Euronews: Ericsson to Manage German Network

Ericsson has landed a five-year managed services deal with Versatel AG that will see 95 staff from the alternative operator join the Swedish giant's Global Services division. Services -- including network rollout services, professional services and managed services -- accounted for nearly 33 percent of Ericsson's first-quarter revenues. (See Ericsson Wins German Managed Services Deal and Mobile Data Fuels Ericsson's Q1 .)

The one-off cost implications of a new "social plan" agreed between Telekom Austria and its employees hit the operator's first-quarter figures, contributing to a net loss of €79.2 million (US$113.9 million) -- and this despite a healthy growth in fixed-line broadband customers and a strong demand for smartphones. (See Telekom Austria Reports Q1, Telekom Austria Probes Huawei Deals and Eurosqueeze?)

Danish incumbent TDC has agreed to buy Onfone, a domestic mobile operator, for a price in the range 288-313 million Danish Kroner ($55.5-$60.4 million). Onfone was founded in 2006 and by the end of last month had 170,000 active mobile customers. (See TDC Acquires Onfone and Euronews: May 4.)

The European Commission has ruled that the manner in which the French government awarded the country's fourth 3G license, to Iliad (Euronext: ILD), did not constitute illegal state aid. The three existing license-holders -- Orange France , SFR and Bouygues Telecom -- had complained that the fee demanded for the license was not high enough. (See EC Dismisses French 3G Operator Complaints and 3G Déjà Vu in France .)

Stockholm, London and Paris feature in the Networked Society City Index Top 10 revealed today by Ericsson and Arthur D. Little . Singapore topped the rankings. (See Networked Society City Index Revealed.)

T-Mobile (UK) 's got the back-office blues after a glitch in its billing system mistakenly charged 4 percent of its customers for a call-forwarding service they didn’t actually use, a debacle first reported by the BitterWallet consumer news website. T-Mobile says it has fixed the problem and that it will refund the affected subscribers. That's big of them...

— Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading