Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Telefónica and Fortinet combine on Virtual Firewall service; Telia offers comfort to Swedish bus passengers; Orange connects Russian shipping fleet.

Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe

June 12, 2019

2 Min Read
Eurobites: Telefónica Hops on Google's Cloud

Also in today's EMEA regional roundup: Telefónica and Fortinet combine on Virtual Firewall service; Telia offers comfort to Swedish bus passengers; Orange connects Russian shipping fleet.

  • Telefónica's enterprise services arm has done a deal with Google which the operator hopes will bolster its multicloud offering to companies worldwide wanting to take the public cloud route to the nirvana of "digital transformation." Google Cloud Platform, G Suite, Google Cloud Interconnect and Chrome Enterprise will all be added into Telefónica Business Solutions' shop window. The deal builds on a local agreement signed by Telefónica Spain last year with Google for the marketing of G Suite, Google's range of collaboration and productivity applications.

    • In other Telefónica news, the Spanish giant has teamed up with Fortinet to launch a new "Virtual Firewall" service that it says makes SD-WAN and public cloud connectivity more secure. The Virtual Firewall service, says Telefónica, forms part of a virtual network functions "marketplace" it is currently developing.

    • Sweden's Telia Company has developed an IoT service that should help many of the country's bus passengers feel more comfortable. The operator collaborated with Nobina, one of the Nordic region's largest public transport service providers, to equip around 2,000 buses with connected temperature sensors and control systems that ensure that the proper amount of energy is supplied at the right time to keep an "ultimate temperature profile." The pair claim that the new system will reduce power consumption by 22GWh annually -- equivalent, they say, to the yearly output from two wind turbines.

    • Orange Business Services has landed a deal with Sovcomflot, described by OBS as Russia's largest shipping company, to connect eight vessels in Sovcomflot's fleet via Orange's Maritime VSAT system. The service will transmit telemetry data from onboard cameras and sensors about the condition of the ships, even when they are in the most remote corners of the Arctic Sea, and provide the crew with a reliable means of communicating with landlubber friends and family.

    • Turkcell's network has been given the SD-WAN core treatment courtesy of a joint effort from Odine Solutions and Versa Networks. The deployment is intended to enable the Turkish incumbent's corporate customers to benefit from a software-defined and secure infrastructure-as-a-service.

    • Openreach, BT's quasi-autonomous network access arm, wants to recruit more female engineers and, with this mind, it is hosting an open day its new Bradford training school later this month, inviting local families to "get a taste of life as an engineer." The event has been scheduled to coincide with International Women in Engineering Day (June 23).

    • Nokia has teamed up with UNICEF for a program that they hope will increase access to "digital literacy" for some of the most disadvantaged children in Kenya, including those living in informal urban settlements and remote rural areas of the country.

      — 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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