A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the development and testing of telco cloud solutions has been signed between Kazakhtelecom and Cisco in Barcelona during the MWC 2019 event.

SES has announced that its newest satellite, SES-12, is now ready to serve its video, fixed data, mobility and government customers across Asia-Pacific and the Middle East.

MainOne has announced a metro fibre infrastructure project in two states of Nigeria, with support from Facebook. The infrastructure collaboration is part of Facebook’s efforts to connect more people to broadband internet.

Hammer Fiber Optics Holdings Corp (HMMR) and WCI have announced the signing of their second Letter of Intent (LoI) to provide fixed wireless, mobile data, voice and SMS services in Jamaica.

India’s Bharti Airtel is deploying Ciena’s coherent optical and intelligent software platforms to build one of the world’s largest photonic control plane networks.

Optical component and transceiver supplier Source Photonics, has opened a new $50 million-plus fabrication facility in Jintan, China, in support of its global growth plans.

Ericsson and China Unicom are developing a 5G smart harbour at the Port of Qingdao in China. The news follows a successful technical solution verification at the port.

Global cross-border payments network for emerging markets Thunes has partnered with Singtel to enable the Myanmar diaspora in Singapore to send money back to their home country through their mobile devices.

Etisalat and Huawei have formed a strategic partnership to deploy an end-to-end 5G network in UAE in 2019.

Uruguayan telco Antel and Tata Communications have joined forces to serve mobile and IoT providers in South America, Central America and the Caribbean. The partnership will act as the foundation for next-generation mobile and IoT services in sectors such as retail, utilities, construction, IT and banking.

Telefónica, Facebook, IDB Invest and CAF (Development Bank of Latin America) are launching Internet para Todos (IpT) Peru, an open access wholesale rural mobile infrastructure operator which aims to help bridge the digital divide in Latin America.

Ericsson has been selected by Ooredoo Qatar to make its ‘Supernet’ fully 5G-enabled and enhance the digital lives of people, enterprises and industries across Qatar.

Nokia and Saudi Telecom Company (STC) have signed a deal to set up a 5G network first in the western and southern part of Saudi Arabia, including the holy cities of Makkah and Madinah. The rollout phase is already ongoing and is expected to be completed by end of 2020.

Kazakh mobile operator Kazakhtelecom JSC and Swedish teleccom giant Ericsson have announced plans to cooperate for the development of 5G in Kazakhstan.

Prefabricated data centre specialist Flexenclosure is further expanding its footprint in Latin America with a new eCentre data centre order in El Salvador.

Irish tech company Zyalin Group is launching its new internet control technology product suite, iKydz, with several different providers across Ghana and Lebanon. The intention is to make internet safer for children throughout these markets.

Standard Chartered has completed a simultaneous multi-market launch of its digitally-led retail banks in Tanzania and Ghana, with Kenya’s roll out scheduled to occur shortly.

Nokia has mounted a successful field trial of its Cloud RAN architecture on the China Mobile Communications Corporation (CMCC) live 5G NSA network in Shanghai.

The South African smartphone market enjoyed solid growth in 2018, with unit sales rising 7.2% year-on-year to around 13.5 million, and value growing 13.2% to just under R35 billion.

Turkcell and Airspan have announced the first deployment of AirDensity to deliver coverage and capacity to the most constrained indoor locations in Turkey.

Although most, or 65%, of mobile Internet users visit Google, they spend most of their time on social networks Youtube and Facebook, according to Latvia’s mobile operator BITE. These websites also consume the largest amount of Internet capacity.

PPF Group has acquired a 100% stake in Serbia-based Telenor Banka from Telenor Group, having obtained the necessary regulatory approval from National Bank of Serbia.

Bolivia’s Telecommunications and Transport Regulation and Control Authority - ATT - reports that, at the end of 2018, there were 11,445,830 mobile connections in the country. This represents a penetration of just over 100%.

Nokia has announced that Bharti Airtel will trial its homogenous fronthaul solution which can support 4G, 5G and enterprise services through a common platform.

Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT) has chosen Fontech software to deliver public Wi-Fi connectivity. The deal includes Fontech’s Wi-Fi Service Management Platform (WSMP) and Connection Manager.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has released a white paper on 'Enabling 5G in India'. The TRAI notes that, globally, full scale deployment of 5G networks is expected to start by late 2019 or early 2020 and that pilots for these have already commenced.

Global communications company Viasat and social media behemoth Facebook are collaborating to accelerate the deployment of affordable, high-speed, high-quality internet to Mexican communities that lack reliable internet, or have no connectivity at all.

According to a new reports from the Canalys market research firm, Indonesia was the brightest spot in Asia Pacific’s 2018 smartphone market. Shipments there reached a record high of 38 million in the year, up 17.1% on 2017.

Chilean telecom operator Gtd Teleductos S.A. has awarded contracts worth €50 million to the Prysmian Group to develop a turnkey repeater-less submarine cable system connecting Arica to Puerto Montt in Chile.

Nokia's annual Mobile Broadband India Traffic (MBiT) Index study of mobile broadband performance in India reveals that the increase in the consumption of data across the country led to overall growth of data traffic by 109%, with 4G technology constituting 92% of this growth.

Latvian telecommunications operator LMT has deployed Harmonic ‘s EyeQ™ content-aware encoding solution for its live OTT service, delivered to TVs via 4G set-top boxes.

Phoenix Tower International (PTI) has reached an agreement with Uniti Group to acquire the ownership rights relating to over 500 wireless communication tower sites located across Mexico, Colombia and Nicaragua.

Ericsson has been selected by Telefónica Movistar México, a subsidiary of Telefónica South America, to deploy the Service Operation Center (SOC) platform to enhance subscribers’ experience through Ericsson Expert Analytics.