Telefónica Digital, Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., Nokia Siemens Networks, Telekom Austria AG and Telecom Italia Sparkle are among the names making the news that provides weekend food for thought.
Telefónica Digital, the next-generation services division of Telefónica SA, has formed a new digital security business unit called Eleven Paths, which has been "created in response to the demand for heightened cyber security in the mobility industry as threats migrate into the tablet and smartphone space." The new unit is headed up by Chema Alonso, a renowned security expert who joins, along with a number of colleagues, from Madrid-based security consultancy Informática 64. To find out more about the kind of research Alonso has done in the past, check out this Dark Reading article. Part of Telefónica Digital's mission is to create internal units that can behave like startups, as well as fund and hot-house external startups. (See Telefónica: A New Breed of Telco and Inside Telefonica's Startup Incubator.)
In response to the publication Thursday of a report that, once again, questioned Huawei's independence from the Chinese state, the vendor has naturally highlighted a number of supportive statements from senior U.K. political representatives, including the British ambassador to China, Sebastian Wood, and the U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne. You can read their comments by checking out this U.K. government website page. (See Security Concerns Cling to Huawei.)
Telekom Austria A1 has demonstrated LTE-Advanced carrier aggregation using current radio access network equipment from Nokia Siemens Networks. The test achieved peak download speeds of 580 Mbit/s, the type of connection that would enable you to watch YouTube videos of piano-playing cats without experiencing buffering. (See Why You Should Care About LTE-Advanced (Eventually).)
Telecom Italia Sparkle, the international services arm of Telecom Italia SpA, has struck a 4G/LTE peering agreement with Tata Communications Ltd., which the two companies claim is the world's first such agreement between two IP exchange providers. The LTE roaming peering between the two operators is an extension of their existing IP exchange peering relationship, which already supports signalling, voice and data roaming, as well as end-to-end QoS. Enabling 4G roaming between networks is going to be critical to the development of the global 4G services market. (See LTE Roaming Action Intensifies.)
Having given its French rivals a headache in the mobile sector during the past year, competitive carrier Free is now piling on the pressure in the fixed broadband market by upgrading its DSL customers who have its Freebox Revolution home gateway to VDSL2 connections without any additional charges. The upgrade, which will provide downstream speeds of up to 90 Mbit/s and upstream speeds of up to 25 Mbit/s, has started in 65 exchanges serving the the Dordogne and Gironde markets. (See Euronews: French Carriers Feel the Squeeze and Europe Needs Mobile Mavericks.)
— Ray Le Maistre, Editor-in-Chief, Light Reading