Operator Telecom Namibia and regulator the Communications Regulatory Authority of Namibia (CRAN) have officially entered into a strategic partnership.

Described as a  milestone event, the partnership marks the commencement of Phase 2 of the Universal Service Fund (USF) project, a critical initiative designed to bridge the digital divide in Namibia’s underserved rural areas.

The agreement followed a successful bidding process in which Telecom Namibia was awarded a subsidy of N$9,796,650 (just under US$600,000). These funds are dedicated to the deployment of vital telecommunications infrastructure across key sites, ensuring that remote communities gain access to reliable and high-quality communication services.

Under the terms of the signed agreement, Telecom Namibia will facilitate the construction of new radio access network (RAN) sites, engineered to significantly improve mobile broadband and voice services.

A central component of this partnership is a commitment to provide free connectivity to all educational and health facilities within the coverage of these RAN sites for a period of seven years, directly supporting socioeconomic development. The infrastructure deployment will target underserved areas in at least eight regions. 

Mrs Emilia Nghikembua, CEO of CRAN, says: “The Universal Service Fund is a cornerstone of our strategy to ensure inclusive communication services. Through a transparent and rigorous selection process, we have partnered with Telecom Namibia to accelerate our 2024–2027 digital infrastructure goals. We are confident that this phase will have a lasting, positive impact on the lives of those in the most remote regions of our country.”

This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Tony Thakur, Chief Technology Officer (CTO), Great Plains Communications (GPC)

Across the Midwest, in emerging growth corridors and across the nation, we’ve seen a recurring pattern: organizations believe they are protected because they have redundant connectivity until an outage proves otherwise. The issue is rarely bandwidth. It is about overall network resiliency and a strategy to mitigate during an outage. … [visit site to read more]

State-owned Bangladesh Submarine Cables (BSCPLC) has warned that internet services will experience slowdowns or disruptions from now until Monday due to repairs being carried out on the SEA-ME-WE-5 subsea cable.

In a statement released on Wednesday, BSCPLC said that the SEA-ME-WE-5 consortium would conduct fault repair maintenance on the cable’s S1.5.1 shunt from Thursday evening (April 9) local time to the morning of April 13.

During that time, the repair work will impact circuits routed between Singapore and SEA-ME-WE 5’s landing station in Kuakata, which may result in slower internet speeds or partial service interruptions, BSCPLC said.

BSCPLC added that service on Bangladesh’s other international subsea cable route, SEA-ME-WE-4, will continue as normal.

However, SEA-ME-WE-4 provides only a third of Bangladesh’s international subsea cable capacity at around 800 Gbps, compared to roughly 1.7 Tbps on SEA-ME-WE 5. A break on the same route in 2024 heavily impacted internet services in the country, highlighting the need for Bangladesh to install more international capacity.

BSCPLC – which is a stakeholder in both subsea cables – is also a member of the SEA-ME-WE 6 cable consortium, but that system’s ready-for-service date has been pushed back to 2027.

The Bangladesh Private Cable System (BPCS) consortium announced plans in September 2024 to construct a privately-owned 1,300-km subsea cable connecting Cox’s Bazar to the Campana-owned UMO subsea cable that runs from Myanmar to Singapore, giving the country another 45 Tbps of capacity.

In December last year, BPCS contracted Nokia to supply submarine line terminal equipment for the project, which is tentatively slated to be ready for service in the second half of this year.

News

The submarines are thought to be mapping the UK’s undersea communications networks.

The UK’s defence secretary John Healey has today revealed to reporters that a trio of Russian submarines have been monitored in UK waters, likely monitoring the country’s subsea cables and pipelines.

British armed forces, including a naval ship and a Royal Air Force plane, were quickly deployed to track and deter the submarines, which subsequently left the area.

There are no reports of submarine infrastructure having been damaged.

“To Putin, I say this: we see you, we see your activity over our underwater infrastructure. You should know that any attempt to damage it will not be tolerated and would have serious consequences,” said Healy.

The incident involved three submarines, a Russian Akula-class attack submarine and two spy submarines belonging to Russia’s Main Directorate for Deep-Sea Research (GUGI). These GUGI submarines are designed to monitor and map submarine cable infrastructure and could be used to sabotage these underwater systems.

“These aren’t standard submarines, they’re specialist vessels designed for deep sea operations,” Charlotte Wilson, Head of Enterprise at Check Point Cybersecurity, told the BBC. “So, this isn’t random movement, it suggests a deliberate effort to understand where critical infrastructure sits and how it behaves. Not only mapping locations but also assessing how resilient those systems are.”

GUGI has often been linked to covert submarine cable surveillance in UK waters, most recently in 2025 when its ‘spy ship’, Yantar, was accused of entering British waters to map subsea infrastructure.

A notable incident occurred in January 2025, when a UK submarine surfaced beside the Yantar in a show of strength, with Healy subsequently saying, “we know what you’re doing and we will not shy away from robust action to protect this country”.

Over a year later, however, and Russia is seemingly undeterred. Healy notes “increased Russian activity” in the Atlantic north of the UK, with a 30% increase in Russian vessels threatening UK waters.

How is the submarine cable security landscape changing? Join our inaugural Subsea Security Summit in May 2026

Also in the news
Connected Britain Award winners 2025 announced!
Netomnia announces ‘powerful and ambitious’ rebrand ahead of Connected Britain
VodafoneThree drops Samsung, relies on Nokia and Ericsson for £2bn network upgrade

Two bits of inorganic activity, and some fiber in the deep south: … [visit site to read more]

News

The Federal Communications Commission has adopted new procedures to streamline transitions from aging copper cables in the US.

By Brad Randall, Broadband Communities

A set of new policies and procedures adopted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will streamline the process for retirement of legacy copper networks, according to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr.

Last month, Carr said the FCC has now cleared some of the “regulatory underbrush” that has slowed down the phasing out of copper networks.

Some of the changes adopted include a clarification enabling providers to use streamlined procedures more often, a waiver allowing retirement of copper networks where bundled services are offered (while keeping pro-consumer protections in place), and a new waiver for notification requirements that the Wireline Competition Bureau considered excessive.

“This initial set of actions gets things moving in the right direction and creates the right incentives for providers to invest and build new networks in communities across the country,” Carr said. “As we take these actions, we are also ensuring that consumers remain protected during the transition.”

Another change announced is a new waiver for requirements regarding services determined to be grandfathered by providers, the FCC announced.

Meanwhile, Carr said the FCC will continue on its current path.

“Outdated FCC rules have left Americans sitting in the slow lane for far too long,” he said. “Those FCC rules have forced providers to pour resources into maintaining aging and expensive copper line networks instead of investing in the modern, high-speed infrastructure that Americans want and deserve.”

He said the FCC’s goal with the aforementioned actions is to free up billions of dollars for new networks that could have otherwise been diverted into copper lines.

Additionally, he said the FCC is not finished with the topic of copper networks.

“There is much more work ahead for the FCC,” he said.

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A few stories to keep up with from: … [visit site to read more]

Smart Communications, Ericsson and Meta announced on Tuesday they have jointly optimised Smart’s network to support better-quality OTT voice and video calls for Meta’s Messenger app in the Philippines.

Ericsson and Smart said they fine-tuned key technical parameters in Smart’s live network in the Luzon area of the Philippines in collaboration with Meta’s local team to enhance network performance.

The result: 24.6% lower round-trip time for Messenger calls, 55% lower packet loss for fewer interruptions, and clearer video at nearly 20% higher video bitrate, all of which enable more stable and reliable real-time conversations.

“These improvements mean [customers’] video calls over Messenger are sharper, and they can enjoy continuous calls with their loved ones,” said Debbie M. Hu, head of network at Smart Communications.

Hu added that the network enhancements also benefit other OTT voice and video call apps, not just Messenger.

Daniel Ode, head of Singapore, Philippines and Brunei at Ericsson, added that the initiative “demonstrates how focused global technical expertise, decades of trusted telco leadership, and platform-level coordination can come together to produce tangible, customer-facing improvements — clearer audio, fewer interruptions, and a more dependable calling experience that Filipinos can rely on every day.”

Interview

Despite decades of technological change, from early mobile devices to eSIM, the core telco retail experience has remained largely static. For Christopher Krywulak, CEO and founder of iQmetrix, the industry now faces the harsh reality of a long-delayed transformation, with raising customer expectations and rapid AI advances pushing operators towards a more holistic retail model.

Speaking to Total Telecom, Krywulak shed light on the broken customer retail experience, organisational inertia, and why operators must embrace AI and hybrid retail models.

Fragmented and frustrating

The mobile industry has long suffered from a persistent failure to connect digital and physical channels into a seamless journey. Despite operators investing heavily in apps and online tools, the in-store experience often remains disconnected from the online experience.

“The retail experience fundamentally still hasn’t changed significantly since the first introduction of mobile phones,” said Krywulak. “It was very transactional and, from a carrier perspective, we have not yet really shifted. There’s no real appetite from telcos to take the lead and bridge their systems.”

This fragmentation is most visible when customers move between channels. Journeys that begin online frequently collapse in-store, resulting in a frustrating customer experience.

“Telcos have always been so focused on their networks that the channel is something of an afterthought. In their minds, it’s just the part at the end of the transaction, where it really needs to be part of the whole flow,” said Krywulak. “Our best-in-class retailers create a continuous experience that moves from online to in-store seamlessly. That’s a great experience and it generates loyalty.”

A ‘phygital’ future

Of course, addressing this challenge is no small feat. The telco industry has long discussed the challenges and benefits of creating a seamless digital–physical retail experience, but few have truly embraced the approach.

“There is awareness that this customer experience really matters, but it has not really been solved at scale yet for telcos,” said Krywulak. “There’s been much talk of multi-channel, omnichannel, but I like the term ‘phygital’ – it literally blends the digital and physical together.”

In practice, this means ensuring that the same systems and data underpin both environments. Key customer interactions, such as checking upgrade eligibility, trade-in value, or product availability, should be consistent regardless of channel.

“A lot of the plumbing that we do at iQmetrix is ensuring that the physical orchestration level is the same as the digital,” Krywulak explained. “We need to be able to hand off from one service platform to the other while retaining the customers’ identity to deliver a unified experience.”

Culture, not technology, is the primary barrier

While legacy systems and siloed data are often cited as the main obstacles to delivering a ‘phygital’ channel experience, Krywulak argues that organisational structure and mindset are equally significant barriers. Operators are used to their various departments operating largely independent, each with its own priorities and little motivation to work across teams. This, Krywulak says, makes it inherently challenging to deliver a consistent customer experience.

“They have their sales team, their marketing team, and their IT team, but no one’s really working on the shared strategy,” he said, describing a lack of ownership over the end-to-end customer experience.

This fragmentation is further entrenched by telcos’ tendency to approach change incrementally, aiming to solve problems in isolation rather than redesigning journeys holistically.

“There’s been a bottom-up reductionist approach to retail,” explained Krywulak. “They do a piece at a time, rather than thinking about how the system works as a whole.”

For Krywulak, this is a fundamental error, arguing that operators’ strategies should begin by defining the desired customer experience and expanding from there.

“What kind of experience do you want your customer to have? What problems do they have and how can you solve it for them? These are the key questions to ask, rather than leading with technology,” said Krywulak.

This lack of a top-down, experience-led strategy contrasts sharply with best-in-class retailers, like Apple, who design their retail strategy around the user journey from the outset

Apple, frequently cited as a benchmark, exemplifies a model where digital and physical interactions are tightly integrated and designed around the user journey from the outset.

“Apple is really the ‘North Star’ for where telco should be headed,” said Krywulak. “The company really understands that the digital and physical should be considered a single, unique final experience for customers. They are creating brand theatre in their stores. When customers come to your store regularly because they trust you to solve problems, not just sell products, then there’s so much commercial opportunity.”

Agentic commerce will demand change

The next phase of retail disruption is rapidly approaching in the form of agentic AI, where digital agents can act on behalf of customers to navigate purchasing decisions.

In this model, the customer journey increasingly begins outside traditional telco channels, with AI tools aggregating options and guiding decisions. This presents both an opportunity and a threat for the telcos. Those that adapt quickly can capitalise on a new route to customer acquisition, while those that fail to expose their offerings via APIs risk being excluded from these new buying pathways.

At the same time, these AI agents will play a growing role within retail operations, supporting both customer journeys and employee workflows.

“Shopping is not far from beginning at the AI agent level […] Agents will orchestrate the entire retail journey, from answering customer questions to building personalised packages,” said Krywulak.

This will inevitably reshape the role of physical stores. While Krywulak admits that there will “likely be fewer physical stores” in the future, he sees stores evolving to focus less on transactions and more on solving complex customer needs, from repairs to upgrades and advice. At the same time, they may double as logistics points, enabling faster fulfilment for online orders.

“I see telcos having large flagship stores that are full service, offering not only basic retail and device support but unique hybrid experiences,” he predicts. “Telecoms’ complexity makes it ideal for the mixture of the physical and digital in retail. That’s not going to change.”

Learn more about how iQmetrix is helping telcos bridge digital and physical retail at https://www.iqmetrix.com/.

Christopher Krywulak is CEO and founder of iQmetrix

iQmetrix is a global provider of Interconnected Commerce software solutions for telecom retail. Interconnected Commerce is an AI-native telecom commerce platform that acts as a system of intelligence. It replaces fragmented legacy stacks with a modern, modular operating layer, connecting telcos, retailers, and OEMs into one flow across channels and markets. The result is less complexity, lower cost, and the speed to move ahead.

For 26 years, we’ve been passionate about helping the leading brands in telecom to grow by providing best-in-class software, services, and expertise that enables them to adapt and thrive. Our solutions power $17BN in sales annually, handling nearly 53 million invoices and more than 28 million activations, and are used by more than 370,000 telecom retail professionals across almost 1,000 clients. iQmetrix is a privately held software-as-a-service (SaaS) company with employees in Canada, the U.S., India, and Europe.

For more information, please visit www.iqmetrix.com.