Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: MTN Nigeria runs 5G pilot; Vodafone Portugal improves the TV user experience; telcos and their vulnerable customers.

Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe

August 25, 2022

2 Min Read
Eurobites: Truespeed turns to Adtran for XGS-PON boost

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: MTN Nigeria runs 5G pilot; Vodafone Portugal improves the TV user experience; telcos and their vulnerable customers.

  • Truespeed, the full-fiber broadband provider based in southwest England, has turned to Adtran's 10Gbit/s XGS-PON technology to help drive its regional rollout. Deployment of the new infrastructure has already begun and will continue to be rolled out as standard across all future build areas. Among its other benefits, Truespeed says that the use of XGS-PON reduces the number of above-ground cabinets and better guarantees timescales between customer sign-up and connection. Figure 1: (Source: the lightwriter/Alamy Stock Photo) (Source: the lightwriter/Alamy Stock Photo)

    • MTN Nigeria is launching a 5G pilot in preparation for its launch of commercial 5G services in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Ibadan, Kano, Owerri and Maiduguri. MTN Nigeria's CEO, Karl Toriola, said earlier this month that his company was "on track" to offer 5G services across the country during the third quarter of 2022. MTN Nigeria was one of two operators (the other was newcomer Mafab Communications) to get their hands on a 5G license at the end of last year. (See MTN Nigeria to launch 5G by September, West & Central Africa Get on 5G Train and MTN and newcomer Mafab snap up 5G licenses in Nigeria.)

    • Vodafone Portugal is hoping to improve the user experience for its TV subscribers through the use of Media Distillery's EPG Correction Distillery software. Using artificial intelligence, EPG Correction Distillery carries out real-time analysis of broadcasts across multiple channels and makes adjustments to coincide with actual start-times of TV programs as they are aired, which helps to ensure that viewers are seeing more accurate information on their EPG (electronic program guide).

    • While 87% of senior telecoms professionals believe network operators have a moral duty to support vulnerable customers, two-thirds (66%) of them admit the industry isn't doing enough on this front. That's one of the findings from new research carried out by Sagacity, a data management and analysis company. Worryingly, more than a third of those asked (36%) claim they do not have the resources to proactively find customers who need extra support, putting the onus on the struggling customers to come and seek out the special tariffs and assistance for themselves.

    • Google's Jigsaw subsidiary is to launch an online campaign that it hopes will build resilience to anti-Ukrainian refugee narratives prevalent in Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. As Reuters reports, the campaign – which will run in advertising slots on YouTube – is based on research carried out by psychologists at the universities of Cambridge and Bristol in the UK.

      — Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

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About the Author(s)

Paul Rainford

Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading

Paul is based on the Isle of Wight, a rocky outcrop off the English coast that is home only to a colony of technology journalists and several thousand puffins.

He has worked as a writer and copy editor since the age of William Caxton, covering the design industry, D-list celebs, tourism and much, much more.

During the noughties Paul took time out from his page proofs and marker pens to run a small hotel with his other half in the wilds of Exmoor. There he developed a range of skills including carrying cooked breakfasts, lying to unwanted guests and stopping leaks with old towels.

Now back, slightly befuddled, in the world of online journalism, Paul is thoroughly engaged with the modern world, regularly firing up his VHS video recorder and accidentally sending text messages to strangers using a chipped Nokia feature phone.

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