News

The move will see the operator take aim at Indiana’s digital divide, seeking to connect some of the state’s most remote communities with fibre broadband

This week, Comcast has announced that it has signed a number of contracts with Indiana’s Office of Community & Rural Affairs (OCRA), aiming to deliver fibre services to rural locations throughout the state.

The deals are part of Indiana’s Next Level Connections Broadband Grant Program, with Comcast partnering with both state and local governments to deploy around 1,200 miles of fibre. These fibre deployments will impact over 10,000 homes and businesses in 19 counties within Indiana.

In total, the deals are worth roughly $50 million, with Comcast investing $36 million and the state of Indiana investing $13.6 million.

“Next Level Connections is used as a model by other states to deliver the best tech infrastructure to rural areas,” explained Indiana’s lieutenant governor Suzanne Crouch, who also serves as Secretary of Agriculture and Rural Development. “The investments made by Comcast and other partners will not only benefit residents and businesses but also contribute to Indiana’s rural economic engine.”

According to Comcast, the network expansion will be completed within two years.

Comcast notes that it has already invested around $500 million in Indiana over the past three years to expand and upgrade its existing broadband networks.

Are US operators doing enough to reach rural customers with high-quality connectivity? Join the discussion at this year’s Connected America conference

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Press Release

With the expanded footprint, Oracle will operate six cloud regions in the Middle East

To meet the rapidly growing demand for its cloud services, Oracle today announced plans to open a third public cloud region in Saudi Arabia. Located in Riyadh, the new cloud region will be part of a planned US $1.5 billion investment from Oracle to expand cloud infrastructure capabilities in the Kingdom. The Oracle Cloud Riyadh Region will join the existing Oracle Cloud Jeddah Region and the planned Oracle Cloud Region to be located in the futuristic city of NEOM.

This investment is included in an MoU that Oracle has signed with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) to help Saudi Arabian businesses take advantage of the latest innovations in the cloud. The MoU was signed during Oracle CEO, Safra Catz’s recent visit to Riyadh in the presence of His Excellency Eng. Haitham AlOhali, Vice Minister, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT).

To quickly meet the requirements of its growing cloud business in Saudi Arabia, Oracle will also expand the capacity of the Oracle Cloud Jeddah Region.

“In the last century, Saudi Arabia transformed its economy by developing the infrastructure needed to produce, refine, process and transport hydrocarbons. This century we are committed to creating the digital infrastructure that will underpin future economies,” said His Excellency Khalid Al-Falih, Minister of Investment. “Oracle’s decision to expand its cloud computing capacity in the Kingdom will play a key role in unlocking the opportunities that rapid technological advancements are creating. MISA will continue in its quest to enable the building of a robust digital infrastructure, by creating an attractive environment for these investments – for example, by establishing special economic zones that are tailored to particular industries such as cloud computing and digital transformation.”

As part of the MoU, Oracle will also work with MCIT and the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) to establish a commercial and operational model for an additional cloud region in Saudi Arabia that is aligned with Saudi government requirements and local data residency regulations. Oracle will also work with MCIT to help foster the development of Saudi Arabia’s cloud industry.

Unique among hyperscale providers, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) offers customer choice to deploy OCI based on regulations, data residency, or latency requirements. OCI distributed cloud includes its public regions, Dedicated Region, Oracle Exadata Cloud@Customer, multicloud offerings, and recently-announced Oracle Alloy.

“Oracle’s investment will rapidly accelerate the cloud transformation across Saudi Arabia’s business and public sector,” said Richard Smith, Executive Vice President, Technology – EMEA, Oracle. “Oracle Cloud delivers pioneering innovation in technologies like AI, Machine Learning, and IoT, and it will help fuel the economic growth and digital transformation that is an integral part of the Saudi Vision 2030.”

Want to keep up with all of the latest international telecoms news? Sign up now to receive Total Telecom’s daily newsletter

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Bouygues Telecom lays out 2G and 3G sunsetting plans
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News

The French operator said it will shut down its 2G networks in 2026, followed by its 3G network in 2029

This week, Bouygues Telecom’s B2B Market Director, Jean-Christophe Ravaux, has been quoted by French news media L’Usine Digitale suggesting that the company still has a few years to go before shutting down its 2G and 3G networks.

According to the article, Ravaux says that the French mobile operator is aiming to shut down its 2G network in 2026 and its 3G network by 2029.

“The closure of these networks is a fundamental trend because these technologies are coming to an end,” he said. “That’s why it makes sense to reallocate these frequencies to 4G and 5G for better quality of service. This is the meaning of the story. We have therefore decided, after studying the interest for our customers, to switch off our 2G network at the end of 2026 and our 3G network at the end of 2029.”

This schedule is roughly in-line with that the company’s local rivals; Altice France (SFR) said earlier this year that they are also aiming to decommission their 2G network in 2026 and their 3G network by the end of 2028, with Orange saying it would target 2025 for the shutdown of 2G and 2028 for 3G.

It is worth noting here that strategies regarding the shutdown of 2G and 3G networks vary widely from market to market. In the UK, for example, all of the national mobile operators have committed to shutting down their 3G networks by the end of 2024, though 2G networks may, in some cases, remain operational until 2033.

This is because 2G networks provide a useful low-power fallback, is well suited for machine-to-machine communications (such as for smart meters), and in some cases is the only network available in some of the country’s most rural regions.

France’s neighbour Germany has been even faster to sunset these older networks, with all of the country’s mobile operators having shut down their 3G services already, and most targeting 2G decommissioning by the end of 2025.

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News

The regulator says its provisional view is to not intervene over Openreach’s plans to further reduce fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) product prices for ISPs

Today, Ofcom has opened a consultation on Openreach’s controversial proposed discount plan, Equinox 2, which would offer major discounts to ISPs purchasing the operators wholesale fibre products.

In its statement, Ofcom said that their provisional decision would be to allow this latest wave of discounts, saying that the move would not threaten competition.

“We have carefully assessed Openreach’s offer – taking into account the interests of consumers, as well as the impact on competitors and retail broadband providers,” Ofcom said in a statement. “Our provisional view is that we should not intervene to prevent Openreach from introducing Equinox 2. We consider the offer is not anti-competitive and is consistent with the rules we consulted on before introducing them under our market review in 2021. Maintaining these rules for the period of the review is also important to achieving certainty for all companies looking to invest in broadband networks.”

“In our provisional view, the proposed offer is consistent with our primary strategic goal of promoting investment in high-speed networks to deliver fast, affordable broadband to people and business across the UK.”

Openreach’s Equinox discounts are a controversial topic for the UK fibre industry.

The original Equinox discounts were first envisaged following the publication of Ofcom’s Wholesale Fixed Telecoms Market Review back in March 2021. Regulatory changes within this document allowed Openreach to potentially launch a range FTTP product discounts – now knowns as Equinox 1 – saying doing so would help keep their products competitive versus the typically cheaper products available from altnets.

In case cases, these original Equinox offers would provide price cuts for ISPs of up to a third for fibre products.

Naturally, this was a controversial proposal, with the UK’s altnet community arguing that it would be unfeasible for them to drop their prices to similar levels, thereby squeezing them out of the market. They also argued that this pricing would be a huge barrier for new market entrants to compete with the incumbent.

Nonetheless, Ofcom ultimately allowed Openreach to launch the Equinox offers, which were formally introduced in October 2021.

Now, Ofcom’s seemingly affable attitude towards further discounts in the form of Equinox 2 could set the altnets on the war path once again. While the provisional decision is certainly in keeping with Ofcom’s original ruling over Equinox 1, additional discounts will heap further pressure onto altnets and we are likely to see significant push-back during this consultation period.

“More than £20bn of investment in competitive fibre networks is at risk and yet Ofcom is comfortable proposing not to oppose the offer, summarily dismissing valid and material concerns articulated by many stakeholders,” said Gita Sorensen, Managing Director of GOS Consulting. “Not only are altnets disappointed about Ofcom’s proposed decision, but they are also angered by Ofcom’s unwillingness to engage with their very real concerns. Jansen’s statements yesterday about BT being an ‘unstoppable machine’ and that ‘there can be only one’ national fibre network are clear indications of BT’s intentions to establish a new full fibre monopoly. Equinox 2 is core to their plans to foreclose the wholesale market and deny altnets access to customers.”

It is worth noting that some legal challenges against these discounts have already begun, with CityFibre lodging an official complaint to the Competition and Markets Authority late last year, arguing that Ofcom was allowing Openreach to pursue “an aggressive strategy to foreclose infrastructure competition in the UK fibre broadband market”.

This is not the first time that CityFibre has been at the helm of a legal challenge against Equinox, having seen a previous appeal to the Competition Appeal Tribunal rejected last year.

Ofcom’s final decision on Equinox 2 will be announced at the end of March.

How will Openreach’s Equinox discounts affect the UK fibre market? Join the broadband community in discussion at this year’s live Connected North conference

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Viewpoint Article

By Azfar Aslam, Vice President & Chief Technology Officer, Europe at Nokia

For a long time, industries have been looking for ways to boost productivity, efficiency and resilience, with digitalisation becoming one of the central methods to achieve that. COVID-19 has allowed companies to accelerate their digital transformation journeys, opening up a myriad of opportunities many never thought possible before.

One path many have taken is the adoption of emerging Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) such as artificial intelligence (AI), edge cloud computing and SaaS models. Driven by trends such as environmental sustainability and cybersecurity, this move will allow for more innovative solutions to be born, and, fused with 5G networks, is set to add $8 trillion to the global GDP by 2030.

Whilst most digital industries such as online retail, media and banking have pivoted during COVID, more physical sectors such as manufacturing, healthcare, transportation and energy have only scratched the surface of the significant value that digitalisation can  generate in terms of increased safety, productivity and efficiency (SPE).

Luckily, the world is now approaching the ‘big inversion’ – a new ecosystem of 5G and key-related technologies such as edge cloud infrastructure, softwarisation, augmented intelligence/machine learning, as well as advanced sensors and robotics.  Infused with these capabilities that we refer to as 5G+, the Operational Technologies in physical and digital industries will find the necessary solutions to undergo the much needed digital transformation within the next ten years.

As a result, the need for digital skills of the future will become more critical, fuelled by the emerging technologies powering Web3, the cloud and perhaps one of the biggest ICT innovations of all, the Metaverse.

The rise of the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse

Described as ‘the next evolution in social connection and the successor to the mobile internet’, the Metaverse’s focus to date has been on consumer-led experiences driven by brands’ engagement. However, the biggest and most impactful opportunities will come from other forms of this virtual and augmented environment: the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse. It is these applications which will allow organisations to blur the lines between physical and digital environments and reshape the world –  referred to as ‘digital twins’.

In practice, this means that projects can take place virtually before being replicated in the real world. For example, using Augmented and Virtual Realities (AR/VR), employees at a factory will be able to design and test equipment before deploying it to a live production line, thus limiting risks and more precisely, predicting production volumes. The current use of 5G+ networks in certain industries is already a great testimony to the further benefits the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse can bring.

We are already reaping rewards from digitalisation in several industries. An analysis of an iron ore mine in Australia showed that the use of private wireless networks instead of WiFi had seen a 20x reduction in wireless access points and a 4x reduction in the personnel required to maintain sites, bringing annual savings of €70 million. In another case, a farm in the Netherlands deployed a precision farming approach with 5G technologies where an application identified good crops from weeds and remotely triggered automatic spraying to eliminate the weeds. This resulted in a 6.7x increase in productivity, and if the same technology was applied to at least 15% of global farms, would lead to an increase in yields by up to 300 million tonnes and a reduction in water consumption by up to 150 billion cubic meters annually.

Further advancement of the Metaverse and the ability to initiate or replicate projects in the virtual environment will mean less time, lower costs and reduced risks. As mentioned by Nokia CEO Pekka Lundmark at Brooklyn summit, take the Brooklyn Bridge as an example – it took 14 years to build, with at least 20 casualties back in the 19th century. If the construction took place today, the approach would be completely different.

Using 3D modelling in the virtual environment, engineers can design construction projects like bridges down to the smallest detail and plot their life cycles up to 100 years in the future. Using the bridge as an example, the Enterprise Metaverse allows project players to co-design and interact with the bridge no matter where they are, providing space for limitless collaboration. Similarly, the Industrial Metaverse allows for sections of the bridge to be prefabricated in factories using AI-powered systems, with production workers ‘operating’ machines through AR and VR tools. Moreover, once the bridge is built, applying sensors to every stress point allows authorities to monitor its condition in real-time and maintain it using drones and robotic technologies. The Brooklyn Bridge of the 21st century could be completed in less than a third of the time, with zero fatalities, and maintained without significant closures and disruption to traffic.

But it’s not just the construction industry that can benefit from the Metaverse. Break-through discoveries in medicine and science will happen at a quicker pace too, allowing for organisations and nations to come together to solve pressing world problems such as finding a cure for cancer or tackling the climate crisis: not just leveraging the power of today’s cloud, but realtime interactions with the genome or climate digital twins from anywhere in the world Clearly, the advantages are numerous. However, in order to allow for a fully immersive experience, there are a few other technology solutions that will need to catch up first.

The connectivity opportunities of the Metaverse

The Metaverse is accessed via smart devices and wearables, which require a high-speed, flexible and stable internet connection. To accommodate this, networks need to make significant advancements in latency, reliability and speed, including retiring or recycling legacy 2G and 3G networks and frequencies in favour of those focused on 5G and 6G.

As we enter a new era of unprecedented immersion and industrial digitalisation, there will be a new level of expectations set for network providers based on the reliability, ubiquity, security and sustainability of the networks they operate on. Whilst consumer adoption will come after several years, we are already seeing industrial and enterprise adoption taking place at a fast pace. To cite an example, IBM already has a digital twin exchange platform that allows organisations to purchase digital twins from their partners. With this in mind, there is a clear argument to move towards a standard of open accessibility for both established and emerging companies looking to improve and grow the potential of the Metaverse.

The launch of 6G networks will finally see the full fusion of our digital and physical lives, which will help companies build the underlying infrastructure of the Metaverse. The development of programmes such as Hexa-X-II, the second phase of European 6G flagship initiative led by the European Commission that will form the basis of 6G standardisation, will also allow organisations to come together and drive future developments in connectivity.

Collaboration is the key to success

The Metaverse economy is predicted to reach over $824 billion by 2030. Organisations investing in this technology now are the ones that will win the initial innovation race. However, the Metaverse can only achieve its full potential if organisations work together to create an open, secure, ecologically sustainable and all-inclusive environment that encourages innovation and translates into value for everyone involved. This will require heavy investment and technology adaptation, sophisticated content creation tools and large servers in order to maintain the stability of the system and create a truly immersive experience.

For this reason alone, the Metaverse can never be solely owned by one person or organisation, and initiatives such as the Metaverse Standards Forum should help drive industry standards of cooperation and openness. Long gone are the days when technology start-ups were able to break through and build their empires on their own. As we move from the 5G to the 6G era, digital transformation will take over every industry through technology collaborations and digital-physical fusion ecosystems.

By 2030, everything taking place in the digital world will affect the physical one and vice versa, and every physical object that can be linked to the digital world will be connected. Whilst many consumers will be looking at Metaverse as a new means to join communities and engaging activities, businesses and entire nations will be using the Industrial and Enterprise Metaverse to boost innovation, collaboration and economy, as well as to create safer and simpler ways of operating highly complex technologies. This is where the Metaverse really does become exciting.

Keep up with all the latest news and views from the telecoms sector with Total Telecom’s daily newsletter

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BT’s trading update for the nine months to 31 December 2022 showed a fall in revenues but a massive growth in profit in what the company described as ‘strong performance in tough market conditions.’

Neil Shah, Director of Content and Strategy at Edison Group, reaffirmed BT’s own statement saying “Today’s announcement from BT Group is a welcome one for investors and only just below market expectations. The company reiterated its full-year outlook, despite seeing third-quarter revenues slip by 3% to £5.2bn, with adjusted earnings rising 2% to £2.01bn.”

Post-tax profit grew 49 per cent to £1.3billion for the latter nine months of 2022. The strong performance was driven on one hand by the formation of a 50-50 JV with Warner Bros. Discovery, boosting the division’s underlying earnings by 15%, and on the other hand by the performance  of the group around fibre-to-the-premises customers.

It was the latter area that prompted Philip Jansen, Chief Executive, to say “On full fibre, we’re building – and now connecting – like fury: 9.6 million premises reached to date, with 29% already connected”.

More controversially he is quoted by the Financial Times as later saying “There is only going to be one national network,” and “Why do you need to have multiple providers?”

It is likely to be these latter comments that will likely draw ire from the likes of CityFibre and VirginMedia O2 as will Jansen’s comment that the market would ultimately be just a “couple of big players” a process that would “end in tears” for many of the other operators.

CityFibre’s CEO, Greg Mesch, in particular said publicly at Connected Britain in 2019 that “that no one operator can deliver on the UK’s fibre targets alone” and the company has just reported 2022 to be their most productive year ever, with the network footprint increasing 83%. However yesterday CityFibre showed its not all plain sailing, announcing a restructuring process that could result in up to 20% of their 2,000 strong workforce losing their jobs.

Greg Mesch stressed the need to take responsible financial and operational decisions saying, “The UK’s economy is struggling, and this is affecting both the market and our customers.”

How many operators can the UK market support? Join the debate around the rollout of fibre networks at our Connected North event in Manchester this April. Find out more here.

News

The operator’s latest results show service revenue down in Germany, Italy, and Spain, with the UK the company’s only major growth market

This week, beleaguered operator group Vodafone has announced its latest financial results, the first under the stewardship of interim CEO Margherita Della Valle.

As expected, they company continues to struggle in some of its largest markets, with revenues falling in Germany, Italy, and Spain by 1.8%, 8.7%, and 3.3%, respectively.

These three markets remain highly competitive, with Vodafone’s fibre business in Germany losing subscribers to rivals, and mobile price wars in Spain and Italy driving down revenues.

The UK was the only large market in which Vodafone’s service revenues had increased, rising 5.3%, largely as a result of inflation-linked price rises.

Vodafone is currently seeking to merge its UK operations with those of CK Hutchison’s Three UK, with Della Valle confirming that talks are ongoing between the two companies.

In total, these Q3 results showed total revenues of €11.64 billion, 0.4% lower than those reported for the same time last year.

Nonetheless, Della Valle said the company would not alter its forecasts for the year, still targeting full year EBITDA of €15–15.2 billion.

“Although we’re continuing to target our financial guidance for the year, the recent decline in revenue in Europe shows we can do better. We need to do more for our customers by delivering quality connectivity in an easy way,” said Vodafone’s interim CEO Margherita Della Valle.

Vodafone has been struggling to find growth for numerous years now, with key shareholders – notably activist investor Cevian capital –increasingly calling for an organisational shakeup.

Previous CEO Nick Read, who stepped down from the role after four years at the end of 2022, had long argued for market consolidation as the key to returning the organisation to growth, but very few deals at scale were ultimately struck during his tenure. Meanwhile, the company’s share value declined by around 40% during this period.

Della Valle took over as interim CEO at the start of this year, with the search for a permanent replacement still ongoing.

Now, Vodafone is pursuing a number of new strategies in order to reduce costs, having announced last year that it would seek to save €1 billion by 2026.

According to Della Valle, initiatives aimed at generating around €500 million in cost savings are already underway.

“We’ve already taken action, including simplifying our structure to give local markets full autonomy and accountability to make the best commercial decisions for their customers. In addition, we now have initiatives underway to generate around half of our €1 billion cost savings target. There is more to do and our focus is to provide a better service to our customers, become a simpler business and deliver growth,” said Della Valle.

It should be noted that this cost cutting plan includes the loss of at least several hundred jobs across the business, with the first batch of job cuts announced earlier this year. The company’s London office is expected to account for the lion’s share of the losses.

Vodafone is not alone in making job cuts in the UK, with BT also notably announcing a reduction in staff earlier this month.

Want to keep up to date with all of the latest changes in the UK telecoms sector? Join the ecosystem in discussion at this year’s live Connected North conference in Manchester

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The operator disputes the legitimacy of the $773 million tax bill forced upon it by the Ghana Revenue Authority

At the start of this year, the Ghanaian tax regulator announced that it was issuing MTN Ghana a bill of roughly $773 million, including penalties and interest, claiming the operator had underpaid its taxes for multiple years the previous decade.

The announcement came following the Ghana Revenue Authority’s audit of the operator’s finances for the years 2014–2018, with the regulator finding that MTN had under-declared its revenue by around 30% during this period.

“The base component of the assessment (that is, excluding penalties and interest), on MTN Ghana’s analysis, infers that MTN Ghana under-declared its revenue by approximately 30% over the audit period,” explained the regulator in a statement.

MTN “strongly disputes” these findings, saying they are inaccurate and made use of a flawed methodology.

“It is important to also emphasise that we believe MTN Ghana has paid its due taxes during this period under assessment,” MTN’s CEO Ralph Mupita told analysts at a meeting earlier this month.

Legal proceedings are ongoing to resolve the situation.

This week, however, the South African government has begun to weigh in on the dispute, urging the two parties to find an ‘amicable solution’ to the conflict.

The international relations and cooperation minister Dr Naledi Pandor called for fairness in resolving the legal battle, arguing that greater cooperation was needed between the two countries, especially in the telecommunications sector.

“Our common destiny, as outlined in the Agenda 2063 aspirations, depend on win-win intra-African collaboration and cooperation,” she said.

Agenda 2063 is a set of initiatives currently under implementation by the African Union, aimed at improving the continent’s economy and promoting closer collaboration between nations. The plan includes numerous flagship projects, ranging from the establishment of a high-speed continental rail network to the creation of a Great African Museum.

Crucially, many of these projects are directly tied to the telecoms industry, such as the creation of a pan-African digital data network, collaboration on cybersecurity, and the establishment of an open, digital Pan-African University.

In related news, it should also be noted that Ghana is currently experiencing a major economic crisis, with inflation rising above 50% and the government seeking financial aid from the International Monetary Fund. If ever there was a time when the government could do with a financial windfall, this is undeniably it.

Keep up to date with all the latest telecoms news with the Total Telecom daily newsletter

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News

The operator says it is the first US operator to make such a commitment

This week, T-Mobile has announced its latest sustainability goals, aiming to reduce its emissions to net-zero across its entire carbon footprint by 2040.

Crucially, this new goal encompasses not only Scope 1 and 2 emissions – those generated directly by the company’s own operations and indirectly by the company’s purchased electricity – but also Scope 3 emissions, those caused by the company’s wider supply chain, its employees, and its customers.

These Scope 3 emissions currently account for two-thirds of the company’s carbon footprint.

The goals have reportedly been validated by the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) using their Net-Zero Standard framework.

“While T-Mobile’s net-zero goal is a decades-long endeavor, we know how important it is to take definitive actions now to reduce our environmental impact for future generations,” said Janice Kapner, chief communications and corporate responsibility officer at T-Mobile. “We’re committed to measurable progress and holding ourselves accountable with strong governance practices, consistent and transparent reporting, and ongoing collaboration with leading sustainability experts.”

In addition to announcing their new net-zero goals, T-Mobile also revealed that that they have signed The Climate Pledge, a commitment to reaching net-zero 10 years ahead of the timeline set out by The Paris Agreement. As part of this pledge, the company has agreed to measure and report its greenhouse gas emissions regularly, implement various decarbonisation strategies, and eliminate any remaining emissions with “additional, quantifiable, real, permanent, and socially beneficial offsets”.

It is worth noting here that T-Mobile’s progress towards this goal is already well underway, with the company having used nothing but renewable energy for around a year now.

T-Mobile’s largest rivals, AT&T and Verizon, meanwhile, have announced their own sustainability targets, though neither of them have announced plans to eliminate Scope 3 emissions.

Verizon, is aiming to reach net-zero operational emissions by 2035, including a 53% reduction in Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions between 2019 and 2030. It is also aiming for half of its total energy consumption to be derived from renewable sources by 2025.

Since December 2019, the operator has announced numerous Renewable Energy Purchase Agreements, amounting to roughly 2.6 GW, with the latest deal being struck earlier this year.

AT&T has similar goals, aiming for carbon neutrality across its own operations (Scope 1 and 2) by 2035. The operator said it would achieve this target by focussing on using renewable energy, bolstering energy efficiency, and reducing fleet emissions through optimisation and the introduction of hybrid and electric vehicles.

Are US operators doing enough to reduce their carbon footprint and promote a more sustainable future? Join the experts in discussion at this year’s live Connected America conference

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The job cuts come amongst a raft of cost-cutting measures that have been ongoing since the start of 2021

This week, the announcement of Telia’s lacklustre Q4 results has been accompanied by an acceleration of job cutting plans, with the company set to reduce its headcount by 1,500 this year.

According to the company’s earnings statement, the first 1,000 of these jobs will be slashed in Q1 this year, with the remaining 500 expected to be cut by the end of the year.

The company currently employs around 20,000 full time staff in various markets.

Telia has been attempting to cut costs significantly for a number of years now, in 2021 laying out a new strategic plan that included job cuts, asset divestiture, and operational streamlining.

At the time, the company said it would aim to cut 1,000 jobs a year until 2025, but now the macroeconomic environment, including rising energy prices and inflation, is forcing the company to accelerate its strategy.

Struggling under the weight of $2 billion in non-financial impairments related to its Norwegian and Finnish units, this year Telia noted a net loss of roughly $1.8 billion –a stark contrast to the profit it recorded for the same period a year ago.

“We are transforming a large, complex business in a challenging market and there are no shortcuts to success. We have known from the start that achieving our ambitious goals demands focus, discipline and perseverance,” said Telia CEO Allison Kirkby. “However, having returned the company to growth, expanded our 5G networks, passed our investment peak and built the foundations for better operational momentum and cash conversion going forward, I remain confident we are on the right track.”

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