Latest Connectivity News

The investment confirms a pledge by the Conservatives at the election to bring full-fibre and gigabit-capable broadband to every home and business in Britain within five years. Andrew Glover, chair of the Internet Service Providers’ Association (ISPA), said the £5 billion promised was “a welcome first step”, but added that the “increased funding alone will not allow the industry to get the job done”. “Broadband rollout is largely privately funded and in order to provide industry with a chance to meet the Government’s 2025 ambition, today’s announcements need to be backed up with further reform on wayleaves, new build legislation, action on street works and further investment into digital and engineering skills,” he said.

Google has announced Anthos for Telecom, bringing the Anthos cloud application platform to the network edge.

Launched last year, the platform allows IT shops to manage containerised applications seamlessly between their own infrastructure and multiple clouds, whether that’s AWS, Azure or Google Cloud.

The UK’s four largest mobile networks have agreed a deal with the Government to invest in new and existing phone masts to improve coverage in rural areas. The Shared Rural Network (SRN) will see EE, O2, Three and Vodafone work together to end poor mobile phone coverage. The four networks will invest in new and existing phone masts, overseen by a jointly owned company called Digital Mobile Spectrum Limited, which they would all share. The £1 billion deal is set to bring guaranteed coverage to 280,000 premises and 9,942 miles (16,000km) of roads.

California-based IT giant Supermicro has launched a cell-tower mounted server for harsh outdoor environments.

The company is touting the enclosure-based servers as a “data centre on a pole” for edge deployments, designed to allow the rapid rollout of adaptable 5G networks.

A heart failure patient has become the first person in the world to be fitted with a new heart implant that can communicate with doctors on a smartphone, an NHS trust said. David Southworth, 73, of Colchester, had an operation to fit the advanced implant at Essex Cardiothoracic Centre in Basildon. Doctors have likened the device to having a “paramedic in your pocket” and Mr Southworth said it has already helped with his breathing.

Rural areas will be the focus of a series of Government trials of 5G technology, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has announced.

Named as the winners of the Rural Connected Communities competition, nine projects across the UK will receive a share of £35 million from the Government as part of plans to find new ways to spread technology like 5G to all areas of the country.

The London School of Economics (LSE) is reportedly in talks with Huawei over the Chinese company funding a three-year study on its “leadership” in the development of 5G technology. The university confirmed to the Financial Times (FT) that “commercial negotiations” were ongoing, but no final agreement or payment had been made.

O2 claimed it will become the first carrier to bring LTE-M to the UK when its new network is rolled out in 2020. 50 sites are already live and national rollout is scheduled to complete this year.

The 4G-based LTE-M (Long Term Evolution M1) network is a Low Power Wide Area Network (LPWAN) service designed to facilitate uptake of IoT business applications like asset tracking, connected traffic lights, parking sensors, soil monitoring and assisted living.

Intel has become the latest high-profile technology company to withdraw from forthcoming trade show Mobile World Congress (MWC) over concerns about the spread of coronavirus. The firm follows the likes of LG, Amazon, Sony, Ericsson and Nvidia in withdrawing from the Barcelona trade show, due to take place at the end of the month.

Major technology trade show Mobile World Congress (MWC) has banned visitors from China’s Hubei province as part of new measures introduced in response to the coronavirus outbreak. The technology convention in Barcelona has announced safety precautions – including a ‘no-handshake’ policy. The annual event, one of the biggest in the industry’s calendar, is due to take place in Barcelona between February 24 and 27.

Plans for a subsea cable system linking Los Angeles directly to China and Hong Kong have been abandoned over concerns about a third-party backer’s ties to Beijing.

Google and Facebook applied to the US regulator, the FCC, for more modest plans for the Pacific Light Cable Network (PLCN), that stop in the Philippines and Taiwan, three years after the tech giants announced what would have been the first submarine cable to directly connect Hong Kong and the US.

The boss of BT has welcomed the Government’s “clarity” over its decision to allow Chinese tech giant Huawei access to the UK’s 5G phone network infrastructure.

Philip Jansen said the decision will have “an impact of around £500 million over the next five years”, and admitted that current trading has been weaker than expected.