Having talked about collaboration and partnerships for so long in telecoms, it seems we’re finally seeing more of them as MWC2019 looms.
BICS announced an IoT application built on Amazon Web Services (AWS) that automatically on-board devices in most of the world.
It will be formally launched next week in Barcelona and combines BICS’ global, multi-network cellular coverage and its own, IoT-enabled SIMs with IoT vendor CESANTA’s VCON module. This will enable AWS customers to expand their IoT footprint to over 200 countries the companies say.
The BICS solution will provide support and roaming to provision and manage AWS IoT, so that moving ‘things’, such as connected vehicles, can be provisioned and managed remotely, regardless of their location.
Orange and NTT to share research
Orange and NTT have a strategic R&D agreement to share knowledge of a range of technologies from 5G, to network transformation, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence (AI) and IoT.
The companies said the collaboration would accelerate development of digital and network transformation technology and speed the launch of new services in their respective markets.
The agreement covers technologies such as cloud services, software-defined networking and network functions virtualisation, and connected devices for markets including smart cities, sport, culture and tourism.
They will also work on Orange’s Djingo smart speaker, plus digital lifestyle techs such as augmented and virtual reality, payments and finance services, and healthcare.
MYCOM assures Red Hat’s edge
MYCOM OSI announced it is providing carrier-grade service assurance for Red Hat’s virtual central office (VCO) solution, which is sited at the edge of an operator’s network, close to their customers.
The VCO is an edge blueprint, built on an open pluggable framework based on Red Hat and partner technologies, including Red Hat OpenStack Platform. It can be used to deliver mobile, residential and enterprise services from central offices using (NFV), software-defined networking (SDN) and open source-based. interoperable solutions.
MYCOM OSI’s Assurance Cloud, which it launched earlier in the week, is described as the world’s first carrier-grade service assurance SaaS. It is used by a number of Tier 1 operators, including Vodafone.
Ericsson and Juniper step it up
The Ericsson-Juniper Networks backhaul tie-up signed last September appears to be going well, in contrast with the Swedish company’s previous attempt to fix the fixed-line gap in its portfolio with Cisco. They have announced that they will extend and deepen the partnership.
Per Narvinger, Head of Product Area Networks at Ericsson, said in a statement, “The positive market response to our expanded partnership with Juniper is a testimony to the strength of our joint end-to-end transport solutions. We hope to sustain this momentum by further enhancing our leading, high-performance transport portfolio to ensure that next-generation networks continue to benefit our customers.”
Manoj Leelanivas, Chief Product Officer at Juniper Networks, stated, “By integrating complementary portfolios and technologies, Juniper Networks and Ericsson continue to partner and further develop end-to-end transport solutions for the 5G era – solutions that give service providers greater flexibility, performance, security and automation”.
VMware teams up with Ericsson too
Ericsson has also announced a five-year alliance with VMware with the aim of simplifying network virtualisation for operators, by combining Ericsson’s applications with VMWare’s NFV platform, vCloud. They have set up a virtual network functions certification lab to test software deployment and best operational practices so speed things up for their customers.