Here’s a rapid round-up of the biggest news stories from over the break so you hit the ground running in 2024
Spain’s government has confirmed it will acquire a stake of up to 10% in Telefonica to offset stc’s acquisition of a large stake Spain’s formerly state-owned telco. The move was first reported in October and will be carried out though government agency, the State Society of Industrial Participations (SEPI). stc moved to acquire the 9.9% stake in Telefónica in September, making it the telco’s biggest shareholder. stc is controlled by the sovereign fund of Saudi Arabia.
This action by Spain’s government could be followed by other administrations in Europe as state-backed operators (and privately funded ones) snap up stakes in cash-strapped telcos which are seen as key strategic national assets.
Huawei is recovering – it reported its biggest earnings for three years despite the ban on using its equipment in the networks of many western countries and the tech trade embargo. At the end of December it reported full-year sales of RMB700 billion ($99 billion), a 9% rise on the previous year. In 2021 revenues fell by almost a third to RMB 636.8 down from RMB 891.4 billion the previous year. Earlier in 2023, Huawei surprised the market by releasing a phone based on an advanced chip made by Chinese partners.
BT/EE could be penalised for missing the deadline of 31 December to strip out Huawei kit from its core network, according to Bloomberg. It and other UK operators are obliged to do so, in stages, since the UK government designated Huawei and ZTE as high risk vendors in 2020, banning them from critical infrastructure on security grounds. BT has already had this specific deadline extended. BT is replacing the offending equipment by an Ericsson core platform. Bloomberg reckons BT could be fined up to 10% of its revenue, or £100,000 for every day it fails to comply.
UEA operator e& (formerly Etisalat) successfully trialled the world’s first 1.6Tbps per wavelength on an optical transport network based on equipment from Huawei. The operators reckons this will help it address the growing demand for capacity from cloud-based business services, as well as to deliver “enhanced 10G home broadband and advanced 5G services”. The trial used up to 65% less power per gigabit, but e& did not say compared with what.
Lumine Group is to acquire Nokia’s device and service management platform businesses for €185 million. This is part of Nokia’s restructuring of its Cloud and Network Services division. The sale should be completed in the first quarter of this year. About 500 staff will move from Nokia to Lumine, which has been building a portfolio of communications networking software systems through acquisitions over several years.
Iliad proposed merging its Italian operator, Free, with Vodafone Italy. Vodafone acknowledged receipt of the offer in a statement which read, “Vodafone is supportive of in-market consolidation in countries where it is not achieving appropriate returns on invested capital and confirms it is exploring options with several parties to achieve this in Italy, including through a merger or a disposal.
“There can be no certainty that any transaction will ultimately be agreed. If required, a further announcement will be made when appropriate.” Iliad’s €11 billion offer to acquire Vodafone Italy was rejected in 2022. Perhaps the most obvious question regarding the proposed merger is how the very different cultures could meld? There were reports in November 2023 that Swisscom’s Italian operator, Fastweb, was eyeing Vodafone Italy.
IDC predicts a strong recovery in the semiconductor market aftera drop in the memory chip sector of more than 40% in 2023. It is forecasting annual growth of more than 20% in 2024, largely driven by what it describes as “exploding” demand for AI and high-performance computing (HPC), plus the stabilising demand for smartphones, personal computers, infrastructure and “resilient growth” in automotive.
Rakuten Mobile, the world’s native first Open RAN operator, announced it has acquired more than 6 million customers as of 26 December. Rakuten set out to shake up the Japanese market, which is one the most expensive in the world and the third largest. The mobile operator is part of the Rakuten Group’s huge service ecosystem which rewards customers for loyalty across its product lines.
In November, Reuters wrote, “By any measure, cash-bleeding Rakuten Mobile is deeply troubled” and said “damage to its parent company has been significant – 13 straight quarters of operating losses amounting to roughly $5.5 billion and a huge amount of debt – $5.4 billion of which is due in the next two years”.
Rakuten Symphony, the vendor arm of Rakuten Mobile, demonstrated the multi-vendor capabilities of the RAN intelligent controller (RIC) within Rakuten Mobile’s testing facilities. The press statement said it proves that “RICs can be used to manage RAN efficiency and reduce overall network power consumption not only in beyond 5G networks but also in 4G Open RAN networks”.