In the weeks running up to AfricaCom 2023 (part of the Africa Tech Festival, the largest digital infrastructure event in Africa – takes place November 14 to 16 in Cape Town), there is a lot of preparation work to do on site, so I have been watching a fair amount of South African television recently. And this has really opened my eyes to the prevalence of the use of SMS text messaging by South African organisations of all shapes, types, and sizes to both communicate with existing clients and help reel in the new. It’s very simple: viewers see … [visit site to read more]

Amazon Web Services (AWS) said on Thursday that Malaysia’s Axiata Group has selected AWS as its primary cloud provider as part of its plan to accelerate digital transformation across its operating companies in Southeast Asia and South Asia.

AWS said Axiata will migrate a wide range of mission-critical applications to AWS by the end of 2024, including more than 650 services across customer service, enterprise resource planning, and human resources, and 80 machine learning (ML) applications.

Axiata will also make use of AWS technologies such as data analytics, ML and generative AI to inform data-driven business decisions, tailor offerings to new markets, and develop new services to meet evolving customer needs across the telecoms, banking, and payments industries, said Axiata group CIO Anthony Rodrigo.

“Customers expect effortless mobile transactions, and by tapping into AWS’s generative AI and machine learning capabilities, we can deliver on the needs of customers rapidly, securely, and more cost effectively,” he said in a statement. “The cloud gives us the agility to build new business models that will differentiate Axiata now and into the future.”

AWS noted that Axiata is already using some of its services and tools. For example, Axiata has been leveraging Amazon Bedrock – which makes multiple foundation models available via an API – to build experimental generative AI applications to improve productivity across all business lines, including customer service, finance, human resources, and sales.

Sri Lankan telco Dialog Axiata has been using Amazon SageMaker to transform its analytics and ML infrastructure into an internal AI factory system that enables the company to use analytics and ML to develop and deploy churn prediction and next best-offer systems to drive customer engagement.

Meanwhile, Indonesian telco XL Axiata is using Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) to launch and run its MyXL and AXISnet mobile applications without needing to manage underlying infrastructure. Result: XL Axiata has expanded the availability of its services, tripled its monthly active users in two years, and scaled its applications nearly twice as fast compared to using on-premises infrastructure, AWS said.

“With AWS, Axiata can diversify and modernize their business in the cloud, while shaping the future of customer service with generative AI,” said Conor McNamara, vice president at AWS ASEAN.

Indonesian telecoms infrastructure Dayamitra Telekomunikasi (Mitratel) said it has added more towers and optical fibre to its portfolio via separate acquisition deals worth a combined US$167.3 million.

Mitratel, a subsidiary of Telkom Indonesia, said on Thursday it had acquired 803 towers belonging to Gametraco Tunggal worth IDR 1.75 trillion (US$112.6 million). Of those, 241 towers are located on the island of Java, while the remainder are outside of the island.

Mitratel President Director Theodorus Ardi Hartoko said that many telecoms players in Indonesia are looking to expand their market share outside of Java as demand for internet connectivity grows elsewhere in the archipelago.

“Of course we have to be at the forefront in helping their expansion,” he said.

Apart from giving Mitratel more towers outside of Java, the Gametraco deal also comes with an additional 1,327 new tenants, which will increase Mitratel’s tenancy ratio, Hartoko added.

Meanwhile, also on Thursday, Mitratel revealed it had acquired 967.1 km of optical fibre from Power Telecom for IDR 85 billion.

Mitratel said the fibre has a billable length of over 1,144 km, which means the new fibre complements its tower business portfolio with a billable ratio of 1.18x.

Mitratel said the transaction was sourced from internal funds, noting that it had budgeted a capex of IDR 7 trillion for 2023, 58% of which had been absorbed by the end of the third quarter of 2023.

“This means that Mitratel has sufficient liquidity to finance tower and fibre optic expansion until the end of this year,” the company said in a statement.

Earlier this month, Mitratel reported profit growth of 16.6% year-on-year to IDR14 trillion in Q3 2023, while revenue increased 11.9% to IDR6.3 trillion. In that quarter, Mitratel’s tower portfolio grew 5.8% year on year to 37,091 towers, while its optical fibre assets grew from 5,872 km to 29,042 km.

Hartoko said Mitratel’s expansion strategy will make it the largest digital infrastructure company in Asia Pacific.

Research firm Dgtl Infra said in September that Mitratel was the 13th biggest telecoms tower company in the world based on the number of towers. As of June 2023, Statista ranked Mitratel at #15 globally, but also said it was the largest tower company in Southeast Asia.

News

The deal is Boldyn Networks’ second London connectivity agreement signed in the last three years 

Boldyn Networks has announced its first ‘small cell’ is live near King’s Cross in London, deployed as part of a partnership with UK mobile operator EE to boost operator’s coverage and capacity. 

The partnership will see a large quantity of ‘small cells’ –small, low-powered cellular radio units – deployed throughout London’s King’s Cross and Euston areas.  

King’s Cross is one of London’s busiest train stations, with 70 million people passing through the station each year. 

These small cell units can provide up to ten-times faster download speeds in high demand areas and achieve download speeds of up to 300Mbps. 

Over the next two years, the project will be expanded to cover some of the highest footfall areas in London, such as Westminster and Southwark, to ensure that the network stays reliable for EE customers. 

“Small cells are essential in delivering high-capacity, superfast mobile connectivity to areas where it’s impractical to build larger sites, and by making use of TfL’s existing street infrastructure, we’re able to deploy with minimal disruption even in such a dense, urban environment,” said James Hope, EE’s Director of Mobile Radio Access Networks in a statement. 

This new project comes off the back of Boldyn Networks’ 25-year strategic partnership with Transport For London (TFL) to deploy 4G and 5G on the London Underground. The deal, which was signed in June 2021, is worth £2.2 billion.  Currently, 18 out of 121 underground stations have 4G or 5G coverage, and under this partnership, this is set to grow.  

We caught up with Boldyn Networks’ Director of Solutions and Innovation Andrew Conway to discuss the company’s strategic partnership at this year’s Connected Britain – watch the full interview here! 

Also in the news:
It’s time for action: COP28 and keeping 1.5°C alive
Mitratel snaps up 803 telecoms towers for $113m
Sateliot partners with t42 to sign 5G IoT Maritime deal 

Tata Advanced Systems Limited (TASL), India’s leading private sector player for aerospace and defence solutions, and Satellogic, a major name in sub-meter resolution earth observation (EO) data collection, have announced a collaboration for establishing and developing local space technology capabilities in India.

This collaboration is described as a first step in TASL’s satellite strategy and a significant milestone for Satellogic as it enters the fast-growing Indian market.

The project will commence with comprehensive training, knowledge transfer, and local assembly of optical sub-meter resolution EO satellites, the first of which is planned to be launched as TSAT-1A. The focus will be on manufacturing satellites and developing imagery in India for national defence and commercial applications, towards which TASL is commissioning a satellite AIT plant at its Vemagal facility in Karnataka, a state in southwest India.

Sukaran Singh, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, TASL, says: “Space is important to TASL not just as a business but also due to its culture of precision that will help other activities in TASL. We are pleased to announce our collaboration with Satellogic, a company with best-in-class technology and an entrepreneurial mindset. Additionally, TASL will also work with local SMEs for payloads and other technologies to bolster India content.”

TASL and Satellogic will collaborate on the development of a new satellite design and work together to integrate multiple payloads on a single satellite that will generate a diverse range of data over India.

“This collaboration will accelerate space capacity building for one of the largest nations in the world with the goal of enabling the advancement of commercial space capabilities and greater access to critical information for a range of applications such as security, sustainability, and energy,” says Emiliano Kargieman, Chief Executive Officer and Founder at Satellogic.

EXA Infrastructure has been putting some significant effort into its footprint in southeastern Europe this year. Today that effort is taking them across the Aegean Sea to directly connect Crete to their fiber network and bring bandwidth to the mythical home of the minotaur. … [visit site to read more]

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News 

The deal is one of the first major changes in the maritime industry since the 1950s. 

Spanish satellite operator Sateliot announced that it has signed an agreement with global maritime container tracking specialist T42, to deploy thousands 5G-IoT (internet of things) sensors in shipping containers, which enable shipping container companies to save €47 billion annually, the company say. 

Under the partnership, t42 will deploy thousands of 5G-IoT sensors in containers for its 50 logistics partners across over fifty countries, which will connect to Sateliot’s LEO satellite constellation. This will mean that merchandise travelling across the sea will be under control at all times – meaning location can be tracked, and conditions such as temperature, humidity, impacts and container damage. 

At present, 99% of shipping containers are not tracked or inspected due to a lack of cellular and satellite connectivity, which can lead to cargo theft or tempering and damages. As a result, shipping companies, who handle around 80% of international trade goods, are making significant investments in smart containers, with the aim of making 25% of containers smart by 2025.  

The partnership is the first major change in a sector that has remained mostly unchanged since 1956. Jaume Sanpera, Sateliot’s CEO, concurred, saying: “Our collaboration marks a pivotal moment in the industry’s history, transforming traditional shipping containers into intelligent, connected assets. Tracking in open seas, until now, a very luxurious satellite service will be democratized to all.” 

“It is unbelievable what a small hardware investment can represent for the industry’s performance overall. This change has come to stay; there’s no doubt about it,” confirmed Avi Hartmann, t42’s CEO. 

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

Also in the news:
Broadcom finalises VMware acquisition deal
From Gigabit goals to Sustainability: Navigating the Optical Fibre frontier in Europe and beyond
Cayman Islands moves to modernise submarine cable infrastructure 

This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Suzy Menneret, Wholesale Advisor and Program Lead at the Mobile Ecosystem Forum (MEF)

One thing that has been a constant in the existence of a Mobile Network Operator over time is the ownership of two core elements: the network and the customer relationship.

This has been historically true in the consumer segment as a large proportion … [visit site to read more]