Well, I know many people, would have loved to be in Barcelona #MWC18 at this moment, but aren’t, so if you are not attending the show this week, you can catch up with all the breaking news from the show floor right here…
Vodafone joins forces with China Mobile in IoT partnership
Vodafone customers will be given access to China Mobile IoT SIMS for deployment in China, while China Mobile customers wanting to offer IoT enabled products outside of China will do so through Vodafone’s Global IoT SIM and Management platform.
“Having reached over 200 million IoT connections last year, China Mobile’s target is to increase the number of connections by 60 per cent in 2018,” said Shina Mobile’s International head of Mobile Business Partnerships, Dorothy Lin.
Huawei and Hong Kong Telecom establish Digital Transformation Centre
Huawei and Hong Kong Telecom have unveiled their new Digital Transformation Practice Centre (DTPC) to help guide the digitalisation of telcos.
The DTPC will be completed by mid-2018 and will be located in Hong Kong.
The DTPC will also function as a platform for exploring and solving the problems carriers are facing as they go digital. Leveraging this platform, HKT and Huawei will further innovate new products and services, incubate solution capabilities and products, pilot new approaches to digitalization, and develop relevant products and offerings.
“It has been a pleasure working with strategic partner Huawei to pioneer the ROADS-driven digital transformation project. We have built all new cloud infrastructure and platforms to strengthen HKT’s digital operation capabilities and improve our customer service. We hope to work more closely with Huawei going forward to share our best practices with the industry and accelerate digital transformation across the globe,” said Peter Lam, managing director of HKT Engineering.
Ericsson: 5G can be truly transformative
Ericsson’s CEO, Borje Ekholm, told attendees at MWC that 5G is now very mch open for business, as far as his company is concerned.
Ekholm highlighted Ericsson’s focus on the 5G business cases as well as the key technological enablers – from radio access to network slicing and machine intelligence – that will make 5G a commercial success.
“We will focus not only on why and what, but also on how. This is what our customers – the service providers – want to discuss,” he said.
Nokia acquires Unium to bolster its home WIFI portfolio
Nokia has announced that it will acquire US-based wireless networking firm, Unium, to boost its residential WIFI offering.
“We look forward to having the Unium team join us. The home networking market is booming and whole-home Wi-Fi is a key enabler for this. Today’s Wi-Fi solutions still have serious issues with sticky clients, interference, coverage gaps and capacity issues. With Unium inside, our Nokia Wi-Fi solution will deliver an unmatched user experience, going beyond what standard mesh Wi-Fi solutions deliver today,” said Federico Guillén, president of Nokia’s Fixed Networks business group.
Unium’s software and intelligent mesh wireless technology complements and strengthens Nokia’s end-to-end, whole-home Wi-Fi solution and supports Nokia’s strategic objective of solving Wi-Fi problems in the home.
The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2018.
