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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.

  • HKBN profit falls 66% in 1H17

    HKBN profit falls 66% in 1H17

    HKBN has reported a 66% decline in net profit for the first quarter of 2017 to HK$46 million ($5.9 million), due in part to investments associated with the operator’s entry into the mobile market as an MVNO.

    But revenue grew 25% to HK$1.53 billion as the company accelerated growth in both its residential and enterprise businesses.

    HKBN said that since the beginning of the financial year, the Hong Kong operator’s residential focus has shifted from subscriber to revenue growth.

    The company traded off a slowdown in broadband net additions – to 21,000 from 38,000 in the same quarter a year earlier – for an improvement in ARPU to HK$192 from HK$166 over the same period.

    Residential revenue accordingly grew 5% year-on-year to HK$941 million, with HKBN increasing its market share to around 37.6% by end-December, from 37.2% as of August 31.

    Enterprise business revenue meanwhile more than doubled to HK$569 million, as a result of the HK$650 million acquisition of New World Telecom (NWT) in March last year. HKBN recorded 1,000 enterprise net additions to take its total base to 51,000, while ARPU was flat at HK$1,467.

    “This interim results mark the beginning of our quad-play harvest,” HKBN CEO William Yeung said.

    “We have a monthly billing relationship with over 870,000 broadband households, representing over one-third of Hong Kong households. We will continue to leverage this to expand from our double-play centric business on broadband and fixed voice to quad-play, which includes OTT and mobile service offerings.”

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  • Jio has India’s fastest average download speeds

    Jio has India’s fastest average download speeds

    India’s newest mobile operator Reliance Jio Infocomm had the fastest average download speeds  during March by a wide margin, according to the latest figures by regulator Trai.

    Jio recorded an average download speed of 16.48Mbps for the quarter, roughly double that of rivals Idea Cellular (8.33Mbps) and Bharti Airtel (7.66Mbps).

    As a 4G-only operator Jio has an inherent advantage in terms of average download speeds.

    Vodafone meanwhile recorded average download speeds of 5.66Mbps, compared to 2.64Mbps for Reliance Communication, 2.52Mbps for Tata DoCoMo, 2.26Mpbs for BSNL and 2.01Mbps for Aircel, Trai’s figures indicate.

    But the findings of the debut report from wireless coverage mapping company OpenSignal into the state of the Indian mobile market appear to contradict the official figures.

    OpenSignal’s analysis indicates that Airtel tops the rankings in terms of average 4G, 3G and overall speeds. The company measured Airtel’s average LTE download speed of 11.5Mbps, and said that both Vodafone and Idea have faster average speeds than Jio, which scored a mere 3.92Mbps.

    But Jio topped the rankings in terms of LTE availability, finding that testers on Jio’s network were able to find a 4G signal 91.6% of the time. No other Indian operator scored higher than 60%.

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  • Hong Kong’s IoT ecosystem taking shape

    Hong Kong’s IoT ecosystem taking shape

    The explosion of internet of things (IoT) has led to the growing need for connecting devices like sensors and actuators. As many IoT devices require relatively low speed and small amounts of data transmission, low power wide area networking (LPWAN) technologies have come onto the scene.

    Like many other countries, LPWAN technologies are getting lots of attention among service providers, hardware manufacturers and enterprises in Hong Kong. The building of LPWAN networks, the manufacture of IoT devices and testing are underway in the city.

    LPWAN technologies

    Compared to cellular or traditional wireless connectivity technologies, LPWAN has lower power requirements and offers a longer range of connectivity and battery life at lower costs.

    They are suited to applications such as city lighting, energy grid and meter management and parking space monitoring. These applications transmit small messages like temperature, movement, battery status and many more in just a few bytes.

    Generally speaking, LPWAN technologies can be separated into two discrete groups—technologies operating in a license spectrum like NB-IoT (narrow band IoT) and those using unlicensed spectrum like LoRaWAN and Sigfox.

    Proposed by 3GPP, NB-IoT leverages existing GSM or LTE cellular networks with software upgrades to existing base stations. More carriers are already moving ahead with NB-IoT functionality in their mobile networks.

    LoRaWAN is driven by semiconductor company Semtech and is supported by the LoRa Alliance. The alliance members include carriers and technology vendors.

    Sigfox is a network owned by the company of the same name, which has teamed up with third-party operators to deploy the network globally. Sigfox uses ultra narrowband, which means lower throughput. LoRaWAN is not as low power as Sigfox but can support higher bandwidth applications.

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  • SKT partners with Bluebell on new business

    SKT partners with Bluebell on new business

    SK Telecom is teaming up with Bluebell Korea, a local subsidiary of luxury goods retailer Bluebell Group, as the mobile carrier seeks to step up on-demand services as part of its business expansion.

    The mobile carrier said Wednesday it signed a memorandum of understanding with Bluebell Korea to cooperate on new business opportunities, by bringing information and communication technologies to the local luxury retail industry.

    Bluebell Group operates luxury brands in Asia and specializes in consulting. The group has eight branches across Asia – in Korea as well as Hong Kong and Taiwan – to distribute products from more than 100 brands. Bluebell Korea distributes luxury goods – from cosmetics to clothes, jewelry, watches and accessories — to duty free shops and shopping malls in Asia.

    Under the deal, the two companies vowed to collaborate to connect offline shoppers over online services.

    For instance, a foreign traveler to Korea may receive the latest information about luxury goods on their smartphone through SK Telecom and shop at stores affiliated with Bluebell. The goods purchased from those shops are embedded with location tracking devices so that shoppers don’t have need to worry about losing them or having them stolen, SK Telecom explains. The top mobile carrier also plans to more actively mobilize its cutting-edge technologies including cloud-based digital signage platform, where information, images and videos about products sold are displayed to respective stores’ need and users may even interact what they see.

    “The luxury industry has so far strictly adhered to the craftsmanship of products and traditional sales channels,” SK Telecom said in a statement. “However, a slowdown in market growth coupled with the rise of young, tech-savvy consumers who are taking up a growing share of luxury spending is driving new changes in the conservative industry.”

    “The convergence between ICT and the luxury retail industry will not only create new business opportunities for both parties but also deliver enhanced value and experience for customers,” said Cha In-hyok, executive vice president and head of the Internet of Things business at SK Telecom.

    The global luxury industry is estimated at 300 trillion won ($263 billion) and its impact on related markets in the clothing and accessories is immense, he added. In this age of digital revolution, fashion and retail also have been undergoing significant changes, applying emerging technologies such as virtual reality, artificially intelligent chatbots and blockchains to their day-to-day operations.

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  • Viettel launches nationwide 4G services

    Viettel launches nationwide 4G services

    Vietnam’s Viettel has launched 4G services across Vietnam after completing a nationwide rollout in just six months.

    The operator has now achieved 95% coverage with its 4G network, and officially launched services on Tuesday.

    The network consists of 36,000 4G base stations using 4-transmit 4-receive (4T4R) technology to improve coverage and capacity, as well as around 320,000km of domestic fiber backbone.

    According to the report, the network delivers average real-world speeds of 30Mbps to 50Mbps, but services will be provided for 40% to 60% cheaper than current 3G services.

    Viettel also plans to offer 4G-capable smartphones for as little as 1.3 million dong ($57.17), and provide free 4G SIM exchanges.

    Vietnam’s deputy prime minister Vu Duc Dam has praised Viettel for achieving the seemingly “impossible” task of launching 4G services nationwide in just six months, and expressed appreciation for the fact that the network incorporates hardware and software researched and produced domestically by Viettel’s engineers.

  • Motorola scores managed mobility win in Australia

    Motorola scores managed mobility win in Australia

    Victoria Police in Australia will adopt a new managed service mobility solution for at least 10,000 police officers across the state.

    The A$50 million ($37.6 million) solution from Motorola Solutions will help increase situational awareness, safety and productivity for frontline officers.

    Motorola Solutions will lead a consortium of service providers to deliver the contract, including Optus, the second largest mobile operator in the country, as well as local IT provider CompNow. The managed service contract will run for a minimum of five years.

    The service will place real-time information at the fingertips of at least 10,000 police officers equipped with iPads and iPhones, helping them manage their daily work more safely, efficiently and productively.

    The solution is designed to help reduce the duplication of data entry by officers while increasing workforce collaboration by sharing vital information between frontline personnel and their colleagues working in control rooms.

    The technology will also help Victoria Police to preserve its mission-critical radio communications for essential emergency communications by removing lower priority traffic from the radio network.

    This investment represents a major goal within Victoria Police’s Capability Plan 2016-2025, which highlights the way the force will transform its service delivery to be more “agile, responsive, people-focussed and connected.”

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  • NEC, Netcracker hold joint trial optical fibre network

    NEC, Netcracker hold joint trial optical fibre network

    NEC and Netcracker Technology have successfully conducted a trial, in collaboration with K-Opticom, for a system combining NFV and 10G-EPON technologies.

    The companies said the trial verified for the first time ever that virtualized customer premises equipment (vCPE) can be successfully applied to 10Gbps Internet connections.

    K-Opticom provides telecommunications services based on its independent optical fiber network. The company operates the “mineo” mobile phone service as a MVNO, and “eo denki,” an electric power retailing service for household use.

    VCPE provides CPE and other top-layer functions, such as Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) and Network Address Translation (NAT), from data centers via the Internet.

    Based on the results of this trial, further trials are being planned in preparation for the full-scale application of vCPE to 10Gpbs Internet services.

    Takamitsu Fukunaga, SVP for K-Opticom, said communication traffic volumes for home-use connections are increasing year by year, and K-Opticom estimates that these traffic volumes will continue to grow.

    “As a result, we are considering the provision of a 10Gbps service. We are engaged in continual efforts together with NEC to enable us to offer this service to our customers as soon as possible,” the executive said.

    NEC senior vice president Shigeru Okuya claimed the trial with K-Opticom is the industry’s first of its kind to validate that vCPE can be applied to 10G-EPON.

    “Moving forward, we will continue to proactively advance the development of solutions that contribute to the improvement of service quality for K-Opticom, and to make use of these results in providing SDN/NFV solutions globally,” Okuya said.

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  • M1 profit falls 14.6% in Q1

    M1 profit falls 14.6% in Q1

    Singapore’s M1 has reported a 14.6% year-on-year decline in post-tax profit for the March quarter to S$36.3 million ($26 million), attributing the result in part to higher depreciation and interest costs.

    Operating revenue grew 1.2% to S$260.7 million, with service revenue remaining flat at S$201.5 million. Fixed line revenue growth reached 22.8% to S$30 million, offsetting declines in both international voice and roaming revenues.

    M1 added 8,000 fiber customers during the quarter, taking its total base to 168,000. In the mobile segment, M1 added 24,000 postpaid customers and 3,000 prepaid customers, with its total mobile customer base reaching 2.05 million.

    But mobile revenue declined 0.5% to S$158.4 million and international call services fell 9.9% to S$15.5 million.

    Monthly MOU also declined 5.6% to 203 for postpaid customers and 9.6% to 191 for prepaid users, while net ARPU fell 2.3% for postpaid users to S$49.50 and 4.5% for prepaid users to S$11.50.

    M1 estimates it ended the quarter with an overall mobile market share of 23.8%, with a postpaid share of 24.8% and prepaid share of 22.5%.

    While announcing the results, M1 CEO Karen Kooi said the new 700-MHz and 900-MHz frequencies acquired from Singapore’s recent major spectrum auction will allow the operator to “deliver an enhanced network experience cost effectively with optimal use of spectrum.

    “With the largest Wireless@SG network and our small cell/WiFi HetNet deployment at targeted locations islandwide, we are delivering a superior data experience in places where it matters most to our customers and laying the foundation for future dense grid 5G architecture,” she said.

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  • How will telcos handle the video “cash cow”?

    How will telcos handle the video “cash cow”?

    Huawei hosted over 500 media and analysts to its 14th annual Analyst Summit, with a variety of executives discussing their roadmaps.

    “Huawei will remain committed to building more connections, enlarging data pipes, and driving digital transformation,” said rotating CEO Eric Xu in an opening keynote.

    Xu said that cloud services are already a basic business model. “Beginning in 2017, Huawei will focus on public cloud services. We will invest heavily in building an open and trusted public cloud platform, which will be the foundation of a Huawei Cloud Family.”

    This cloud-based unit “will include public clouds we develop together with operators, and public clouds that we operate on our own,” said Xu.

    William Xu, executive director and chief strategy marketing officer, said that digital transformation “opens up immense new potential for value-driven growth in traditional industries.” He said that ICT infrastructure is a pillar for economic growth, and that “the cloud in particular is key to unleashing the power of connectivity.”

    He said “Huawei recommends that countries and industries turn their attention to digital transformation as a driver for growth, and pursue greater development and investment opportunities in emerging fields like cloud computing, IoT, and big data.”

    Ryan Ding, executive director and president of products & solutions, said in his keynote that operators in some markets are beginning to monetize video services, with an early winner being high-definition streaming of sports events. Ding pegged video at “70% of [mobile] traffic” in the near future, with 1K (1080p), 2K and 4K options available depending on the operator.

    In a media roundtable interview, Ding offered more granular data on the future of mobile video, describing it as a “new cash cow for mobile operators.”

    “We believe that 2K on smartphones and 4K on TVs is the sweet spot,” he said, noting that “different countries have different situations.”

    Ding described sports as the most popular content worldwide, giving an example of Spanish pubs that draw punters with live 4K broadcasts of football matches. As he described it, the largest TV features traditional match coverage while additional displays show different views of the same match—an experience viewers won’t get at home. He also said Huawei’s X Lab Insights estimates the overall entertainment market opportunity alone at $650 billion worldwide by 2020.

    Ding isn’t bullish on videoconferencing, but sees opportunities in the video surveillance market. There are 1.3 million CCTV cameras in Beijing alone, he said. “Last year in China, operators deployed 40 million IPTV sets,” said Ding. “This number is comparable to the number deployed from 2005-2015.”

    The Huawei president of products & solutions urged operators to migrate legacy systems to the cloud, adding that those in China are better positioned for the move than operators in Europe who are more vested in their legacy systems.

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  • Nokia studies business case for 5G

    Nokia studies business case for 5G

    With the 5G era fast approaching, Nokia has released the findings of a series of studies into the potential benefits and return on investment for the emerging mobile technology.

    The vendor said in-depth analysis of how 5G will perform in real networks found the technology can increase capacity by 40 times compared to 4G.

    This makes 5G the only commercially viable technology for the delivery of a true immersive VR video experience to large audiences, and deliver the performance required for advanced industrial applications.

    In terms of RoI, the analysis indicates that investments in 5G to the home will break even after four years if the monthly average revenue per user remains above €40 ($42.90).

    Investments in 5G events and hotspots, in locations such as stadiums meanwhile have a one year RoI period assuming at least five events per month.

    “While market news has recently focused on the announcement of 5G technologies that drive increased network performance, it’s important to discuss how these low latency broadband connections will translate into customer value,” Mobile Experts principal analyst Joe Madden said.

    “With the publication of the two new studies and its 5G Acceleration Services, Nokia is showing operators and enterprises how they will be able to benefit from early 5G deployment.”

    Nokia’s 5G Acceleration Services aim to help operators and enterprises identify how the move to 5G will enable them to deliver transformational new services and create new revenue streams.

  • ZTE back to black for the first quarter

    ZTE back to black for the first quarter

    After reporting a loss for 2016, ZTE swung back to a 1.21 billion yuan ($175.6 million) profit for the first three months of 2017 – a year-on-year increase of 27.8%.

    The vendor reported a 17.8% increase in revenue for the quarter to 25.75 billion, due to strong momentum across its networking and smartphone businesses.

    ZTE announced that its Pre5G products have now been deployed in over 40 networks in 30 countries. The company is on track to begin 5G pre-commercial deployments in the third quarter of 2018, with full commercial deployment starting in 2019.

    On the wireline front, ZTE said it is sustaining its momentum as one of the industry leaders in the PON segment.

    The company meanwhile reported more than 25% growth in shipments of set-top-boxes within its Big Video business, and a 70% growth in shipments for its self-developed NB IoT chipsets.

    ZTE swung to a 2.36 billion yuan ($34.3 million) net loss for 2016 as a result of its $829.3 million settlement deal with the US Department of Commerce over the company’s alleged sale of telecommunications equipment using US components to Iran, in violation of trade sanctions.

    At the time, ZTE CEO Dr Zhao Xianming said the company “acknowledges the mistakes it made, takes responsibility for them, and remains committed to positive change in the company.”

  • Telkomsel demonstrates FDD Massive MIMO

    Telkomsel demonstrates FDD Massive MIMO

    Indonesia’s Telkomsel has completed the market’s first FDD Massive MIMO demonstration as part of its 5G evolution roadmap.

    The operator teamed up with Huawei to conduct the demonstration, which achieved five times the capacity of traditional FDD LTE 2×2 MIMO.

    Since Telkomsel started building its network at the end of 2014, the operator’s LTE userbase has reached more than 19 million. The large number of concurrent users and Indonesia’s scarce spectrum resources will inevitably lead to network congestion in high-traffic areas, the companies said.

    In anticipation of congestion issues, Telkomsel and Huawei have established a joint innovation center focused on the research of high-capacity pre-5G network solutions such as Massive MIMO.

    “Telkomsel has always aimed to bring the best MBB experience to Indonesian users by leveraging on cutting edge technologies. Multi-antenna technology fully meets our requirements for improving  customer experience,” Telkomsel network director Sukardi Silalahi said.

    “Massive MIMO can increase the capacity without adding sites and spectrum, thus reducing the cost per bit. I am very satisfied with the demonstration results today.”

    He pledged to continue working with Huawei at the Joint Innovation Center to explore other network technology breakthroughs.

  • CAT to propose 2G tower JV with Dtac

    CAT to propose 2G tower JV with Dtac

    Thai state-owned operator CAT Telecom is seeking to enter a telecommunications infrastructure joint venture with private operator Dtac to allow it to continue generating revenue after its concession revenue dries up.

    CAT’s concession agreement with Dtac expires in September 2018, marking the end to the prior build-operate-transfer regulatory regime, whereby private operators paid a portion of their revenues to the state-owned operators. The market is instead transitioning to the more conventional spectrum licensing model.

    After this period CAT will be left without a sustainable revenue stream. Dtac will meanwhile need to transfer its roughly 13,000 2G mobile towers and base stations to CAT. As the deadline approaches, the CAT board is exploring establishing a JV with Dtac for the operation of CAT’s 2G mobile tower assets.

    Under the proposal, Dtac would need to invest nearly 10 billion baht () in exchange for a 51% stake in the venture, which would be named Telecom Tower Co. CAT would take the remaining 49% in exchange for transferring the tower assets to the venture.

    According to the report, the CAT board believes that such an agreement would be mutually beneficial, as it would allow CAT to earn new revenue from the venture, while Dtac would be able to guarantee service continuity after the concession expires.

    The proposal still requires approval from the Thai Cabinet, the report adds. CAT hopes that the venture will help it realize annual revenue of around 10 billion baht per year.

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  • China Telecom, Huawei lead group exploring AI in networks

    China Telecom, Huawei lead group exploring AI in networks

    China Telecom and Huawei will lead a new industry working group exploring the use of AI in the deployment and optimization of telecoms networks.

    The European Telecommunications Standards Institute’s (ETSI) Industry Specification Group on Experiential Networked Intelligence (ISG ENI) held their first meeting last week, electing a new chair and vice chair.

    Huawei UK’s Raymond Forbes has been selected as chairman and China Telecom’s Haining Wang will serve as vice-chair.

    Other members of the group include Samsung, the China Academy of Telecommunications Research of MIIT, Verizon UK and Samsung R&D Institute UK.

    Forbes said the purpose of the group is to “improve operators’ experience regarding network deployment and operation, by using AI techniques.”

    Wang added that while SDN, NFV and network slicing technologies are helping networks become more flexible, the complexity of network management is not being reduced, but merely transferred from hardware to software. Experimental Networked Intelligence helps to address this complexity.

    ETSI ENI will work with other major standards groups including ETSI NFV, ETSI MEC, ETSI NGP, IETF, MEF, 3GPP and BBF on the development of the industry specification, and is inviting new members to join the group.

  • Cloud Services in Indonesia Provided by Japan’s Leading Network Solutions

    Cloud Services in Indonesia Provided by Japan’s Leading Network Solutions

    FPT Telecom of Vietnam and Internet Initiative Japan on Thursday launched a cloud computing service for individual, business and enterprise customers in Vietnam.

    FPT Telecom has called the new service, FPT HI GIO Cloud, the first full-scale, full-spectrum and quality cloud computing service in Vietnam. Nguyen Van Khoa, general director of FPT Telecom, which is part of leading Vietnamese information technology group FPT, stressed the new service would provide access computing services via a stable network.

    The product enables users to quickly launch virtual machines instead of investing in physical devices.”We will lead the market in Vietnam to tap demand for cloud computing,” General Director of IIJ Global Solutions Vietnam Ryo Matsumoto told Retail News.

    FPT Telecom aims to acquire around 4,000 enterprise customers within a year. FPT Telecom and IIJ also aim to tap individual customers in a country where 70% of the more than 90 million population is expected to have access to the internet by 2020.

    IIJ, one of Japan’s leading internet and network solutions providers, has already launched similar cloud services in Singapore, Indonesia, and Thailand. FPT Telecom and IIJ are looking to launch additional joint projects related to security and network management in the coming years, according to Matsumoto.

    In Vietnam global players such as IBM, Google, Symantec, Amazon, Oracle and Microsoft have launched their own cloud and joint services by teaming up with local telecom companies and using mobile broadband infrastructure. FPT and IIJ’s partnership will further intensify competition in this area.

    Vietnam ranked 14th in the Asia-Pacific region in the Asia Cloud Computing Association’s Cloud Readiness Index 2016, coming after Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia.