Searching Weekly Analysis
Searching Weekly Analysis
The private networks (PNs) landscape requires more cohesion than competition between participants and technologies, according to speakers in Wireless Watch’s webinar on private 5G networks. Speakers Vijay Venkateswaran from consulting firm Viventum, Peter Cappiello from systems integrator Future Technologies, and Assen Golaup from MNO Liberty Global also discussed the popular architectures of PNs, spectrum, partnerships, and more. In the opening comments, Cappiello described his experience building PNs at Future Technologies. “We’ve been doing network transformation for the last 25 years, really focused on private networks – not just private 5G but also fixed broadband,” he said. “We’ve been doing private cellular networks since about 2010, starting in the military sector. In 2017, we started to do private 4G, starting originally…
The long-heralded global smartphone bounce back continues with Samsung taking more than its share of the spoils at the expense of Apple. It was a strong quarter almost all round for Samsung, which attributes revenue and market share gains across several key segments to the Generative AI wave. While GenAI should in theory benefit other vendors equally, Samsung has been very vocal about its incorporation in top-end Galaxy smartphones, while in other sectors it is playing to increasing AI-driven demand for servers, storage systems and memory chips, in particular. Samsung noted that the continuing increase in demand for servers and associated cloud services around GenAI was boosting revenues in those hardware sectors, even if there was no direct AI capability…
Microsoft has signed a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Brookfield Asset Management, with renewable energy to power data centers in the US and Europe, possibly elsewhere too, with a time frame of 2026-2030. The agreement states that the energy types involved will go beyond just wind and solar, but doesn’t specify. This 10.5 GW PPA figure is more than just the latest record which any sector with a 20% annual growth rate posts as a matter of routine. It’s some 8 times the previous biggest-ever PPA, according to BNEF tracking. It’s bigger than all of the PPAs which Microsoft announced across 16 countries last year combined (8.8 GW, for a cumulative Microsoft total of 23.3 GW prior to this deal).…
M&A, IP, Patents The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is extending is exclusion of Chinese firms from its telecoms industry, and is trying to ban Huawei, ZTE and other foreign companies deemed to be a national security threat from certifying wireless equipment. Last week, the FCC denied a Huawei test lab from participating in a telecoms equipment authorization program. The US is paying a heavily for its anti-China position, the FCC is asking the government for another $3 billion in funding so that operators can remove and replace equipment from Huawei and ZTE from their networks. US operator Windstream will be bought by Uniti Group, the fibre network infrastructure company that was spun out from Windstream a decade ago. Uniti will pay…
Vodafone has launched the InstantX project, within the Linux Foundation’s LF Edge wing, aiming to create an open platform that enterprises can use to exchange data in a manner that deals with the problems of asynchronous transmissions. As part of the deal Vodafone has become a ‘premier member’ of LF Edge, and will “participate actively in its governance.” Sampada Basarker, Vodafone’s Product and Platform Engineering Director, will be joining the board, to this end. So new is the project that it does not exist on the LF Edge website yet. Vodafone claims it has already developed several applications using it, and while this sounds like good progress, other MNOs will have questions regarding how well the approach can be translated…
Ambitious operators are extending their product lines into AI-esque services, such as telco-specific large language models (LLMs) and even customer-facing personal AI assistants. These are commendable diversification strategies for those that are ready to compete with hyperscalers in their digital offerings. But one thing to consider is the huge expense of the infrastructure needed to run AI systems. While many operators are coming down from peak spending on 5G network infrastructure in 2021 and 2022, there are new costs on the horizon. Operators in Japan and Korea are making huge investments in AI infrastructure. Last week, Japan’s SoftBank announced it would spend JPY 150 billion ($956 million) over the next two years to upgrade its computing infrastructure with GPUs from…
Vodafone and Nokia are upbeat about their recent Open RAN trial in Italy, and claim to have achieved speed parity with conventional 5G RAN systems and a significant reduction in latency, compared with earlier pilots. Nevertheless, the fact such claims still need to be made indicates that Open RAN is still a work in progress. Even those telcos most advanced in their Open RAN planning are aware of the need to build critical mass and foster collaborations – both among themselves to overcome challenges, and with vendors to accumulate a sufficient body of components. At present, there is a sense that the case for Open RAN is only established when the equipment comes substantially from a single vendor, which would…
At NAB Show 2024, one of the largest trade shows for the video industry, the battle between ATSC 3.0 and 5G Broadcast was prominent. Our sister service Faultline investigated the next-gen alternatives to traditional broadcast TV infrastructure, and found much to write home about from the glitz of Las Vegas. The ATSC pavilion has been one the buzzier places at recent NAB Shows, once you have successfully avoided the gravitational pull of the traffic-sucking AWS citadel. This year’s event saw the ATSC 3.0 upgrade accessory receivers released from the confines of the glass cabinets seen at NAB 2023 – giving attendees access to demos for the first time, many eager to know when ATSC 3.0 will be available country-wide, with…
Massive MIMO (mMIMO) deployments will accelerate in all major markets and total global units installed will reach 22 million by 2031. By then the number of units deployed annually worldwide will have reached 3.07 million, over three times the 930,000 in 2023. These are conclusions of the latest Massive MIMO Market forecast from RAN Research, the analytics arm of Rethink Technology Research. The report discusses the regional dimension which echoes 5G, since China dominates the numbers with around one third of global deployments through the forecast period, exceeding 1 million a year in 2031. The USA is second, at just over 400,000 and India third on 262,000. India began its 5G roll out late, starting only after its first 5G…
Five years ago this week… After seeking a buyer for some time, Israeli video recommendations engine and discovery software supplier Jinni was on the verge of shutting up shop, a source told Faultline citing Ooyala as a potential savior that fell through. Jinni’s software had historically been dominant in systems built around Ericsson’s Mediaroom (now spun off as MediaKind), known to have a gaping search and recommendations-shaped hole. Historic customers also included AT&T and Time Warner Cable, and Faultline had been aware of prior Jinni switch-offs at Telefonica, Proximus, Bouygues Telecom, in place of the likes of ThinkAnalytics and Spideo. The Alliance for Open Media has released SVT-AV1 v2.0, the second generation of the Scalable Video Technology encoder project which was first debuted…
Making a return visit to the pages of Faultline, Swiss start-up GlobalM launched a hybrid cloud and on-prem networking product at NAB 2024, as part of its dynamic gateway technology. The new offering integrates orchestration with cloud providers AWS and OpenStack, giving users the flexibility to route video traffic through a mix of local networks, direct internet or cloud services. When we first crossed paths with GlobalM in the aftermath of CES 2021, the start-up was then aiming to transform smartphones using the GlobalM mobile app into broadcast-quality cameras by switching satellite distribution for cellular networks – enabling a point-to-multipoint IP distribution model on the back of open-source SRT delivery. This was made possible with a high-availability and scalable network…
Barcelona-based streaming analytics provider NPAW has introduced the second generation of its AI companion NaLa (Natural Language), the firm’s attempt to leverage LLMs, which it has been beta testing since launch two years ago, at NAB 2022. One of our conclusions from the 2024 NAB Show was a maturation of proposed AI services, with vendors focusing on practical “agent” use cases, exemplified by LLM-supported digital assistant chatbots—and that is exactly what NPAW is offering as well. NaLa essentially acts as a human language translator for NPAW’s analytics data. Customers can type in a question and get information on required metrics, compare performance with previous data, or get a general overview, in real-time. An OTT video service could for example ask…
FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr, former aide to ex-Chair Ajit Pai during the Trump-era FCC, is among abundant critics of the reinstatement of net neutrality, which was passed last week. “The FCC tries to dress up its latest power grab in a 400-plus page Order that offers a laundry list of bogus justifications. Few of them rely on actual evidence. Virtually none point to real problems. All fall apart under casual scrutiny. Indeed, it’s not even clear the FCC believes the reasons it offers today for Title II. Misleading the American people is one thing, but the order also leaves them worse off,” laments Carr. While a Republican win at the next US election would trash the reinstatement of net neutrality…
Xperi has issued a call to arms among voting stockholders to block an aggressive activist attempt by investor Rubric Capital to elect two candidates to the Xperi board of directors. The TiVo owner views the US hedge fund’s nominees as inadequate and irrelevant to its future strategy – stressed in an unprecedented presentation still steaming off the press. The extraordinary 104-page slideshow is a defiant display of anti-Rubric rhetoric, explaining in great length why shareholders should vote for the incumbent slate of directors at the 2024 annual meeting, scheduled for May 24, 2024. Xperi waxes lyrical about why the two nominated director candidates should not be voted to the table—chiefly a lack of new ideas and impediment to business transformation…
Natron Energy, a US-based sodium battery company, has opened the region’s first sodium battery cell manufacturing capacity with a yearly output of 600 MWh. The facility is the US’ first commercial scale sodium battery factory, and will be producing Natron’s patented Prussian Blue Analogue (PBA)-based sodium battery trays. Natron will initially be supplying into the energy storage sector with a particular interest in supplying data centers within the US. This fits the company’s initial low manufacturing capacity and the safety requirements of data centers. The company claims that its PBA-based sodium chemistry will be high power enough to offset the low capacity, as it claims a 40W/Wh power to capacity ratio relative to Li-ion’s 10W/Wh by comparison. The company claims…
M&A, IP, Patents European satellite company SES has agreed to buy Intelsat Holdings for $3.1 billion. The new company would have a fleet of more than 100 geostationary Earth orbit and 26 medium Earth orbit satellites. Though investors are concerned about the amount of debt SES is taking on for the acquisition, shares in Paris-listed SES fell 24% on the news on Tuesday. Financials AT&T reported Q1 earnings in line with last year’s values and beat analysts’ expectations for consumer growth. Mobility revenues grew about 3% (to $16 billion) and consumer broadband revenues around 8% (to $2.7 billion), while the firm had higher operating costs and lower equity income from DirecTV which meant that net income was $3.8billion, down from…
AI wunderkind Nvidia is further extending its influence in the telecoms industry, with a huge new order of graphics processing units (GPUs) for Japan’s SoftBank and a 6G Research Cloud platform to encourage operators to experiment with its cutting-edge kit. Nvidia’s meteoric rise has been well documented. Since the beginning of 2023, when its reputation in AI started to spread, shares in the company have risen 491%. Nvidia now has a market capitalization of $2.19 trillion, ranking as the sixth largest company in the world in terms of market cap, with Microsoft ($2.99 trillion) and Apple ($2.68 trillion) at the top of the list. The firm is known for its specialism in GPUs, which were originally used more commonly in…
Japan’s Rakuten contends the 5G revenue conundrum can be solved by reorganizing OSS (Operational Support Systems) as app stores for networks built around cloud-native principles. As owner of the greenfield Open RAN operator Rakuten Mobile, and services and software subsidiary Rakuten Symphony, the parent company believes it has an opportunity to rally its legacy brownfield peers around its OSS model. As Rakuten Group Managing Director and President of OSS Rahul Atri put it during the recent Telco Cloud and Edge Forum, OSS provides the foundation for creating app stores that harness underlying capabilities of 5G networks. “When we designed the OSS system, it was for management of the network functions and figuring out if the network is performing well, and…
China’s operators have enjoyed some success in raising ARPUs on the back of their 5G rollouts, meanwhile subscriber growth is winding down towards saturation. The latest financial results from the big three show 5G numbers tapering off, after a sustained growth period that has endured since the rollout began at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. The trend shows up well for China Mobile, the world’s largest MNO by most metrics, except now for data carried. Over the last year, ending March 31st 2024, China Mobile added 125 million 5G subscribers (defined as those with a 5G package) although a substantial proportion do not have a 5G phone – a curiosity that we intend to investigate. But over the last…
Speaking at FutureNet World, a bustling network automation event, Swisscom’s EVP of Mobile Networks and Services described how the operator is building its 5G Standalone (SA) network, with plenty of patience and a fair bit of DIY software design. Swisscom has now completed its 5G SA network and plans to migrate to standalone at the end of the year. “Looking at our 5G SA, our first large-scale deployment of cloud-native functions, we couldn’t find any software on the market that suited our needs at the time, so we started to develop on our own, based on open-source tools,” Mark Duesener said at the event. “In other cases, we have embraced tools from the hyperscalers and others.” 5G SA promises to…