In related territory, Orange Business Services has signed a three-year IoT deal with Yepzon Group, a Finnish supplier of wearable locating devices used for keeping track of children, vulnerable adults, pets or valuable pieces of equipment. The deal will see Yepzon using Datavenue, Orange's modular system for enterprises wanting to better exploit the potential of IoT. OBS will provide SIM cards for 100,000 locator devices.

Ericsson AB (Nasdaq: ERIC) has launched three new small cell products that it says will help prepare networks for 5G and IoT applications. Multi-Operator Dot delivers a set of Radio Dots that can be shared between multiple operators; Multi-Dot Enclosure, as its name suggests, combines multiple Dots in a single enclosure; and the Strand-Mount Unit for outdoor micro radios makes it easier to install the radios on the existing grid. These new offerings will be shown to the world at Mobile World Congress Americas next month.

Swisscom AG (NYSE: SCM) is shutting down its TV 1.0 service after 11 years. According to the operator, just 1% of its customers use the first-generation IPTV product, which has been superseded by the latest -- cloud-based -- version of the service.

Russian operator MegaFon has seen adjusted net profit fall by 22.2% year-on-year in the second quarter, to RUB5.63 billion ($95.9 million), on group revenue that increased 13.9% to RUB89.69 billion ($1.52 billion). Mobile subscribers as of 30 June 2017 grew by just 1% to 77.4 million.

Former Windstream Communications Inc. (Nasdaq: WIN) CTO Randy Nicklas has joined Colt Technology Services Group Ltd , the pan-European services provider, as vice president of network engineering, reporting to CTO Rajiv Datta. Colt recently appointed Ashish Surti as chief information security officer (CISO), also reporting to Datta. (See Nicklas Steps Down as Windstream CTO.)

Also hiring is Juniper Networks Inc. (NYSE: JNPR), which has appointed Kristian Kerr as head of channel, alliances and commercial for the EMEA region. Prior to joining Juniper, Kerr ran the EMEA partner organization for Brocade Communications Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: BRCD).

The Johnstone Press, a publisher of national and regional newspapers in the UK, has teamed up with Vodafone UK to create what it is calling the "newsroom of the future." The project will include a trial of using live streaming to relay news stories via smartphones to Johnstone Press's online outlets, as well as experiments with new data-driven advertising models.

— Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading