuten acquires OpenRAN partner Altiostar

Rakuten announced that it has completed the acquisition of the software company Altiostar, which it had already partly owned and has collaborated closely on OpenRAN.

Daily Roundup: Arista Beats Q2 Expectations, Warns on Chip Shortage

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Marvell's Innovium Ingestion to Burn Broadcom

Marvell’s $1.1 billion acquisition of switch ASIC vendor Innovium this week fills a gap in the chipmaker’s lineup and positions it to compete directly with networking giant Broadcom, said Guy Azrad, SVP & GM of Marvell’s networking switch business unit.

Google, Microsoft, Intel Ranked as Top Green Power Users

Google, Microsoft, and Intel grabbed the top three spots on the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) latest Green Power Partnership National Top 100 list.

Trend Micro: 86% of Orgs Expect a Serious Cyberattack

A vast majority of global organizations reported they would “somewhat to very likely” suffer one or more serious cyberattacks in the next 12 months, according to Trend Micro’s latest Cyber Risk Index (CRI) report.

Rakuten Acquires Altiostar to Boost Open RAN Efforts

Japan’s Rakuten Group scooped up U.S.-based open radio access (RAN) network equipment provider Altiostar for more than $1 billion. The move expands on an already established financial partnership between the two companies and bolsters Rakuten’s internal work toward creating an open RAN ecosystem.

Lumen inks $7.5 deal to sell ILEC assets to Apollo

Lumen Technologies struck a $7.5 billion deal to sell its ILEC assets in 20 states to investment firm Apollo Global Management. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2022.

AT&T extends airline ties, equips Delta pilots with 5G iPad Pros

AT&T continues to focus on the airline travel industry, this week announcing Delta Air Lines pilots are getting a 5G upgrade with the new iPad Pro.

Don't subvert wireless retail store metrics — Greenblatt

After a difficult pandemic year, wireless customers appear more than ready and willing to return to stores. Clearly, 2021 has picked up where 2019 left off, with many consumers exhibiting a preference for hands-on, in-store sales experiences. The desire to touch and closely evaluate devices in person remains un-phased as consumers flock to stores to purchase new phones and related devices. In-person contact has remained a steadfast driver of customer satisfaction and will continue to be vital.

SBA: Dish, Verizon very busy in Q2

The second quarter marked SBA Communications’ highest quarterly level of operational leasing activity, where it put new revenue under contract, in the U.S. since 2014 – and executives said Verizon and Dish Network were very busy.

Nokia touts 5G carrier aggregation trial with Taiwan Mobile

Nokia reports that, along with Taiwan Mobile (TWM), it achieved “the world’s first” New Radio (NR) carrier aggregation (CA) by combining spectrum in the 700 MHz and 3500 MHz bands.

U.K.’s Project Gigabit targets broadband upgrades for 2.2M

The U.K. government targeted broadband upgrades for 2.2 million locations across the country, expanding the scope of a massive digital infrastructure initiative known as Project Gigabit.

Marvell ramps cloud play with $1.1B Innovium acquisition

Semiconductor company Marvell sought to strengthen its cloud portfolio, striking a $1.1 billion deal to acquire cloud and edge networking solutions company Innovium.

China to drive private 5G network growth despite regulatory headwind– research

Private 5G networks are on the verge of taking off in a big way worldwide, with China leading the way, according to new research published this week.

Eurobites: Ethiopia to re-open bidding on second operator licence

Also in today’s EMEA regional round-up: MTN warns of H1 earnings fall; Orange combines with SSE Networks for improved maritime connectivity; Brussels looks into latest Facebook acquisition.

Iliad-UPC tie-up will make Poland a market to watch

Iliad is making good on its ambitions to enter the Polish fixed-line market, making an offer for number two player UPC worth the best part of US$2 billion.

Ericsson wins a bit bigger in China, as Nokia misses out — report

Report suggests that the Swedish vendor has won 3% of a joint contract from China Telecom and China Unicom.

Google to power new Pixel phones with own chip

Google will use a custom chip designed in house to power the next generation flagship Pixel smartphones, following in the footsteps of Apple and Samsung to rid themselves of the perceived limitations of off-the-shelf offerings.

What the latest infrastructure bill says about 3.1-3.45 GHz

A massive infrastructure bill that’s making its way through the U.S. legislature includes a section on spectrum auctions, including pre-auction funding for the Department of Defense to research sharing and commercial use in the 3.1-3.45 GHz band.

Arista Beats Q2 Expectations, Warns on Chip Shortage

Arista Networks posted strong second-quarter earnings as the vendor barreled through supply constraints spurred by the ongoing semiconductor shortage.

Marvell Munches Innovium in $1.1B Acquisition

Chipmaker Marvell snapped up switch silicon vendor Innovium in an all-stock deal valued at $1.1 billion.

Juniper Cloud Workload Protection Weaves an Application Safety Net

Juniper Networks announced a new workload platform to connect and protect applications against malicious actions in real-time within zero-trust data center architecture. 

Cisco Patches Firepower Firewall Vulnerability

Cisco this week patched a vulnerability in its Firepower Device Manager (FDM) On-Box software, which allowed threat actors to gain control of the company’s Firepower next-generation firewalls.

Traceable Rolls Out Free API Security

Traceable rolled out a free version of its API security software just a year after former AppDynamic CEO Jyoti Bansal launched the company with $20 million in funding and an enterprise application security platform. Alongside the free version, the startup also announced self-deployment that takes less than 10 minutes across all tiers: free, teams, and enterprise Traceable AI.

Can Frenemies Exabeam and Google Cloud Make Open XDR Stick?

There’s a new cybersecurity alliance in town and this one, led by Exabeam, aims to develop an open extended detection and response (XDR) framework and architecture.

Alkira Amps AWS in Multi-Cloud Domination Bid

Alkira announced an expanded relationship with Amazon Web Services (AWS) in a bid to simplify multi-cloud deployments. As part of the announcement, the startup also joined Amazon’s ISV Accelerate and Global Startup programs.

Daily Roundup: AWS, Microsoft, Google Dominate $40B Q2 Cloud Market

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Facebook Connectivity, STL develop 2 open RAN Evenstar radios

STL is working with Facebook Connectivity to develop two Evenstar radios for the open radio access network (RAN) ecosystem.

Here’s what broadband gets in the U.S. infrastructure bill

The U.S. Senate set the stage for action this week on a sprawling infrastructure package which contains billions in broadband funding, on Friday approving a motion to proceed with a freshly negotiated version of the legislation.

Ericsson secures share in latest China 5G RAN contracts - report

It appears that Ericsson was successful in securing a portion of  Chinese mobile operators’ latest 5G tender, while Nokia was left out.

Canada raises $7.2B in 3.5 GHz auction for 5G

Canada wrapped up its $7.2 billion 3.5 GHz auction last week, ending in per-MHz POP bids that were higher than the record-setting C-band auction in the U.S.

Inmarsat combines satellite and 5G for new type of network

The satellite company Inmarsat unveiled plans for a new type of communications network that brings together its existing geosynchronous (GEO) satellites along with new low earth orbit satellites (LEO) and terrestrial 5G.

Liberty Global CEO says it's not done with DOCSIS – yet

Liberty Global CEO Michael Fries insisted cable and DOCSIS technology will continue to play a key role in its networks for years to come, after Virgin Media O2, the company’s U.K. joint venture with BT, unveiled a plan to transition to full fiber-to-the-premises.

Red Hat and Nutanix team on hybrid cloud offering

Red Hat and Nutanix are partnering to help their customers manage and scale their hybrid cloud. Specifically, Red Hat’s OpenShift is the preferred platform for Kubernetes on Nutanix’s Cloud Platform and Nutanix’s Cloud Platform is the preferred choice for hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) on Red Hat’s Enterprise Linux and Red Hat’s OpenShift.

Safaricom shareholders greenlight Ethiopia expansion

Safaricom’s shareholders formally approved the operator’s incorporation in neighbouring Ethiopia, following it led a successful bid for a telecoms licence in Africa’s second largest country.

Eurobites: Musk sets up Isle of Man beachhead for UK broadband assault

Also in today’s EMEA regional round-up: UK government updates on Project Gigabit; Telecom Italia makes quantum leap; O2 turns on 5G street light in Frankfurt.

Optus aggregates 3.5 GHz with mmWave, plans commercial launch this year

Optus has shared details of a lab trial that saw it aggregate 3.5 GHz frequencies with spectrum in the 26 GHz mmWave band to enable it to provide high-speed 5G connectivity over a wider area.

Canadian 5G auction raises competition questions, again

Canada has announced the results of its latest 5G auction, raising C$8.9 billion (US$7.1 billion) from the sale of spectrum in the 3.5 GHz band. But while the country’s innovation minister declared the result to be a success from the point of view of market competition, it’s pretty clear who the big winners really are.

TPG boosts 5G spectrum assets with Dense Air deal

TPG Telecom has been on a 5G spectrum shopping spree of late and has just augmented its stock of 3.6GHz frequencies in six cities through a swap with Dense Air.

AWS, Microsoft, Google Dominate $40B Q2 Cloud Market

Amazon Web Services (AWS) continued to dominate the rapidly expanding enterprise cloud market during the second quarter, maintaining a significant market share advantage over its smaller – but faster growing – rivals Microsoft and Google. 

Daily Roundup: Op-Ed: Intel’s New Branding Is an Admission It's Losing the Race

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Ampere's AI Acquisition Puts Intel, Nvidia in Its Crosshairs

Ampere Computing’s acquisition of OnSpecta last week was a warning shot to Intel and Nvidia as the Arm-CPU vendor turns its attention to artificial intelligence (AI) inference.

McAfee Builds Its Own ZTNA for SASE Boost

McAfee expanded its secure access service edge (SASE) platform with homegrown zero-trust network access (ZTNA) technology that, in addition to securing access to private applications from any location or device, also integrates with its data loss prevention (DLP) capabilities.