Etisalat 's Nigerian unit has completed the sale of 555 telecom towers to IHS, reports Reuters, in what is the second part of a deal announced last year. IHS is the biggest towers company in Africa, controlling more than 23,000 installations across the continent.

Another Middle East-based operator, Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Co. (du) , has waded into NFV waters with the completion of CPE virtualization trials in the UAE, reports UAE Interact.

Switzerland's CERN, which is home to the Large Hadron Collider and more, has entered into a partnership with Brocade Communications Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: BRCD), the California-based New IP vendor, for an SDN research project. CERN generates mountains of data, and the project with Brocade is intended to create a "future-proof" network based on New IP principles to shift said data securely.

Telekom Albania, a Deutsche Telekom AG (NYSE: DT) subsidiary, has switched on RCS (rich communications services) powered by Jibe, following similar launches in Romania and Slovakia. (See Telekom Albania Launches RCS With Jibe.)

Beeline, a Russian mobile operator owned by VimpelCom Ltd. (NYSE: VIP), has deployed an Amdocs Ltd. (NYSE: DOX) CRM offering intended to improve contact center efficiency. The project entailed the integration of more than 60 user interfaces into a single user window.

— Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading