Networking kit manufacturer TP-Link, which produces a lot of affordable broadband routers, WiFi extenders and smart home devices for ISPs and consumers, has this morning announced the opening of its “largest” UK and Ireland National Distribution Centre to date in Newbury.

The new 72,000-square-foot warehouse is said to be “double the size” of any previous TP-Link facilities, boasts a 50% increase in storage capacity allowing faster deliveries, greater stock availability and improved service for business, retail and ISP customers. The company hopes this will help them to meet the demands of customers more effectively.

“By streamlining logistics, the new facility reduces goods handling time by 62% and cuts resource usage by 66%, making operations significantly leaner. It means customers can expect shorter lead times and enhanced supply reliability, while ISPs benefit from new service opportunities like direct fulfilment and pre-configured product deliveries,” added the announcement.

Looking ahead, TP-Link said they have already provisioned two additional expansion phases to help meet the growing demands, although they didn’t specify what this would entail.

Nelson Qiao, MD of TP-Link UK, said:

“At TP-Link, innovation is not just about technology but also about delivering a better customer experience for our partners and customers. This new facility allows us to work faster, stock more and support businesses, retailers and ISPs like never before – helping them stay ahead of constantly changing market demands.”

The company has come a long way over the past few years, and their kit tends to be fairly capable. But over in the USA there have been reports of investigators at the Commerce, Defence and Justice departments opening probes into TP-Link’s routers, due to alleged ties to Chinese cyberattacks. Some members of Congress have even called for a ban on the sale of their kit (Independent).

On the flip side, TL-Link has denied the claims, said it is unaffiliated with the China company and that its products are assembled in Vietnam. “Contrary to claims of widespread vulnerabilities, comparative data places TP-Link on par with, or in some cases ahead of, other major industry players in terms of security outcomes,” said a spokesperson for TP-Link.

All routers can and do suffer from security vulnerabilities, although not all manufacturers are as effective at patching these as others. But we’ve also seen how some similar security fears about Huawei and ZTE ended up being followed by bans in other countries.

Network operator Netomnia (inc. Brsk and ISP YouFibre) has today announced that their £39m investment to deploy a new 10Gbps capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband ISP network across the city of Liverpool (Merseyside) has covered 110,000 premises (homes and businesses). But they’re now planning to add another 80,000 premises.

In case anybody has forgotten, the operator originally announced their roll-out in the city all the way back in May 2022 (here) and the goal back then was to cover 130,000 premises. Progress has been good since then and work is now continuing in the Sefton Park, Stoneycroft, and Aintree areas to connect even more premises.

The company, which started its original roll-out in the city alongside contractor MJ Quinn, now has “ambitions to extend [their] coverage” to an additional 80,000 premises in two new locations in Liverpool by 2026 (total of 190,000 premises). But the details of this have yet to be revealed.

The alternative network provider has so far covered a total of 2.08 million premises (ready for service) across parts of over 90 UK cities and towns, and they also have a customer base of 238,000. Netomnia is currently aiming to expand their full fibre network to cover 3 million premises by the end of 2025 (inc. 1 million customers by 2028) and the Liverpool expansion will play a role in that, while also confirming that they have build plans beyond 2025.

Zoltan Kovacs, Managing Director at Netomnia, said:

“Reaching 110,000 premises in Liverpool is a testament to our team’s dedication and commitment to delivering the UK’s best full-fibre infrastructure. As we continue to expand our footprint, our focus remains on empowering communities with the connectivity they need to grow and succeed. Our recent merger with brsk reinforces our ability to scale and our commitment to supporting nationwide gigabit connectivity.”

We should point out that several other operators also have a significant to major level of gigabit-capable broadband coverage in Liverpool, including Virgin Media (inc. nexfibre), Openreach and Hyperoptic. Some other providers, such as Grain and OFNL, similarly have a mix of modest to smaller coverage levels.

Network operator CityFibre has today published a key trading update for the year ended 31st December 2024 (FY24), which reveals that the coverage of their full fibre (FTTP) broadband ISP network has now reached 4.3 million UK premises (inc. Lit Fibre), with 518,000 live customers, and they also delivered their “first full year of profitability“.

Just to recap. The alternative network operator currently still aspires to cover up to 8 million UK premises with their new full fibre network (funded by c.£2.4bn in equity, c.£4.9bn debt and c.£800m of BDUK / public subsidy) – representing c.30% of the UK. So far, they’ve covered 4.3 million premises and have connected 518,000 customers, although it’s unclear when they’ll hit the 8m target (certainly not by their original 2025 goal).

CityFibre has also won several state aid funded contracts under the Government’s £5bn Project Gigabit broadband roll-out scheme, which is focused on upgrading the final 10-20% of hardest to reach premises (usually those in rural areas). The operator expects these to help boost their coverage by another c.1.3 million premises.

Breaking news.. more to follow..

News 

The upgrade is part of EE’s ongoing efforts to improve connectivity at Wembley Stadium after a recently renewed partnership between EE and Wembley 

Wembley Stadium is now the first sports venue in the UK to have its own dedicated 5G standalone (SA) network, following an upgrade by mobile network operator EE. The development puts Wembley ahead of other major UK sporting venues like Twickenham, the Principality Stadium, and Wimbledon in terms of mobile connectivity. 

“The Lionesses have made history with their ground-breaking performances on the pitch, and now we’ve made history off it with the launch of the first 5G standalone network at Wembley Stadium,” said Marc Allera, EE’s CEO in a press release. 

“Whether it’s the Emirates FA Cup Final or one of the hotly anticipated gigs this summer, our cutting-edge mobile connectivity will ensure fans can capture, share and experience history in new ways under the iconic Wembley arch in 2025,” he added. 

Unlike non-standalone (NSA) 5G, which combines 5G RAN technology with a 4G core, 5G SA delivers 5G connectivity using dedicated 5G core. This allows for faster speeds, lower latency, and increased capacity, making it more efficient at handlig large amounts of data. It also allows for advanced uses such as real-time streaming and improved connectivity in crowded areas.  

Beyond improving fan experience, EE’s 5G standalone network could also support Wembley’s operations, such as retail transactions and broadcasting services, with potential for future enhancements. 

Since launching its 5G standalone network in September 2024, EE has expanded its availability to over 21 million people, equating to around a third of the UK population.  

Join us at Connected Britain, 24-25 September in London. Get discounted tickets here! 

Also in the news:
Why network infrastructure needs a rethink in the age of AI and Edge computing
Iliad once again eying Italian consolidation with TIM
Eutelsat connects one million Sub-Saharan Africans to satellite 

The telecoms regulator, Ofcom, has today published the results of a recent study it conducted into the costs of improving power resilience at UK mobile network sites (masts etc.). This finds that the cost of ensuring “almost everybody” could maintain access to the emergency services for up to 4 hours, in the event of a power cut, would be approx. £1bn.

Communications providers in the UK currently have a legal obligation to identify, prepare for and reduce the risk of anything that compromises the availability, performance or functionality of their networks. But such networks are highly complex and outages can still occur, with Ofcom warning that the consequences of these are “likely to become more severe as society becomes increasingly dependent on them to function.”

The regulator has thus been working to improve network resilience since 2023, and they’ve already made some progress (here). But the issue of improving power backup for Radio Access Networks (RAN), such as at the mobile mast sites operated by Three UK, EE, Vodafone and O2, has required further work. Mobile operators are also known to have balked at the potential costs of deploying national battery backup (here).

For example, Ofcom’s original Call For Input (CFI) on the matter asked questions about the feasibility of mobile operators installing a minimum 1 hour of battery backup at RAN sites. But Ofcom’s own illustrative example suggested that to install this on such sites, where power backup is likely to be feasible, could cost in the region of £0.9 – £1.8bn (this would end up being passed on to consumers as higher prices).

Due to the challenges and high costs involved, the regulator didn’t initially consider it “proportionate” to include such a measure in last year’s updated guidance and instead set about conducting a deeper analysis to “determine if additional resilience measures are needed“. The original costing estimate was also derived from a high-level (limited) understanding of the total number of UK masts, which required some refinement.

Ofcom has today published a new technical report into Mobile RAN power resilience, which reveals some very interesting findings.

Key Findings – Mobile RAN Power Resilience

The output from the modelling and analysis suggests that:

a) For short duration power outages up to around 1 hour, around two thirds of the population would be able to make emergency calls. This level of protection is enabled through the power back-up of around 20% of all mast sites in the UK up to at least one hour, coupled with the fact that mobile phones will roam onto available networks to make an emergency call, so are not dependent on their home network.

b) As the duration of an outage increases fewer consumers can make emergency calls: only around [REDACTED] could make an emergency call in the event of a power outage lasting up to 6 hours. This is because far fewer (5%) sites [REDACTED] have backup facilities of at least 6 hours.

c) We estimate that the costs to upgrade mobile networks to ensure almost everyone can maintain access to the emergency services for up to 4 hours would be approximately £1 billion. As we noted in our CFI, Ofgem data indicates that the majority (approximately 90%) of power outages last between 3 mins and 3 hours.

d) Further enhancements or network hardening to increase the duration of protection and/or to allow more services (such as data [broadband] connectivity or the ability to make calls to any number rather than simply 999) would incur significantly higher costs.

e) Technological innovation may provide alternative solutions to maintain connectivity, such as the increasing availability of ‘Direct to Device’ satellite communication. The geographic extent, capacity and timescales of such approaches need further investigation before they can be considered viable alternatives to current mobile backup measures.

f) Internationally we have not seen a common consensus emerge on how to ensure resilience on the RAN, with individual countries adopting different positions depending on their circumstances. For example, challenging weather conditions prompted Australia and Norway to implement mobile network power backup, with Australia taking a voluntary approach (12 hours for a limited number of sites) and Norway mandating it (2 hours, with 4 hours in rural areas), while Switzerland has considered plans to mandate up to 72 hours of backup with potential service restrictions.

The data and insights contained in this report do not form a cost/benefits analysis (CBA) and do not quantify the value of different levels of resilience considered. But the information is intended to help inform further discussion on power resilience in the mobile network and power backup of MNO mast sites.

Ofcom are now considering what their next steps in this work should be and will set that out at a later date. A solid solution still seems to be some distance away. The report also included a table showing the estimated ‘aggregate’ cost range to improve RAN resilience, UK wide, across all mobile operators and over different time periods (note: the £1bn estimate for up to 4hrs mentioned earlier only covers access to the emergency services).

News

Nokia’s current CEO, Pekka Lundmark, is stepping down from the role after five years in the role

This week, Nokia has announced that it has appointed Intel’s head of the data centre and artificial intelligence group, Justin Hotard, to replace their outgoing CEO Pekka Lundmark.

Hotard will formally take over the role on April 1.

Word that Nokia’s board was looking to replace Lundmark first began circulating in September last year, with reports suggesting that Nokia had approached numerous candidates to fill his shoes.

At the time, both Lundmark and Nokia dismissed these claims.

Lundmark has served as CEO for Nokia since 2020. He took over the business four years after Nokia’s acquisition of Alcatel-Lucent, at a time when the company’s share price was falling and the battle for 5G market share was just beginning. After recovering from his predecessor’s ill-fated choice of Intel’s 5G chips, Lundmark gradually turned Nokia back onto the path of 5G stability, but much of the financial damage had already been done.

As such, Lundmark’s tenure at Nokia has focussed on cost-cutting measures, as well as pushing the company towards the data centre, private wireless, and industrial Edge segments with mixed success.

This focus on data centres appears to be at the heart of the board’s choice to appoint Hotard, who has led Intel’s data centre unit since last January.

Commenting on the announcement, Nokia’s chair Sari Baldauf described Hotard as having “a strong track record of accelerating growth in technology companies along with vast expertise in AI and data centre markets, which are critical areas for Nokia’s future growth.”

Last year, Nokia moved to acquire optical networking specialist Infinera for $2.3 billion, a move that analysts suggested would put the company to better profit from the boom in AI data centre investment currently taking place worldwide.

“It is not just the connectivity inside the data centre, but the connectivity across data centres. I think the will be opportunities in mobile networks as well. I look forward to seeing that [the Infinera acquisition] close, ad working with the Nokia team to ensure we successfully integrate the acquisition and maximise value capture,” said Hotard in a streamed press conference.

“As we look at the opportunity in AI, this gives us a great opportunity to differentiate as we move into the hyperscaler customers and the emerging neo-cloud customers that are coming up. I think there is a tremendous opportunity for us on a global basis to win it.”

The Infinera acquisition is expected to close later this quarter.

Keep up to date with the latest international telecoms news by subscribing to the Total Telecom newsletter

Also in the news:
Vodafone reports strong Q3 growth amid Germany challenges
CEO of AireBeam discusses ‘secret sauce’ behind ISP’s growth
BT scraps managerial DEI targets

Press Release

TalkTalk confirmed as first large-scale broadband partner for Kraken platform, joining global energy and water utilities, as Wi-Fi provider takes next step on customer-focused transformation

TalkTalk has signed a multi-year partnership agreement with Kraken – the operating system revolutionising global utilities – to propel its ongoing transformation and ambition to become the most recommended Wi-Fi provider in the UK. 

TalkTalk will adopt Kraken as its sole customer management platform as part of its shift to deliver a more customer-friendly offering. 

The partnership will see TalkTalk customers migrate from various legacy internal platforms to Kraken, which uses a single universal model to simplify all aspects of customer service, for both customers and colleagues. By streamlining account operations and consolidating everything into a single platform, Kraken will enable customer service teams to solve any problem. 

This will be Kraken’s first major expansion outside of energy and water utilities to a large-scale broadband provider, with both companies keen to leverage Kraken’s existing system as well as develop new capabilities for the telecoms industry.  

Kraken’s end-to-end operating system is already contracted to run over 60 million customer accounts on behalf of many of the UK’s top utilities, including Octopus Energy, EDF Energy, Severn Trent and E.ON Next, as well as other major utilities around the world. 

Susie Buckridge, TalkTalk CEO, said: “At TalkTalk, we are undertaking a significant transformation as part of our ambition to become the most recommended Wi-Fi provider in the UK. An innovative and flexible technology platform that enables us to provide excellent customer service like Kraken is central to our ambition. 

“I know I speak for all of us at TalkTalk when I say we are excited to be the first major connectivity provider to join the Kraken network, not least because of the significant benefits it will bring to our customers and colleagues.”  

TalkTalk expects to migrate its 2.3m customer base from its own proprietary platform to Kraken within the next two years, with the first cohort expected to go live later this year. The first new customers will be on Kraken by early summer, expanding over the next year.  

Deepak Ravindran, CEO, Kraken for Water & Telco, says: “After successfully disrupting the energy and water markets, we are thrilled to expand the magic of Kraken to the telco industry with our first scaled telco customer. Our collaboration with TalkTalk gives us a unique opportunity to partner with a leading player in the UK market to deliver outrageously good customer service, unlock operational efficiencies and bring our best-in-class tech to yet another industry.”

How are customer expectations changing in 2025? Join the discussion at Connected North, live in Manchester 

Also in the news:
Vodafone reports strong Q3 growth amid Germany challenges
CEO of AireBeam discusses ‘secret sauce’ behind ISP’s growth
BT scraps managerial DEI targets

Viewpoint

by Jon Abbott, Technologies Director & Industry Advisor at Vertiv

Telecommunications infrastructure has evolved in response to growing demand. But right now, that evolution is happening at a pace the industry hasn’t seen before. The surge in data traffic, the push for lower latency, and the rise of AI-driven applications are forcing operators to rethink how networks are built and managed. The challenge is no longer just about expanding capacity – it hinges on enabling networks to scale efficiently, adapt to new technologies, and support increasingly decentralised workloads.

The challenge: A network model under pressure

For years, network architecture has been built around major hubs. Data travelled through core sites in cities like Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, and Paris, where it was processed and stored before being distributed. That model worked when demand was predictable and most applications could tolerate some latency. But today’s use cases – real-time financial trading, AI-powered automation, and low-latency content delivery – call for a different approach.

A growing reliance on AI is accelerating the need for a rethink. AI applications require immense computing power but transmitting massive datasets back and forth between core data centres isn’t practical. This is leading to a shift towards distributed processing, where workloads are handled closer to where they are generated.

Network sites are evolving into processing hubs

Telecom infrastructure has historically been designed for a single function; for example, cable landing stations bring subsea cables ashore, intermediate line amplifier sites extend signal transmission distances, and aggregation nodes consolidate fibre routes. But these sites are now being repurposed to support a broader range of functions, including local processing and caching.

At cable landing stations, compute power is increasingly being installed at the point where undersea cables come ashore, reducing the need to transfer data inland before it is processed. Intermediate line amplifier sites, which were originally designed to house relatively low-power equipment, are now seeing energy demands increase significantly as network operators retrofit them for edge computing.

These changes are essential to reducing strain on core infrastructure, improving efficiency and supporting applications that can’t tolerate delays. But they also introduce new technical challenges, particularly around space, power, and cooling.

Scaling up without disruption

Many of these facilities were never designed to accommodate the kind of workloads now being placed on them. Expanding capacity in a way that doesn’t cause downtime or disrupt existing services is a key challenge. This is where modular infrastructure is proving to be a practical solution. Prefabricated, pre-integrated modules can be deployed rapidly, allowing organisations to add computing power without the need for large-scale construction projects.

One government department scaled up a new edge site in under two months using a modular approach with Vertiv solutions. The ability to deploy fully integrated infrastructure quickly ensured that additional capacity was brought online without disruption – something that is becoming increasingly important as AI workloads expand.

The Vertiv™ SmartMod™ platform

What’s next for network infrastructure?

As the boundaries between data centres and network infrastructure continue to blur, operators should prepare for a more distributed model of computing. In the coming years, there is likely to be a wider adoption of prefabricated modular deployments, more intelligent energy management to balance sustainability with performance and a shift towards facilities that can support AI-driven workloads as standard.

The industry is in the midst of a major transition. Networks are no longer just pipes that move data – they are becoming dynamic, high-performance computing environments. Organisations that adapt now will be best placed to meet the demands of the next decade.

You can find Vertiv at Booth 3 at Submarine Networks EMEA, Europe’s most important submarine cable event

Digital IPTV platform provider Netgem TV has today announced that their broadband-based TV box and service, which is typically bundled by ISPs like Brsk, Connect Fibre, TalkTalk, CommunityFibre and a few others, has added UK support for Fox’s free (ad supported) Tubi video streaming service.

“We’re thrilled to be expanding Tubi’s footprint further in the UK, and that Netgem’s customers will now have access to the largest free content library in the country.” said Ross Appleton, Tubi’s GM for the UK. Readers can check out our article on Tubi from last year for a bit more context.

Netgem TV users will now have access to thousands of movies and TV episodes, spanning every genre imaginable. From familiar titles like “Jerry Maguire” and “Eat, Pray, Love”, to British comedies like “Shameless” and “Peep Show”, and documentaries such as “Hoaxed”. You can of course access all this through various other platforms too.

Network analyst firm Streetwave, which is currently conducting various UK surveys to study the coverage and speed of 4G and 5G mobile broadband networks using bin lorries and private vehicles, has published another free and interactive visual map of their results – this time for the London borough of Brent.

Just to recap. Streetwave have spent the past year harnessing waste (bin / refuse) collection lorries to map mobile network / broadband coverage and speeds in various parts of the UK, particularly Wales (here, here, here, here and here). In this setup, refuse trucks are installed with several off-the-shelf Smartphones using software from Streetwave on top, which run continuous network tests (once every 20 metres in rural areas and 5m in urban areas) as the vehicles go around their routes.

The data they collect is then being used by local authorities to help identify areas that may require additional intervention in order to improve local mobile coverage and or network capacity. In addition, members of the public have also been given access to some of this data via an address-based coverage checker (more will become available as the studies are completed) and interactive map.

The latest area to benefit from this is the London borough of Brent – https://app.streetwave.co/coverage-checker/70. The example picture on this article shows a zoomed-out view of Brent with O2 selected, but you can also get more specific results and speeds by entering an address.