Liberty Global and Telefónica have reached an agreement to combine British operations O2 and Virgin Media. This is under a new, £31.4bn agreement that could have a huge impact on the UK market.
The second day of this year’s ANGA COM conference and exhibition in Cologne saw the Broadband and Media Summit prompt lively debate amongst panellists, particularly regarding the recently announced Vodafone Deutschland-Unitymedia acquisition. Keely Portway reports
Moderator, Claus Strunz mediated between participants Dr. Manuel Cubero, CCO, Vodafone; Lutz Schüler CEO, Unitymedia; Conrad Albert, deputy CEO and group general council, ProSiebenSat.1 Media; Carsten Schmidt CEO, Sky Deutschland; and Dr. Dirk Wössner, member of the board of management for Germany Deutsche Telekom.
UPC Switzerland has acquired a cable network that serves some 15,000 homes in the Höfe region of Germany, from EW Höfe.
EW Höfe said that it decided to sell its existing cable network to long-standing partner and Liberty Global-owned company, UPC Switzerland, in order to focus on the expansion of its new fibre optic network. This is set for completion in 2019.
Vodafone has agreed to acquire Liberty Global’s operations in Germany, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Romania for an enterprise value of €18.4 billion.
The four businesses represent approximately 28 per cent of the cable group’s consolidated 2017 operating cash flow, which does not include its 50 per cent share from the VodafoneZiggo joint venture in the Netherlands.
As the pandemic underlines the value of the internet more than ever, its underlying technology is making one of its biggest transitions for years.
The data centre market is a particularly wide-ranging one, with one of the driving forces in recent years the emergence of the hyperscale data centre or cloud service provider.
As the world struggles to settle into the ‘new normal’, today’s optical networks need to be flexible in their architecture blueprint, while adapting to new technologies to provide the kinds of new capacity and service options to meet accelerated demand for higher bandwidth.
To address the undeniable growing demand for higher bandwidth, optical vendors have been playing their role with the development of various coherent optical transceivers for different areas of the market, each with its own set of design considerations.
The demand for bandwidth has unarguably skyrocketed in recent years, thanks largely to the increased appetite for online gaming, content streaming and social-media use.
The importance of reliable connectivity has never been more recognised than it is now. While ambitious targets have been in place across the world for fibre deployment for some time, the ongoing pandemic has served to push it to the forefront.
Looking into the future of telecommunications, it could be argued that AI and telcos will effectively transform each other, explains Raf Meersman
How do we, as an industry, build better broadband for a post-pandemic world? The answer could be fixed, suggests Stefaan Vanhastel
Altnets could be the key to connecting rural areas in 2021, argues Michael Armitage
A glance at the current market for fifth-generation coherent optics, and some of the latest developments available
