Mobile network operator Three UK has announced that they will be opening all 244 of their stores in England and Head Office at 10am on Monday, apparently so “colleagues can enjoy the European Football Championship final this weekend” (translation – recover from a hangover or after seeing another flaky performance on the pitch).

“This special adjustment to store opening hours will come into play on Monday 15th July and will allow colleagues in England to make the most of all the excitement Sunday evening will bring,” added a spokesperson for the operator.

The UEFA Euro 2024 Final will kick off at 8pm on Sunday as England takes on Spain.

News

The breach, which occurred in 2022, could affect tens of millions of customers

Today, a regulatory filing from AT&T has revealed a major data breach that occurred in 2022, with hackers able to access call and text message records of “nearly all” of the operator’s wireless customers.

The data was reportedly compromised between April 14 and April 25, 2022, as well as a single day in January 2023.

The breach exposed call and text records, though AT&T says this does not include the content of those calls or texts.

Personal information, such as names or social security numbers, was not accessible by the hackers.

“At this time, we do not believe that the data is publicly available,” AT&T said in a statement. “We sincerely regret this incident occurred and remain committed to protecting the information in our care.”

According to AT&T, the breach impacted “nearly all” of the company’s roughly 100 million wireless customers, as well as those of mobile virtual network operators that provide services to customers using AT&T’s network. A number of AT&T’s landline customers who interacted with affected mobile numbers between May and October 2022 may also have been impacted.

Investigations into the breaches began on April 19, when AT&T says a “threat actor claimed to have unlawfully accessed and copied AT&T call logs.”

AT&T says its delay in informing customers of the data breach relates to instructions from the US Department of Justice, who told the operator in May and June that a delay in public disclosure was “warranted”. No further information was given about the delay.

Exactly how the breach occurred remains unclear, though AT&T reportedly told CNN that customer data was illegally downloaded from its workspace on Snowflake, a third-party cloud platform.

Snowflake rejects this claim, with the company’s chief information and security officer saying no evidence has been found that the breach was caused by a vulnerability, misconfiguration or breach of Snowflake’s platform”.

AT&T is working with police to find those responsible for the breach, with one person reportedly apprehended in connection to the investigation.

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Press Release

Vodafone, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. and Xiaomi continued their innovative streak with the successful test in Germany and Spain of a new 5G technology capable of download speeds close to 1.8 gigabits-per-second (Gbps) using a new smartphone.

Specifically, they tested enhanced technology which improves the way data and video is transmitted from the radio network over 5G to a customer’s mobile device. Called 1024 quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM), it is a step up from today’s system (256 QAM) since it packs together more data into each transmission, leading to faster download speeds.

This increase in speed and data throughout will ultimately lead to greater network capacity, freeing up additional bandwidth at mobile sites to improve the overall experience for customers.

1.8 Gbps Peak Speed

Using Xiaomi’s smartphone, the Xiaomi 14 Ultra, equipped with its latest Snapdragon® X75 5G Modem-RF System, Vodafone engineers recorded excellent results. In Germany, the team measured a throughput improvement on the commercial network of around 20% over a distance of up to 600 meters, and at its 5G test centre in Ciudad Real, Spain, they achieved peak 5G download speed of nearly 1.8 Gbps. Theoretically, 1.8 Gbps could provide a capacity gain of up to 25% in ideal conditions.

The technology, which Vodafone expects to become more widely available during 2025, is suited to supporting multiple customers close to a mobile site in busy areas such as a shopping centre or high street.

Wave of Innovation

Alberto Ripepi, Chief Network Officer of Vodafone, said: “Vodafone is at the forefront of the next wave of innovation in 5G. Our customers will benefit from a head start when the next generation smartphones become more widely available, and we can offer our technical expertise to partners and other providers through our new commercial model.”

Dino Flore, Vice President, Technology of Qualcomm Europe, Inc. added: “The successful trials conducted in Germany and Spain with Vodafone and Xiaomi are proof that we are continuing to push the boundaries of what is possible with 5G technology.”

Guoquan Zhang, General Manager of Xiaomi Software Department, said: “We are honored to have collaborated with Vodafone and Qualcomm on this achievement. It demonstrates how Xiaomi is actively driving and showing innovation in the 5G space.”

This latest technological breakthrough follows news earlier this year that the same three companies achieved upload speeds of up to 273 megabits-per-second (Mbps) using another innovative technology. This is more than double the average uplink speed of today’s smartphones and home broadband services.

Efficiency Gains

Industry body 3GPP has defined the 1024 QAM technology, helping operators make further efficiency gains using existing spectrum whilst providing greater speeds for customers even among bandwidth-hungry digital services.

For the test, Vodafone engineers used 1024 QAM with a Time Division Duplexing (TDD) spectrum band – a way to send and receive data within pre-determined time slots on the same frequency (3.5 GHz in this instance). 3.5 GHz spectrum can benefit from 1024 GAM because it has been widely assigned for 5G and associated mobile broadband applications. Vodafone will continue to test drive 1024 QAM-compatible networking equipment and devices ahead of their commercial deployment later.

Join the operators in discussion at this year’s Connected Germany conference live in Munich

Also in the news:
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Vodafone Invests £120m in AI Chatbot ‘SuperTOBi’

News

SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son said earlier this year that AI will be SoftBank’s ‘next big bet’ when it comes to technology

This week, Japanese conglomerate SoftBank has announced the acquisition of struggling UK-based AI chipmaker Graphcore.

Official financial details have not been disclosed, but anonymous sources speaking to the Financial Times valued the deal at $600 million.

Graphcore creates specialised AI chips, known as intelligence processing units, which can be used to train and operator AI large language models.

This is the same type of chip technology that has seen rival chip company Nvidia soar to around $3 trillion earlier this year.

Unlike Nvidia, however, Graphcore has struggled significantly to commercialise its technology. Valued at $2.8 billion back in 2020, Graphcore has since failed to sell its products at scale, noting “lower hardware sales to key strategic customers”. In 2022, the company recorded just $2.7 million in sales, 46% lower than in 2021, and booking a pre-tax loss for the year of $205 million.

As a result, 2023 saw Graphcore undertake cost cutting measures, cutting 20% of its workforce and closing its operations in Norway, Japan, and South Korea. At the time, the company said there was ‘material uncertainty’ over the company’s survival and called for fresh funding.

Now, as part of SoftBank, Graphcore will reportedly have all the resources it needs to return to full force.

“Demand for AI compute is vast and continues to grow,” said Graphcore’s co-founder and chief executive, Nigel Toon. “There remains much to do to improve efficiency, resilience, and computational power to unlock the full potential of AI. In SoftBank, we have a partner that can enable the Graphcore team to redefine the landscape for AI technology.”

SoftBank itself has been stepping up its focus on AI for over a year now, with Son saying earlier this year that “realising ASI (Artificial Superintelligence)” was “his only focus”. He has also said the company is ready to invest roughly $9 billion a year in AI and is prepared for largescale dealmaking in the future.

Keep up to date with all of the latest telecoms news with Total Telecom’s daily newsletter! Sign up here

Also in the news:
Australian Government and AWS Collaborate to Strengthen country’s Cybersecurity
Solving congestion challenges in FTTP deployment
Vodafone Invests £120m in AI Chatbot ‘SuperTOBi’

The Common Wholesale Platform (CWP), which is a non-profit member-owned organisation that helps alternative broadband networks to provide wholesale services to the UK ISP market, has announced that they’re offering retail ISPs free access to their Common Switching Platform (CSP) until the One Touch Switching (OTS) regulation launch on 12th September 2024.

In case anybody has forgotten. Ofcom’s much delayed One Touch Switch (OTS) system aims to make it quicker and easier for consumers to switch broadband ISPs, regardless of what physical network the provider is using under the hood. OTS is currently set to go live from on 12th September 2024 (here), which is over a year past its originally targeted launch date of April 2023.

The CWP has responded to this by developing a Common Switching Platform (CSP) for retailers to comply with consumer OTS and business Gaining Provider led-Business (GPL-B) Ofcom regulated processes: CWP serves as a Full Management Managed Access Provider (MAP) to the OTS hub, which allows providers to comply with Ofcom OTS and GPL-B obligations and simplify the integration process.

As part of this the CWP has today announced that they’re providing their CSP service free of charge until the OTS regulation launches on 12th September 2024. This initiative allows UK broadband and telephony retailers to test their connectivity, perform integration tests, participate in industry trials and production integration tests towards a seamless OTS compliance.

CWP Statement

This complimentary service period ensures retailers can prepare for the OTS regulation efficiently, demonstrating compliance and enhancing customer growth through improved switching processes. Additionally, CWP offers various wholesale connectivity services, enabling retailers to expand their horizons and grow their network utilisation.

Retailers of consumer broadband services are encouraged to visit cwpuk.org/join and sign up using the discount code ZERO. Terms and conditions apply.

Broadband ISP Quickline, which is building a new gigabit-capable full fibre (FTTP) and fixed wireless (5G FWA) network across rural and semi-rural parts of the North East and Midlands of England, has confirmed that a further three villages across North Yorkshire have now been connected to their network.

The latest additions include Brearton, Scotton, and Riccall in North Yorkshire. The new fibre across this area is understood to have reached some 1,600 premises (homes and businesses). Residential customers will typically pay from £29 per month on a 24-month term for 200Mbps speeds with free installation, and that goes up to £49 for their top 900Mbps (450Mbps upload) tier. The first 3 months of service are also free.

Quickline is being supported by funding of c.£500m from Northleaf Capital Partners and c.£177m of public subsidy from Project Gigabit (here, here and here). The provider holds an aspiration to cove around 500,000 premises in rural and semi-rural areas across Northern England and beyond with “ultrafast broadband” – via both FTTP and wireless technologies – “by 2025” (here). Some 200,000 of those rural premises will be tackled by their wireless network, with the other half or more coming from FTTP.

Credits to Thinkbroadband for spotting this one, which also notes that Openreach’s full fibre is also available to some of the homes in these communities.

Brsk, who recently announced their merger with Netomnia, to form the second largest UK
alternative network, is celebrating a new milestone in the West Midlands; now providing over
100,000 homes with access to full fibre broadband.

Across the Black Country and South Birmingham, homes and businesses can now enjoy rapid
speeds and seamless connectivity thanks to brsk’s full fibre. This is a huge milestone not just for brsk, but also for the West Midlands, an area where gigabit connectivity has largely been
lacking until recent years.
Speaking of the rollout, Gary Blunt, Broadband Lead at WM5G – an organisation part of the
wider government Urban Connected Communities Project and an Associate Partner of UK5G; a national innovation network dedicated to the promotion of research, collaboration and the
commercial application of 5G in the UK, said, “It’s great to see brsk have invested £25,000,000
in broadband for the people of the West Midlands. Commercial investment like this is key to
making the West Midlands the best-connected place to live and work. The brsk full fibre
broadband network is future-proofing the connectivity of the Combined Authority area. At WM5G we believe working in partnership and supporting suppliers to build these networks helps ensure that all our homes and businesses can access fast and reliable digital connectivity that they deserve. We look forward to seeing further investment and the ongoing network expansion across the WMCA.”

Speaking of the project to bring the West Midlands up to speed, brsk Regional Head Laura
Richardson said, “With technology playing such an important part in today’s society, I’m
incredibly proud to be a part of upgrading the broadband, to the area that I call home, to the
fastest internet available in the UK.. Full fibre technology not only future proofs us, it enables
Birmingham and the Black Country to continue as technology hubs for the UK.”

Leading the way in how broadband should be, recent winner of “Best Urban Fibre Provider”
category at the 2024 UK Fibre Awards, brsk offers symmetrical upload and download speeds
across all of their packages, in addition to guaranteed no mid-contract price rises, and award-
winning customer service.

From the borough of Dudley to Earlswood in South Birmingham, brsk is continuing to expand
their coverage at pace across the West Midlands, to deliver more homes with future-proof
broadband. With an unabated build engine and no limit on their network footprint, brsk recently added an additional 30,000 premises in the areas of Blackheath and Bearwood in the
Metropolitan borough of Sandwell, further additional areas are to be announced soon.

Nationally, brsk has passed more than 600,000 homes across the North West and West
Midlands, including Greater Manchester, Cheshire, Merseyside, West Yorkshire, Lancashire,
The Black Country and South Birmingham, becoming a leading broadband provider across the
regions.

Check if you can get brsk full fibre here: https://www.brsk.co.uk

KDPOF (leading supplier for high-speed connectivity over fiberoptics in harsh environments) proudly announces its business upgrade and brand-new corporate identity, evolving from ‘KDPOF – Knowledge Development for Plastic Optical Fiber’ to ‘KD – Approaching Shannon’s Limit’. As the company keeps striving for technical innovation and new products, the new image perfectly fits with the ambitious designs, challenges, and future projects.

“Since our founding in 2010, we’ve mastered the path of innovation, dedication, and excellence in high-speed optical network technology for harsh environments,” explained Carlos Pardo, CEO and Co-founder of KD. “The present major step is to evolve from a fabless company to setting up a high-volume production site for semiconductors close to our headquarter in Tres Cantos, Madrid, in Spain.”

Rubén Pérez-Aranda, CTO and Co-founder of KD, added: “With the development of our new IEEE Std 802.3cz compliant multi-gigabit optical transceivers, based on a new paradigm in integrating electronics, photonics, and optics, we’ve become a global benchmark for robust communication needs in the most adverse environments. Now it’s time for an upgrade of our corporate identity to align it with our achievements and future milestones.”

Last Thursday, July 4th, KDPOF successfully announced its rebranding and was honored to have the presence of great personalities such as the Minister for Industry and Tourism of the Government of Spain, Jordi Hereu, the Mayor of Tres Cantos, Jesús Moreno García, and investors who have supported the company from the beginning, such as Bullnet Capital, Caixa Capital Risk, Kibo Ventures, the high commissioner of PERTE CHIP, CDTI agents, and friends of the company.

Approaching Shannon’s Limit

When Carlos Pardo and Rubén Pérez-Aranda founded KDPOF in 2010, they entered new terrain as pioneers in the optical networking sector. Since then, the engineers have always kept exploring the limits of the impossible – striving for innovations nearing the Shannon limit. With their own production facility, KD empowers new paradigms of hybrid integration of microelectronics, photonics, and optics.

The Shannon limit or Shannon capacity of a communication channel refers to the maximum rate of error-free data that can theoretically be transferred over the channel if the link is subject to random data transmission errors, for a particular noise level. Stated by Claude Shannon in 1948, his theorem has wide-ranging applications in both communications and data storage.(1)

Based on this principle and the values of teamwork, excellence, innovation, and passion, the company remains proud of its past achievements and ambitious about the challenges of the future that lie ahead. KD will continue to set milestones in the industry and in the history of high-speed optical communications for the automotive industry.

Optoelectronics Production in Spain

With the 26.8 million Euros IPCEI investment from the European Commission, KD is setting up a packaging plant for optoelectronic devices in Spain. “We’re excited to pioneer the manufacturing of automotive optoelectronics in Spain in high volume, thus reducing the dependency on Asia and US,” explained Carlos Pardo.

Close to its headquarters in Tres Cantos, KD is advancing a high-quality packaging factory for state-of-the-art optoelectronic devices. In addition, the company is opening their first prototype laboratory for testing their own products. The new laboratory was inaugurated a few weeks ago and is equipped with highly qualified machinery for the necessary testing of KD products.

During the day of the presentation of the new corporate identity, Jordi Hereu and Jesús Moreno García took a guided tour to learn about the quality processes that have been carried out in this new workspace for the past few weeks. The encapsulation and testing factory for large volumes will go into operation in 2025. It will be applied for the first time to produce the upcoming transceiver IC for high-speed automotive optical communications, including the new and innovative optoelectronics packaging technology developed by KD.

(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noisy-channel_coding_theorem

Rome, 10 July 2024

Sparkle, the first international service provider in Italy and among the top global operators, and Aruba S.p.A, Italy’s leading provider of cloud, data centre, hosting, e-mail, domain registration and PEC (certified email) services, announce the activation of the new Sparkle’s Point of Presence (PoP) at the Hyper Cloud Data Centre of Aruba, the largest data centre campus in Rome, to be inaugurated soon. 

The agreement between Aruba and Sparkle reinforces Rome as a global connectivity hub between Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia thanks to the connection with BlueMed, Sparkle’s new cable that increases connectivity in the Mediterranean basin by linking various countries – including France, Greece, Israel and Italy – with landings in Rome, Genoa, Palermo and Golfo Aranci. BlueMed is an integral part of the Blue & Raman Submarine Cable Systems project. In partnership with Google and other operators, the project is set to establish a new digital infrastructure between Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia with extension as far as India, and is among the first projects being implemented on the IMEC (India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor) set up at the G20 summit in September 2023.

Designed with an “open cable system” and “open landing station” architecture, BlueMed ensures maximum openness to other operators and the development of internet traffic interconnection ecosystems. With four fibre pairs and a capacity of over 25 Terabits per second (Tbps) per pair, BlueMed offers operators and businesses high-speed, high-performance international connections from Rome to all of Sparkle’s destinations worldwide.

Sparkle’s new PoP was activated at Aruba’s Hyper Cloud Data Centre (IT4), a technology campus located at the Tecnopolo Tiburtino, a district where more than 150 companies operate, ranging from aerospace to ICT, in an environment designed also to support the growth and development of new companies and start-ups. The data centre campus covers an area of 74,000 m² and, when fully operational, will include five independent data centres for a total of 30 MW of IT power, the first of which (DC-A) is already ANSI/TIA Rating 4 certified. Designed to the highest standards of resilience and infrastructure quality, the new hub will use renewable energy, cooling systems and highly efficient equipment.

“With the activation of the new PoP integrated with BlueMed, we intend to respond to the needs of companies and operators that require large international interconnection capacities,” said Enrico Bagnasco, CEO of Sparkle. “We bring Rome closer to the world’s major connectivity exchange points thanks to a unique, low-latency route to Marseille and Palermo, integrated with the main submarine cables crossing the Mediterranean and other destinations in Sparkle’s global network.”

Stefano Cecconi, CEO of Aruba commented: “We share with Sparkle the aim of serving companies and operators, that need large capacities, with not only connectivity but also space and power within state-of-the-art data centres that are large enough to support even the most ambitious growth plans. Being able to host a Sparkle PoP, with the availability of BlueMed, is an important building block in the consolidation of our data centres as strategic assets at a national and European level, and is perfectly in line with our carrier neutral philosophy. This approach is designed to allow customers to enjoy, in maximum autonomy, extremely reliable and high-performance internet connection solutions, and to foster the development of interconnections that benefit the entire ecosystem, making Rome an additional connectivity hub and an IT and cloud service delivery centre for the capital and all Central and Southern Italy.”

The new PoP – which already hosts important international players – adds to the four existing points of presence in Rome, increasing the capillarity of the metropolitan ring, a protected and redundant system fully integrated with Sparkle’s Tier-1 global IP network “Seabone”. Network operators, ISPs, OTTs, content and application providers can benefit from the range of IP and data services offered by Sparkle, including DDoS Protection – that gives customers the option to self-protect their networks from attacks – and Virtual NAP – which provides virtual access to leading Internet Exchange Points (IXPs) without the need to build proprietary infrastructure.

About Sparkle

Sparkle is TIM Group’s Global Operator, first international service provider in Italy and among the top worldwide, offering a full range of infrastructure and global connectivity services – capacity, IP, SD-WAN, colocation, IoT connectivity, roaming and voice – to national and international Carriers, OTTs, ISPs, Media/Content Providers, and multinational enterprises. A major player in the submarine cable industry, Sparkle owns and manages a network of more than 600,000 km of fiber spanning from Europe to Africa and the Middle East, the Americas and Asia. Its sales force is active worldwide and distributed over 33 countries.

Find out more about Sparkle following its X and LinkedIn profiles or visiting the website tisparkle.com

About Aruba S.p.A.  

Aruba S.p.A. (http://www.aruba.it), founded in 1994, is Italy’s leading provider of cloud, data centre, hosting, e-mail, domain registration and PEC (certified email) services. The company, with wholly Italian capital, has 16 million users and manages a vast infrastructure distributed on 7 data centres that includes 2.7 million registered domains, 9.8 million e-mail accounts, 9 million PEC accounts and thousands of customer IT infrastructures. Aruba PEC and Actalis are the group’s two Certification Authorities, accredited with AgID (Agenzia per l’Italia Digitale) for the provision of qualified services. Aruba’s infrastructure is also qualified by ACN (National Cybersecurity Authority) to handle ordinary, critical and also strategic PA data. In 30 years of activity, Aruba has developed extensive experience in the design and management of high-tech data centres, owned and distributed throughout Italy. The largest is located in Ponte San Pietro (BG) and features green-by-design infrastructure and facilities that comply with the highest security standards in the industry (Rating 4 ANSI/TIA-942, ISO 22237), to which is added the Hyper Cloud Data Centre in Rome, which covers 74,000 m² in the area of the Tecnopolo Tiburtino and at full capacity will include 5 independent data centres. Aruba implements energy-efficient solutions in its data centres, demonstrating its commitment to sustainability and, in addition, produces clean energy through photovoltaic plants and hydroelectric power plants. The infrastructure network also extends across Europe, with a proprietary data centre in the Czech Republic and partner facilities located in France, Germany, Poland, and the United Kingdom.

For further information, please visit https://www.aruba.it/and social networks Facebook, X and LinkedIn 

Sparkle Media Contacts

sparkle.communication@tisparkle.com

X: @TISparkle

Aruba Media Contacts

Megan Cowlbeck/Lorna Miller 

aruba@rlyl.com

Red Lorry Yellow Lorry for Aruba   

News

According to reports, the network has demonstrated a ten-fold improvement in key communication metrics, including capacity, coverage, and efficiency

This week, a team of Chinese researchers from Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications have revealed the ‘world’s first’ 6G field test network.

According to Chinese government news agency Xinhua, ‘the experimental network has demonstrated that semantic communication can reach the transmission capabilities of 6G on existing 4G infrastructure’.

The network is reportedly intended to provide the national research community with a more accessible platform for 6G testing, thereby allowing wider participation in 6G research.

Results so far reportedly demonstrate the network delivering a ‘ten-fold improvement to capacity, coverage, and efficiency’, though it does not specify what this improvement is being compared to. Further details on the test network are slim for now, with the data having been presented by the researchers as a seminar in Mandarin earlier this week.

China’s emphasis on taking an early lead in 6G has been plain to see for a number of years now. Only last week Jin Zhuanglong, head of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, listed 6G as a technical area of national focus, alongside other fledgling technologies like humanoid robotics, quantum computing, and brain–computer interfaces.

Indeed, state support for 6G research is already significant. Both academia and the private sector have been heavily incentivised, via a variety of subsidies and tax breaks, to develop the technology rapidly. As of last year, the government has also played a key role in the creation of a dedicated working group comprising a number of government departments and 37 universities, research institutes, and enterprises.

The exact amount of funding being allocated to support 6G development, however, remains unclear.

Nonetheless, the national focus on the technology is seemingly bearing fruit. China’s private sector – primarily Huawei – currently dominates the global market when it comes to 6G patents, accounting for roughly 40% of the global total. China also celebrated another 6G ‘world first’ back in May, when China Mobile launched a satellite into Low Earth Orbit designed to “test 6G architecture”.

Whether all this activity is turning into a tangible lead in 6G, however, remains to be seen. The standardisation process for 6G has only just begun, with commercialisation no expected until 2030 according to both 3GPP and the ITU. If China truly does have a lead in 6G research, it will still be a long time before this translates to a commercial advantage on the global stage.

Keep up to date with all of the latest telecoms news with Total Telecom’s daily newsletter! Sign up here

Also in the news:
Australian Government and AWS Collaborate to Strengthen country’s Cybersecurity
Solving congestion challenges in FTTP deployment
Vodafone Invests £120m in AI Chatbot ‘SuperTOBi’