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Category: Telecom

Retail News Asia is committed to providing both local and global retailers with the latest Telecom & Telco news throughout the Asian market. This on a daily base.

  • Globe taps NuRAN for rural broadband trial

    Globe taps NuRAN for rural broadband trial

    The Philippines’ Globe Telecom has selected Canadian wireless broadband provider NuRAN Wireless to conduct the next phase of its trial rural connectivity program.

    Globe will use NuRAN’s equipment within 50 sites at various villages in across the Philippines. These sites will use NuRAN’s LiteCell 1.5 base stations, connected using a de-centralized GSM network topology.

    Globe will also be able to make use of the ecently-announced NuRAN Open Access (NOA) software suite, which includes the Community Cellular Manager (CCM) solution.

    Globe will be able to use this software to manage prepaid charging and forge business partnerships with local and regional organizations, NuRAN said.

    The agreement marks the next stage of a trial that commenced with the deployment of the same equipment at two sites in the Philippines in the fourth quarter of last year.

    During the same period, Globe also worked with NuRAN on a trial involving using TV white space spectrum with wireless backhaul. Both initiative form part of Globe’s goal of improving connectivity for remote or underserved regions of the Philippines.

    “We are proud to be partnering with Globe Telecom on this important initiative. The Philippines is an important market for NuRAN with a large rural and remote population desperate for connectivity,” NuRAN Wireless CEO Martin Bedard said.

    “This deployment further strengthens our relationship with Globe Telecom, the number one mobile brand in the Philippines.”

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  • SoftBank, Ericsson to trial 5G over 28-GHz

    SoftBank, Ericsson to trial 5G over 28-GHz

    Ericsson and Japan’s SoftBank have announced plans to demonstrate 5G over 28-GHz millimetre wave spectrum, as part of the next stage of their joint 5G trials.

    The companies said they are moving forward with more advanced 5G tests following the successful completion of basic 4.5-GHz and 15-GHz 5G trials in Tokyo last year.

    The upcoming trial will involve both indoor and outdoor testing environments and cover both device mobility and stationary tests. The trial will use Ericsson’s mmWave 28-GHz 5G Test Bed base station and device prototype solution.

    SoftBank and Ericsson will make use of advanced 5G technologies including Massive-MIMO, massive beamforming, Distributed MIMO, Multi-user MIMO and beam tracking.

    “SoftBank started to verify 4.5-GHz radio back in August 2016 and now 4.5GHz is becoming the leading candidate band for 5G services in Japan together with 28-GHz,” the operator’s SVP Hideyuki Tsukuda said.

    “We are leveraging Ericsson’s Test Bed with 28-GHz radio to validate a lot of advanced features at super low-latency and high throughput, which helps position us as a pioneer of 5G.”

    Ericsson Japan head Mikael Eriksson added that he is confident that the company “will be the first to deliver 5G services and that we will deliver the best performing end to end network in Japan.”

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  • Airtel to buy Tikona Digital’s 4G business

    Airtel to buy Tikona Digital’s 4G business

    India’s Bharti Airtel has arranged to acquire ISP Tikona Digital’s 4G business for around 16 billion rupees ($244.6 million), to help shore up its ability to compete against Reliance Jio and the combined Vodafone-Idea Cellular.

    The company will acquire 4G assets including 20 MHz of 2300-MHz 4G spectrum in five of India’s 22 telecoms circles, as well as 350 existing cell sites in these circles.

    The five circles are Uttar Pradesh East and Uttar Pradesh West, as well as Rajasthan, Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.

    The merger is expected to fill gaps in Airtel’s spectrum holdings, particularly in the former three circles, and allow the operator to secure a pan-India footprint in the 2300-MHz band.

    This could prove crucial to Airtel’s efforts to stay competitive against disruptive pan-India 4G operator Reliance Jio Infocomm, as well as the entity that will be created with the planned $23 billion merger of Vodafone India and Idea Cellular – which is expected to overtake Airtel to become the market’s largest operator by subscribers.

    But Airtel could have some hurdles to clear in order to close the deal. Tikona Digital co-founder Rajesh Tiwari is objecting to the deal on the grounds that the companies have not provided details of how the proceeds will be split among shareholders, the report states.

    Tiwari, which owns just over 1% of the ISP, has filed a legal notice seeking to block the deal until he is provided this information.

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  • StarHub opens Hubtricity innovation center

    StarHub opens Hubtricity innovation center

    Singapore’s StartHub has opened a new innovation center and converged operations cockpit named Hubtricity, aimed at accelerating Singapore’s transformation into a Smart Nation.

    The 58,000 square feet facility will act as a foundation to foster service innovation and co-creation with partners and customers.

    The centerpiece at Hubtricity is the converged command cockpit, where StarHub with real-time data can monitor how its fixed, mobile and pay TV networks and services are performing and understand how customers are using and responding to its service offerings through call center metrics and social media analytics.

    Tan Tong Hai, CEO of StarHub said Hubtricity is derived from three words Hubbing – the convergence of technology and services; Tri – the three core networks that power Hubbing; and City – where it is about the consumers.

    “Hubtricity not only showcases our extensive connectivity and deep competency in data analytics and cyber security, but is also a co-working space for partners and start-up companies to create solutions for a Smart Nation,” said Tan.

    “Currently, we are working with both local and global partners to build platforms, such as smart home, intelligent vehicles, connected buildings, virtual reality and smart retail, to meet the future needs of our customers,” added Tan.

    As a home-grown company, StarHub supports the nurturing of local talent and is keen to help drive the local tech startup ecosystem. Hubtricity aims to bring local technopreneurs together, who can create ideas and test out their solutions, catalyzing greater collaboration and innovation from Singapore.

    Kiren Kumar, assistant managing director at Singapore Economic Development Board, said that with Hubtricity, StarHub is investing in capabilities that will enable it to innovate and develop new digital products, services and solutions with partners across industries.

    “Hubtricity will add to Singapore’s position as the Digital Capital of Asia and will create exciting jobs in Singapore in areas such as cyber security and social media analytics,” said Kumar.

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  • BT completes first stage Michelin deployment

    BT completes first stage Michelin deployment

    BT has delivered the first milestones of its global enterprise networking contract with tyre manufacturer Michelin.

    The contract was signed late 2016 and is now in deployment phase. It is designed to transform Michelin’s global network infrastructure and provide all the advantages of the latest network, unified communications and security technologies.

    Under the terms of the five-year contract, BT is to provide Michelin with managed network services for 216 sites in 43 countries across all continents.

    Managed from France, the services covered by the contract are set to play an important role in delivering Michelin’s strategic IT transformation program.

    Agnès Mauffrey, Group CIO of Michelin, said they are driven to look for new ideas to improve the performance of our products and the efficiency of our business.

    “We see a great match between these requirements and BT’s global reach, local in-country capabilities and strong global portfolio,” said Mauffrey.

    “Our aim is to create a platform for digital innovation which will give our people around the world high performance access to cloud-based services, allowing them to collaborate more effectively, she said. “This is being done in a secure and reliable environment over which we have complete control.”

    Luis Alvarez, CEO of BT’s global services division, said BT will support Michelin globally through a dedicated network operations centre and provide centralised network management.

    The contract includes services from several areas of the BT portfolio: BT Connect (network services), BT Security (security services), BT One (unified communications and collaboration services) and BT Advise (professional services).

    “We understand how important digital is to our customers and how cloud services integration can contribute to their success,” said Alvarez. “In the midst of this digital revolution, we also make sure that organizations retain control of their IT, so that the performance, reliability and security of their cloud applications meet all their business requirements.”

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  • China Mobile service revenue up 6.7% in 2016

    China Mobile service revenue up 6.7% in 2016

    China Mobile has recorded a five-year high growth in service revenue growth for 2016, due to strong mobile data revenue growth.

    Operating revenue for the year grew 6% to 708.42 billion yuan ($102.7 billion), with service revenue up 6.7% to 623.42 billion yuan.

    During the year, wireless data traffic became China Mobile’s single largest revenue source for the first time, after growing by 43.5% to account for 46.2% of total service revenue.

    Net profit grew a slim 0.2% to 108.74 billion yuan ($15.78 billion), but excluding the gains from the disposal of tower assets to telecommunications infrastructure sharing joint venture China Tower in the prior year, profit would have grown 10.5%.

    China Mobile added 223 million 4G customers throughout the year, bringing its total 4G base to 535 million and representing a penetration rate of 63%. The company also added 400,000 4G base stations to its network, taking its total population coverage to more than 1.3 billion.

    The operator’s total mobile customer base grew 2.7% from 2015 to 848.9 million.

    On the fixed line front, China Mobile added 22.59 million broadband customers, taking the total to 77.62 million, with 76.9% of these subscribed to services with speeds of at least 20Mbps.

    China Mobile is the last of China’s big three operators to report its results for 2016. China Mobile’s performance compares to a 6.4% increase in operating revenue and 10.2% decline in net profit for China Telecom, as well as a 94.1% slump in net profit and 1% decrease in operating revenue for China Unicom.

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  • Mavenir unveils new cloud platform

    Mavenir unveils new cloud platform

    Mavenir has launched its cloud-based Rich Communication Services (RCS) Platform and Hub, further expanding its suite of flagship RCS solutions.

    The firm said the solution currently supports tens of millions of subscribers worldwide.

    It added that with its new RCS Platform and Hub, Mavenir provides communications service providers (CSPs) with an innovative approach to quickly and efficiently deploy secure and advanced communications, while capitalizing on new monetization services but without the high costs and complexity associated with large-scale network infrastructure projects.

    The Mavenir RCS Platform can be easily deployed either directly in the operator network, as a Mavenir-hosted model or managed across a hybrid model that results in a combination of both.

    This approach, allows CSPs to decide which functionalities they want to remain in their network, such as customer data – bringing back control to the operators and expanding their role in the digital economy.

    These new additions to Mavenir’s suite of RCS solutions, provides CSPs with greater control over their RCS deployment options, driving openness and interoperability, the company further said.

    Mavenir’s unique offering in RCS solutions is underpinned by its dedication to driving an industry-wide ecosystem, open to any business who plays a part in advanced communications. This will support the roll out of richer experiences to device users and provide CSPs with access to new monetization channels from enterprise application to person (A2P) flows to dynamic mobile marketing and chatbot frameworks.  Such a capability is critical, as CSPs move to NFV environments, and start to support Internet of Things (IoT) and 5G network traffic.

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  • Nokia, Facebook set transatlantic efficiency record

    Nokia, Facebook set transatlantic efficiency record

    Nokia and Facebook have announced they have set a new spectral efficiency record over a transatlantic subsea cable using Nokia Bell Labs’ new probabilistic constellation shaping technology (PCS).

    During the trial involving a 5,500km subsea cable between New York and Ireland, shaped 64 quadrature amplitude modulation (64-QAM) was used to achieve record spectral efficiency of 7.46 b/s/Hz.

    PCS uses shaped QAM formats to flexibly adjust transmission capacity to near the physical limits of a fiber link.

    The results showed an increase of nearly 2.5 times more capacity than the stated limit of the system, indicating the potential to upgrade the cable to 32 Tbps per fiber.

    Transmission tests validated the successful transmission of 8-QAM wavelengths running at 200 Gbps and 16-QAM wavelengths running at 250 Gbps, a first for a transatlantic transmission.

    “Facebook wants to increase the pace of innovation and adoption of next-generation optical technologies,” Facebook global optical network architect Dr Stephen Grubb said.

    “This field trial with Nokia demonstrates that the scalable optical technology of PCS together with narrow linewidth laser sources can achieve capacities extremely close to the Shannon limit. This ensures that we are both maximizing our investment in submarine cable systems, as well as continuing to drive the cost per bit of submarine transport lower.”

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  • China Telecom revenue grows 6.4% in 2016

    China Telecom revenue grows 6.4% in 2016

    China Telecom has reported a 6.4% increase in operating revenue for 2016 to 352.28 billion yuan, as the company doubled its 4G subscriber base.

    Net profit for the year fell 10.2% to 18 billion yuan, due to the positive impact in the prior year associated with the sale of its tower assets to telecommunications infrastructure joint venture China Tower. Excluding this impact, profit would have grown 11.7%.

    Service revenue increased 5.6% to 309.64 billion yuan, with mobile service revenues up 10.5% to 137.61 billion yuan.

    Total mobile customers grew by 17.1 million to 215 million, giving China Telecom a mobile market share of 16.2%. Total 4G users doubled to 122 million, representing a penetration rate of 57% and giving China Telecom a total 4G market share of 16% – up 1.9 percentage points from end-2015.

    As a result of this growth, total 4G data traffic meanwhile increased by 130% during the year and mobile data revenues grew by 43%.

    Fixed service revenues meanwhile increased 1.9% to 172.03 billion yuan, with wireline broadband revenues up 3.3% over the prior year.

    China Telecom added 10.06 million fixed broadband subscribers during the year, taking its total to 123 million. FTTH subscribers accounted for 106 million of these customers, with total subscribers up 35%.

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  • PLDT launches “Fibr city” in Cebu

    PLDT launches “Fibr city” in Cebu

    PLDT has ramped up its FTTH rollout with the launch of what it calls its first “Fibr City” in Cebu, which provides residents of Toledo City with speeds of up to 1Gbps.

    The initiative, named after PLDT’s Home Fibr branded FTTH service, has been conducted in collaboration with the Toledo City government.

    PLDT has invested $6 billion over the past ten years to roll out 150,000km of fiber infrastructure, and its FTTH services had a footprint of around 2.8 million premises by the end of last year.

    Last month, the operator announced plans to expand the reach of the network by around 80% this year, taking the total number of premises passed to around 4.4 million. The operator has also started adopting hybrid fiber technologies such as G.fast to boost data rates significantly over existing copper connections.

    By next year, PLDT aims to ensure that all its subscribers are accessing smart home services enabled by the fiber network.

    The company selected Toledo City to pioneer the Fibr City concept as part of its expansion plans in Central Philippines, the report states.

  • Cloud components market to hit $41b by 2021, says report

    Cloud components market to hit $41b by 2021, says report

    Ongoing customer build-outs of hybrid environments is fueling cloud components growth as IT vendors modernized hardware and software portfolios.

    According to a report from Technology Business Research (TBR) the cloud components market, which encompasses the foundational building blocks for on premises cloud environments, will grow from an estimated $27 billion in 2016 to $41 billion in 2021 at an 8.4% CAGR.

    Cloud hardware components revenue will generate most of total cloud components revenue; however, we expect long-term market growth will be sustained by cloud software components as hybrid cloud demands rise and underlying cloud infrastructure becomes commoditized, TBR said.

    Sanjay Medvitz, TBR cloud analyst, said, “Enterprise hybrid IT environments continue to grow, increasingly encompassing disparate on-premises and cloud assets as well as infrastructures from multiple vendors, driving up the importance for software solutions that provide efficient management, orchestration and cloud services capabilities to ease complexities.”

    “Accordingly, vendors such as IBM and Oracle are shifting focus to cloud software businesses that offer high-value opportunities for long-term success,” Medvitz said.

    From a hardware perspective, customers’ ongoing migrations to public cloud services and software-defined storage-enabling hyper converged platforms will render standards-based servers as critical aspects of cloud computing environments across a range of customer segments.

    Meanwhile, TBR notes that customers will invest in flash storage capabilities, along with gradual build-outs of virtualized network implementations to further accelerate performance, simplicity and reliability of their hybrid and heterogeneous cloud data centers.

    Industry stalwarts Hewlett Packard Enterprise, IBM, Dell EMC and Cisco held top market share among cloud components vendors in 2016, leveraging legacy hardware and software strengths and large install bases alongside investments in private and hybrid cloud-enabling technologies such as hyper-converged to win customer modernization engagements.

    Market leaders will continue to modernize legacy assets, innovating hardware and software together to create common architectures and building out cloud based versions of traditional solutions to promote flexible cloud on-ramps and meet evolving customer hybrid IT needs.

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  • IoT adoption in retail set to take off

    IoT adoption in retail set to take off

    Retailers will connect 12.5 billion business assets such as products, digital signs and Bluetooth beacons to IoT platforms by 2021, up from 2.7 billion in 2016, Juniper Research has predicted.

    The company has argued ‘next-gen’ processes, such as personalized retail, could be achieved by integrating enterprise software and emerging technologies, with data from connected IoT assets.

    Juniper forecasts that software spend for enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems to integrate this data would reach $11.3 billion annually in 2021, from $1.5 billion in 2017.

    The research firm also predicted that radio-frequency identification (RFID) will re-emerge as the industry’s ‘killer app’ becoming the key factor in the IoT retail ecosystem.

    RFID tags, used to identify and locate retail assets in real-time, are now at a low enough price point for mass deployment and integrate well with new IoT systems and analytics. New services, such as dynamic pricing or enabling promotional offers via in-store digital signs are also poised for growth.

    “Innovative retailers such as Rebecca Minkoff have combined RFID with smart mirrors,” said research author Steffen Sorrell. “Integrating these systems allows real-time information to improve the store experience and bridge physical and virtual worlds – in this case, the concept drove a 200% increase in sales.”

    Juniper believes that physical retail spaces still have many benefits, not least in terms of being able to avoid the sterility of online shopping. It predicts online retailers’ focus would be on technologies such as machine learning to provide digital assistance, or digital performance management.

  • Singtel teams up with Microsoft on Office 365

    Singtel teams up with Microsoft on Office 365

    Singtel and Microsoft have announced a new partnership for the Singaporean incumbent to offer Microsoft’s cloud-based Office 365 suite to its customers.

    With this new offering, customers who subscribe to Singtel’s fiber broadband and postpaid mobile services can sign up for either Office 365 Home or Office 365 Personal plans through Singtel.

    Singtel also said customer can enjoy savings of at least S$46.80 ($34) per year or over 30% off regular online price. In addition, customers can enjoy the added convenience of paying for their Office 365 subscriptions together with their monthly Singtel bills.

    “With this new offering, customers will also enjoy ease of payment and enhanced productivity. We will continue to engage different partners to offer solutions that are suitable for our customers’ digital lifestyles, whether for work or play,” said Yuen Kuan Moon, CEO consumer Singapore at Singtel.

    Singtel customers can select the plans that best suit their needs, the company said.

  • Nokia, Ciena providing gear for Jio’s major 4G rollout

    Nokia, Ciena providing gear for Jio’s major 4G rollout

    Nokia and Ciena have both detailed their roles in providing equipment for disruptive Indian newcomer Reliance Jio Infocomm’s greenfield pan-India 4G rollout.

    Reliance Jio finally launched LTE services for the public in September last year, and has signed on 100 million new users in just 170 days due to its aggressive strategy of initially offering all services for free.

    Nokia announced that its optical deployment for Jio covers over 90,000km across India, making it one of the biggest 100G deployments in the world.

    The vendor provided switches with 100G DWDM capabilities as well as generalized MPLS intelligence to support capacity management and restoration

    “In only 170 days, Jio has signed on 100 million new users. With growth rates of this magnitude we had to ensure we deployed the highest capacity, most resilient transport network to build out the 4G network,” Reliance Jio president Jyotindra Thacker commented.

    “Nokia’s next-generation DWDM portfolio provides the ability to scale easily as Jio continues to expand the network to reach the underserved areas of India with digital services in key areas such as communication, education, healthcare, payments and multi-media entertainment.”

    Ciena meanwhile deployed multi-terabit converged packet optical technology for Jio’s 4G network core, operating at speeds of up to 200Gbps.

    The Ciena packet optical platforms use Ciena’s WaveLogic coherent technology for the core network, which connects all major cities of India.

    • “With Ciena we are not only able to provide robust scalability to offer new levels of data consumption, which is already 8 to 10 times above market levels, but also a supreme level of confidence in our network’s reliability and level of service that stands out in our marketplace,” Thacker said.
    • “Ciena’s coherent technological offerings and proven control plane technology is helping to make us the fastest growing 4G network in the world.”
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  • Cellcos to spend $250m on pre-standards 5G networks by year-end

    Cellcos to spend $250m on pre-standards 5G networks by year-end

    Mobile operators will spend more than $250 million on pre-standards 5G network rollouts by the end of 2017, according to SNS Research’s latest report.

    Despite the lack of sufficient LTE coverage in parts of the world, mobile operators and vendors have already embarked on R&D initiatives to develop 5G, the next evolution in mobile networks.

    5G is expected to provide a single network environment to deliver not only existing mobile broadband and IoT services, but also new innovations such as self-driving cars, cloud robotics, 3D holographic telepresence and remote surgery with haptic feedback.

    In fact, many mobile operators are betting on 5G to diversify their revenue streams, as conventional voice and data service ARPUs decline globally.

    At present, the 3GPP and other SDOs (Standards Development Organizations) are engaged in defining the first phase of 5G specifications. However, pre-standards 5G network rollouts are already underway, most notably in the United States and South Korea, as mobile operators rush to be the first to offer 5G services.

    Although 2020 has conventionally been regarded as the headline date for 5G commercialization, the very first standardized deployments of the technology are expected to be commercialized as early as 2019 with the 3GPP’s initial 5G specifications set to be implementation-ready by March 2018.

    Between 2019 and 2025, SNS Research expects the 5G network infrastructure market to aggressively grow a CAGR of nearly 70%, eventually accounting for $28 billion in annual spending by the end of 2025.

    These infrastructure investments will be complemented by annual shipments of up to 520 million 5G-capable devices.