Happy New Year to all!  While network operators were mostly focused on the organic path last year, there were a few significant deals.    Verizon is buying Frontier, Lightpath bought UFD, and of course Uniti and Windstream are merging.  And that last one was not a big surprise, as Windstream topped last years poll with Uniti in 4th. What is on tap for 2025 among US network operators?  Who you think are the likeliest candidates to be sold (in part or in whole)?  (Not including already pending transactions). … [visit site to read more]

Operator MTN Uganda says it has secured UGX370 billion (about US$100 million) in committed debt financing from five local banks.

This debt financing is described as one of the largest local currency debt transactions in Uganda. The syndicated debt facility from five local banks was 1.6x oversubscribed.

MTN Uganda says this deal reflects robust confidence from lenders in the operator’s long-term potential and focus on expanding its digital and financial services offerings. The financing will be used by MTN Uganda for general corporate purposes including the expansion and improvement of the network.

The arrangement was led by Stanbic Bank Uganda, partnering with Absa Bank Uganda, Citibank Uganda, Standard Chartered Bank Uganda and Centenary Rural Development Bank.

MTN Uganda’s Chief Financial Officer, Andrew Bugembe, says: “MTN Uganda’s achievement in securing this substantial funding underscores our competitive strength and reflects the growing appetite for premium corporate debt instruments within Uganda’s financial sector.” MTN Uganda continues to operate with a strong balance sheet, he points out.

MTN Uganda serves approximately 21.6 million mobile subscribers as of September 2024. Its main competitor in the market is Airtel Uganda with 15.6 million customers by 30 June 2024. The company is 76% owned by the MTN Group, Africa’s leading telecommunications company with more than 280 million customers in 17 markets.

Reuters notes that in June MTN Uganda sold shares left over from its 2021 Initial Public Offering (IPO) on the Ugandan stock exchange, leaving its parent owner controlling 76% of its shareholding.

As years go, 2024 was a bit surreal on lots of fronts, but not here. In telecom and internet infrastructure it was pretty smooth. Growth has been largely organic, layoffs haven’t been a thing, investments have been sane and plentiful, and technology has continued to advance. This smoothness makes the job of a prognosticator more difficult, but there’s always next year!  So what does 2025 hold for us? Hmmm, let’s make some guesses, topic by topic: … [visit site to read more]

Keep up-to-date with all the latest news, articles, event and product updates posted on Developing Telecoms.
Subscribe to our FREE weekly email newsletters for the latest telecom info in developing and emerging markets globally.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has enabled prepaid payment instruments (PPIs) to make unified payments interface (UPI) transactions via third-party mobile applications, a concept that may sound arcane on first glance, but one that could speed up the money transfer process in India.

PPIs are financial tools that allow users to store funds for future transactions on cards or digital wallets. Until recently, UPI payments linked to PPIs could only be carried out using the mobile application of the PPI issuer.

This change wasn’t unexpected. In fact it was first outlined in RBI’s statement on Development and Regulatory Policies in April 2024, stating that users of full-KYC (know your customer)-compliant PPIs can use any third-party app’s interface to transfer and receive money in their wallets. With the new rules now in place, PPI issuers are permitted to facilitate the discovery of their full-KYC PPIs on third-party UPI mobile applications.

As news resource Electronic Payments International notes, these third-party applications will enable PPIs to be linked to their payment service provider (PSP) handles. Transactions made from PPIs using third-party UPI applications will require authentication with UPI credentials.

As for what this means in practice, Indian news resource Mint explains that the UPI is a sort of bank-to-bank money transfer, where the interface is a mobile application such as Google Pay.

Users can transfer money across platforms via a mobile number and QR code. PPIs are mobile wallets which have preloaded money. This money can be transferred to another person who is also using the mobile wallet by the same PPI provider.

But a PPI is not a UPI; the money does not move from one bank account to another. To move money from one mobile wallet to another requires interoperability, which the RBI has now allowed with its latest rollout.

In other words, by integrating PPIs with UPI, the RBI has made it easier for users to link their digital wallets to UPI-enabled apps. The latest change means that users of PPIs will now be allowed to use third party apps as well as the UPI functionality provided by the PPI provider.

While much of this was in the April statement, the latest move on 27 December was apparently a follow-up action where the RBI instructed all prepaid payment instrument (PPI) issuers to enable UPI payments from and to full-KYC PPIs through third-party UPI applications.

So is this a positive move for customer – and could it be a boost to the digital payment ecosystem in India? Almost certainly, because the new ruling makes PPI instruments easy to use for UPI transactions. In fact Mint says UPI is an essential payment mode for everyday usage of more than 500 million Indians. 

An internet law that gives the government power to regulate online content took effect in Vietnam last week. Decree 147, as the law is known, expands government control over access to information on the internet for reasons of ‘national security’ and ‘social order’.

The law expands radically on guidelines from 2021 that codify ethics for social media companies and the public, and rules, issued in a decree in August 2022, that require technology firms to store their users’ data locally and set up local offices.

It requires social media platforms providing services to users in Vietnam to store user data and provide it to the authorities on demand. Essentially this means social media giants like Facebook and TikTok must now verify user accounts using people’s phone numbers or personal identification numbers and, of course, store that data. 

The law also requires organisations to take down anything the authorities consider ‘illegal content’ within 24 hours.

Rights groups say the move is aimed at stifling dissent. The government issued the decree this November, though it appears it was actually effective from Christmas Day.

A large proportion of the Vietnamese population is on social media. Some sources estimate that there are about 65 million Facebook users, 60 million users on YouTube and 20 million users on TikTok, a significant proportion of a population estimated at close to 101 million.

The new laws also include curbs on gaming for under-18s, though these are supposedly designed to prevent addiction. Games publishers are expected to enforce a time limit of an hour a game session and not more than 180 minutes a day for all games. Just over half of Vietnam’s population – more than 50 million people – apparently regularly play games, so it’s not clear how these curbs can be enforced. 

Decree 147 also requires organisations to provide search and content-scanning tools to government authorities upon request. It limits certain functions, like live video streaming, to only verified accounts. As a number of news resources have pointed out, this not only an attacks freedom of expression; it also affects the large number of people earning a living through social media channels.

As a number of news outlets have noted, in October, independent Vietnamese blogger Duong Van Thai was sentenced to 12 years in prison on charges of anti-state propaganda.

It’s not yet clear how Facebook’s parent company Meta, YouTube owner Google and TikTok will respond to the new laws.

This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Tom Loberto, Senior Vice President of Technology, Media and Telecom at HGS.

Telecommunications (telecom) companies are often challenged with high customer churn, due to factors such as a highly competitive market landscape and an overwhelming amount of call center inquiries, which can lead to poor customer service and departing customers. As a result, elevated customer churn rates can cause lost revenue and increased customer acquisition costs, as acquiring new customers typically costs more than … [visit site to read more]

Telecom Egypt, the country’s main telecom services operator, has signed a commercial agreement with China Mobile International (CMI), a wholly owned subsidiary of China Mobile, to expand digital services.

While specific plans have not yet been unveiled, it’s clear that there could be a lot of opportunities enabled by this alliance. Not too surprisingly, the partners suggest that this agreement promises to unlock additional value and represents a cost-effective strategy for developing a robust global network infrastructure.

Indeed, CMI’s parent company China Mobile operates the world’s largest network. As well as being a service provider in Egypt, Telecom Egypt is also one of the largest subsea cable operators in the region.

As the two companies point out, their partnership aims to leverage the investments of both companies in subsea cable infrastructure and share resources to address the rapidly growing data needs of businesses and consumers worldwide.

The companies also appear to be examining the potential for a set of innovative, enterprise-grade digital and business services tailored to meet the dynamic needs of enterprises in Egypt and across the region.

Thus it is hoped that this agreement will expand the global reach of both companies. Through combining CMI’s advanced digital solutions with Telecom Egypt’s robust nationwide infrastructure, extensive market expertise, and widespread regional reach, both organisations say they will explore customised DICT (digital, information, communication, and technology) solutions to advance smart services for enterprises.

There is also the opportunity to add new routes across their respective cable systems in order to diversify and enhance the resilience of their networks, ensuring more reliable connectivity.

CMI, founded in December 2010 and headquartered in Hong Kong, provides comprehensive international information services and solutions in 39 countries and regions. It serves enterprises, carriers and mobile users.

Telecom Egypt offers a wide range of services, including fixed and mobile voice, high-speed internet, smart solutions, data centres, and cloud computing.

Operator Movistar Colombia has announced the launch of its shared network with former rival operator Tigo. This comes after a fairly lengthy wait since we reported the companies’ signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to pursue a network sharing arrangement via a jointly owned infrastructure company in mid-2023.

The move was approved by the Colombian business regulator later on that year. In February the board of Colombian telco Une EPM authorised a binding agreement between its mobile subsidiary Tigo and Movistar, which is controlled by Spanish giant Telefónica and has the Colombian state as a key minority shareholder.

The agreement involves the two companies’ 2G, 3G and 4G networks. However, as readers will be aware, the two companies have also jointly bid for 5G spectrum aiming for a shared 5G rollout of this technology. Reports suggest that the two companies have jointly developed just under 100 5G sites.

The launch of the shared network will allow Movistar to significantly increase its 3G and 4G mobile coverage. Tigo has reportedly said that the shared network will boost its nationwide mobile coverage by around 22%.

As the BNamericas website points out, Movistar Colombia has been one of the operators with the lowest mobile coverage nationwide. In the last three years, it was also the operator with the lowest number of sites deployed. Claro is the operator with the largest number of sites deployed nationwide in all technologies with 10,157, followed by Tigo’s 7,575, Movistar with 7,023, and WOM’s 5,045.

As a united force, Movistar and Tigo serve nearly 35 million customers. The country’s population is estimated at just under 53 million.

Further complicating matters, we reported in July that Tigo owner Millicom International Cellular had entered into a non-binding MoU to acquire a 67.50% stake in Movistar from owner Telefonica Hispanoamerica, for approximately US$400 million.

Technology giant Ericsson and Bahrain-headquartered technology group Beyon have renewed their collaboration to expand their joint sustainability initiatives and circular economy practices for building energy-efficient networks in Bahrain.

The two companies have also announced the successful outcomes of their initial sustainability collaboration, signed in early 2024, for accelerating the journey to a net zero future for both companies and managing waste from electronic and electrical equipment (aka WEEE or e-waste).

The memorandum of understanding (MoU), which we reported at the time, and which was signed by Bahrain operator Batelco, part of the Beyon Group, aimed to reduce Beyon’s environmental footprint by addressing energy consumption and carbon emissions on live networks operated by Batelco, using Ericsson’s sustainable solutions.

Implementation of this MoU, say the partner companies, has so far resulted in a 30% energy reduction on Batelco’s network by the deployment of the Ericsson 5G radio access network product, Radio 6646, a triple-band, tri-sector radio that, Ericsson says, can do the job of nine radios.

Additionally, energy-saving software features such as cell sleep mode and artificial intelligence (AI)-powered MIMO sleep mode, were implemented on pilot sites, leading to a 22% average reduction in energy consumption where the features were activated.

A further 18% energy reduction was realised through the deployment of the single-antenna footprint interleaved antenna integrated radio (AIR) 3218 compared to AIR 3227 to provide 5G massive MIMO while addressing space constraints on rooftops and towers.

Circular economy practices have also been addressed; in particular an e-waste recycling initiative has been launched under the Ericsson Product Take-Back Programme. These efforts enable Beyon to recycle end-of-life electronic and electrical equipment in a responsible and sustainable way, supporting the group’s e-waste management efforts.

Furthermore, the collaboration also focused on knowledge sharing, with monthly sessions involving global experts discussing climate action, circularity, and the collective efforts required to achieve net zero goals.