There was a bit of FTTx consolidation news on Friday on the east coast. IQ Fiber has announced an agreement to acquire ThinkBig Networks in a move that will take it northward into the state of Maryland. … [visit site to read more]
Telecom operator MTN Benin officially launched the country’s first commercial 5G network on Friday, with initial services available in select areas of the port city of Cotonou and Abomey-Calavi.
At the launch ceremony, MTN Benin touted 5G’s potential role in accelerating digital transformation for enterprises and expanding digital services in Benin, especially in terms of streaming, video games and Internet of Things (IoT), according to the Ecofin news agency.
Bolaji Adeola, senior network manager at MTN Benin, also said 5G can enable smart agriculture and boost healthcare access with services like remote care and teleconsultation, as well as improve logistics services, the report said.
MTN’s business director Chary Doumbia said 5G services will expanded throughout Cotonou and the rest of the country “soon”, but gave no specific timeline for rollout plans.
According to Ecofin, MTN Benin’s 5G network is partially funded by a syndicated loan of XOF65 billion (US$103.8 million) it obtained in July from various regional financial institutions, including West African Development Bank (BOAD), Banque Atlantique, Société Générale, Banque Internationale pour l’Industrie et le Commerce (BIIC), and BGFI Bank.
In January this year, MTN Group pledged to invest US$215 million in infrastructure in Benin over the next three years after seeing positive results from 5G trials in the country.
According to the latest figures from Benin’s telcoms regulator ARCEP, MTN Benin was the biggest mobile operator in the country at the end of June 2024, with just over 11 million subscriptions – 6.1 million of which are active mobile Internet subscriptions.
A new report commissioned by Openreach and produced by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) has outlined the value of ultrafast connectivity could deliver to the UK economy by 2034.
The report forecasts that the rollout of full fibre could add £66 billion a year to the UK economy by 2029, rising to £73 billion by 2034. It attributes this growth to improved productivity and the return of over 620,000 people to the workforce by the end of the current parliament, with numbers climbing to 652,000 by 2034.
Realising these potential economic gains, however, relies heavily not only on the technology’s effective delivery, but on its widespread, especially in less connected regions. Recent research from Point Topic suggests that fibre take-up in the UK currently sits at 34.7%, below the European average of 54.4%.
The report also highlights the shift to remote work, which was accelerated by the pandemic, as a key driver in fibre’s ongoing economic impact. By 2029, it estimates an additional 900,000 people will be working from home compared to 2024, many in rural areas. This could help reverse rural depopulation trends by allowing people to live further from major cities while maintaining their careers. However, delivering reliable broadband to hard-to-reach areas remains a major challenge.
The environmental benefits of the fibre rollout could also be significant. By 2034, the reduction in commuting is expected to cut over 4 billion kilometres of car travel annually, leading to a reduction of 320,000 tonnes of carbon emissions each year. While these numbers are encouraging, they hinge on widespread adoption of remote work and sustained progress in building digital infrastructure.
The report also highlights how full fibre could enhance public services. It estimates that the NHS could enable 5 million additional online appointments by 2029, while better broadband access may help thousands of students achieve higher grades.
Beyond its economic and environmental impacts, Openreach emphasises the social value generated by the rollout. The company estimates that small and medium-sized businesses gain £1.2 billion annually from enhanced connectivity, and it reports over 8,000 hours of staff volunteering in community projects. Openreach has also implemented ethical training for its 16,000 suppliers to strengthen responsible practices.
The UK’s fibre rollout is a significant infrastructural investment, but it is not without challenges. Ensuring equitable access across regions, maintaining delivery pace, and helping communities adapt to new technologies will all be critical. While the report paints an optimistic picture of what ultrafast broadband could achieve, turning that potential into reality will require close collaboration between government, industry, and local stakeholders.
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Also in the news:
VMO2 launches UK’s first 5G standalone small cells in Birmingham
BT says Labour’s budget will cost company £100m
Vodafone Spain and Telefonica complete FibreCo deal
Underlining Saudi Arabia’s reputation as the fastest-growing data centre market in the Middle East are no fewer than three data centre-related announcements this week.
The first is from data centre infrastructure provider Pure Data Centres, and digital infrastructure platform Dune Vaults. These two companies have announced a joint venture to develop hyperscale data centres in Saudi Arabia.
The partners says they plan to develop multiple 100+ MW-capacity campuses of best-in-class facilities, making their venture one of the largest data centre providers in the region, poised to meet growing local and international customer demand.
Meanwhile, data centre and digital infrastructure services company Ezditek says it has broken ground on its flagship data centre facility in the capital, Riyadh.
The RUH01, as it will be known, is to be located on a more than 35,000 square metre plot in the Princess Nourah Bint Abdulrahman University (PNU). It is mainly aimed at providing a sustainable and scalable foundation for local digital transformation.
Its strategic location, says Ezditek, provides an ideal entry point for hyperscalers, cloud providers and enterprises looking to establish a presence in the country with direct access to major carriers.
Ezditek adds that the RUH01 will reach 100% of public and enterprise customers in the Saudi central region and deliver a maximum capacity of 24 MW. The facility is expected to go live by Q1 2026.
The third announcement involves Saudi ICT infrastructure company Tawal and 5SKYE, a provider of edge AI infrastructure solutions, which have signed a partnership through which they will jointly deploy 5SKYE’s next-generation 5G AI micro edge data centres, providing what is described as scalable, real-time data processing.
By combining Tawal’s telecommunications expertise with 5SKYE’s “innovative and aesthetically pleasing” edge AI use case infrastructure, the partnership says it will enable industries across the kingdom to adopt intelligent applications that enhance efficiency, reduce costs and drive growth.
The infrastructure, say the partners, will support transformative use cases such as IoT-driven CCTV, AI analytics, digital advertising and edge compute/MEC, further empowering sectors like public safety, logistics, retail and industrial automation, as well as smart city initiatives.
As a number of news outlets note, these and many other such initiatives are driven by government digitalisation efforts, a ‘cloud first’ policy and a favourable regulatory environment, so we can, presumably, expect even more such announcements in the coming weeks and months.
Another attempt to manage virtual private network (VPN) use is under way in Pakistan, where the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has extended a deadline for unregistered VPN owners to give their details until the end of this month.
The official explanation for the mandatory registration requirements is government concern over the misuse of unauthorised VPNs for illicit activities, including bypassing internet restrictions and accessing prohibited content, accessing sensitive data and facilitating criminal or terrorist activities.
A nationwide crackdown on unregistered VPNs will begin on 1 December. This may include VPN blocking, which, local reports say, has already been successfully trialled once and will be trialled again before any full-scale shutdown.
The PTA stated last weekend that the authority has streamlined the VPN registration process for entities such as software houses, call centres, banks, embassies and freelancers; all of these can now easily register their VPNs online through the PTA’s official website.
Registration involves completing an online form and providing basic details, including, for freelancers, documentation verifying their project or company association. Applicants must also provide the IP address for VPN connectivity.
Local reports suggest that Pakistanis make up to 20 million daily attempts to access blocked explicit content using unregistered VPNs, despite government restrictions.
As regular readers will remember, VPN use in Pakistan was in the news only a few months ago. An internet slowdown in August was blamed by activists on state attempts to build a China-style internet firewall as it looks to exert further control over the online space. Officials, however, blamed the widespread use of secure connections or VPNs for the slowdown.
One bit of M&A, one bit of federal dollars, some subsea fiber, and a new PoP: … [visit site to read more]
A new Notice of Proposed Rulemaking adopted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will begin a review of the regulations surrounding submarine cables.
The rulemaking notice, approved Nov. 21 by the FCC, will now seek public comment regarding how the commission can streamline the rules around submarine cables to ensure efficient deployment.
According to the FCC’s release following the vote, the agency has not conducted a major review of submarine cable rules since 2001.
“Oversight of submarine cables traces back even before the existence of the commission itself,” the FCC’s release following Thursday’s vote stated.
According to the release, there are currently a total of 84 FCC-licensed submarine cable systems.
As part of the rulemaking notice approved Thursday, the FCC will also seek comment on how the commission can improve security and protection of submarine-cable infrastructure.
“This proceeding will look to streamline the agency’s review process,” the release stated. “It proposes a three-year periodic reporting requirement for cable landing licenses and, in the alternative, seeks comment on shortening the current 25-year license term.”
As of Dec. 2022, the FCC reported that cable-landing licensees had more than 5.3 million Gbps of available capacity, with an additional 6.8 million Gbps in planned capacity this year alone.
“Today’s action continues the FCC’s recent efforts to support national security,” Thursday’s release continued. “The commission has proposed new rules that would require, for the first time, companies with international telecommunications authorizations to file renewal applications with the FCC.”
Join the submarine cable industry in discussion at Europe’s most important subsea connectivity event, Submarine Networks EMEA 2025
This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Riccardo Amati, The Mobile Ecosystem Forum (MEF)
2024 is the “year of elections,” and mobile messaging apps have become the dominant medium for political campaigns, revolutionising voter engagement. This shift is driven by the ubiquity of smartphones, declining trust in traditional media, and the powerful capabilities of AI, which have enabled more direct and personalised communication between candidates and voters. While this transformation offers more … [visit site to read more]
Indonesian telco Telkomsel said on Thursday it has teamed with ZTE to implement an AI-powered network solution in its 4G network to optimise base station performance after completing tests in Makassar and Kendari.
The “self-adaptive feedback solution” promises to optimize network performance without the need for additional hardware. The solution leverages AI and machine learning to automatically adjust network parameters such as speed and power control, for data-intensive apps such as video streaming and gaming.
Telkomsel said it has been testing the solution in more than 90 sites on its live network in Makassar and Kendari, covering 300,000 users. Results: video buffering was reduced by 15%, download speeds increased by 11%, web page loading times improved by almost 30%, and latency for gaming was reduced by 47%.
“By integrating artificial intelligence into the network, we are not only increasing efficiency, but also answering the increasing need to access high-quality digital content,” said Richard Liang, president director of ZTE Indonesia.
Telkomsel’s planning and transformation director Wong Soon Nam said that the self-adaptive feedback test is part of the telco’s “Hyper AI” strategy to utilise end-to-end AI and ML to improve the customer experience.
The self-adaptive feedback solution also improves energy efficiency, which translates into lower opex costs, Telkomsel said. By automatically switching the base station to low-power mode when traffic is low, the solution increased power efficiency by about 15% while lowering energy consumption by 8%.
With the tests in Makassar and Kendari complete, Telkomsel will deploy the solution across the rest of its network in Indonesia.
The collaboration between Telkomsel and ZTE is part of a strategic partnership agreement signed by both companies at the Mobile World Conference earlier this year. The agreement covers ZTE network solutions designed to boost network performance and the user experience, such as Network Edge AI, 5G-Advanced, and Intelligent Home Network.
AT&T will decommission it narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) network, with IoT workloads to be shifted to alterative technologies like LTE-M early next year.
NB-IoT – a low-power wide-area network technology – was standardised by 3GPP in 2016. Designed specifically to handle low-power IoT devices, the technology was built to allow devices to be more energy and spectrum efficient.
AT&T subsequently began offering NB-IoT services in 2019 and, according to the company’s 2023 sustainability report, currently has more than 127 million connected devices on its network as of Q4.
Now, however, AT&T says that it is aiming to improve IoT services for business customers by moving devices to alterative technologies like LTE-M, which can handle higher data rates.
“We are improving our IoT services for business customers by moving from NB IoT to the LTE-M network. This change will provide more data capacity for both fixed and mobile devices. As a result, we’ve stopped the certification of new NB-IoT devices and the sale of data plans utilizing the NB-IoT network. We’re working closely with customers to make this process as seamless as possible,” said AT&T in a statement reported by RCR Wireless.
The operator says it hopes to have fully transitioned customer devices off of its NB-IoT network by Q1 next year.
In addition to LTE-M, AT&T is also exploring another promising IoT technology in the form of the newly released 5G Reduced Capacity (RedCap). While this technology is still in its infancy, it potentially represents the next step-up from LTE-M, offering even greater capabilities for IoT devices while reducing energy usage and spectrum usage.
But while AT&T seemingly feels its IoT infrastructure warrants an upgrade, its rivals Verizon and T-Mobile consider the issue much less pressing, with both confirming to Light Reading that they have no immediate plans to shut down their own NB-IoT networks.
Join the telecoms ecosystem in discussion over the industry’s biggest issues at Connected America 2025
Also in the news:
VMO2 launches UK’s first 5G standalone small cells in Birmingham
BT says Labour’s budget will cost company £100m
Vodafone Spain and Telefonica complete FibreCo deal
