The silver jubilee celebrations of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) seem to have been the occasion for some important announcements too – notably announcements involving 5G and long-awaited Department of Telecommunications (DoT) reforms.

More controversy seems imminent in the row about Safaricom’s alleged dominance of the Kenyan market. African press reports now suggest that the operator’s mobile termination rates (MTRs) are soon going to be controlled by the government in a bid to protect Safaricom’s smaller rivals.

Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group (VNPT) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Casa Systems to explore 5G capabilities and pave the way for next-generation network services in Vietnam.

The wearable market in India recorded double-digit growth in Q1 2022 as a result of new launches, discounts and aggressive marketing by vendors.

Deutsche Telekom’s Romanian unit GTS Telecom has commissioned Ciena to upgrade its network from 10G to 100G nationwide.

Alibaba Cloud, described as the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Chinese e-commerce giant the Alibaba Group, has launched its first data centre in Thailand – and has been highlighting the security aspects of the new facility.

An interesting story recently highlighted in the Indian press raises the possibility that India’s ongoing 4G expansion and 5G rollout may face an additional problem apart from unattractive pricing and arguments over spectrum allocation. Another issue, reports suggest, could be testing.

Rural and remote parts of both Latin America and Europe are set to benefit from a deal involving low earth orbit (LEO) satellite communications company OneWeb and global telecommunications company Telefonica.

Leading Kenyan operator Safaricom is reportedly planning to raise up to $2 billion from local banks and development finance institutions over the next five years to fund its new Safaricom Ethiopia operation. Part of the proposed funding will also be raised internally and through rental financing from equipment vendors.

The board of Argentina’s regulator ENACOM (Ente Nacional de Comunicaciones / National Communications Agency) has approved the allocation of additional 2600MHz spectrum to the country’s mobile providers as they seek to augment their LTE coverage.

Viettel and chip manufacturer Qualcomm announced a collaboration to develop next-generation technology to fast track the development and rollout of 5G in Vietnam and globally.

MTN Ghana has selected Tecnotree’s digital transformation stack for B2B and B2C, allowing the operator to meet its enterprise market demand and deliver augmented customer experiences at a reduced cost.

A deal that has the potential to be one of the largest foreign investments in the data centre sector in Indonesia, carrying an estimated enterprise value of US$300 million, has just been announced.

Claro Colombia has announced it will fully dismantle its 2G network by December this year to divert resources to 4G, and is urging customers to trade in their old devices to maintain their services next year.

Vodafone’s Papua New Guinea unit has signed interconnection agreements with rivals Telikom and Digicel, a move to advance its status in the country and fulfil a government coverage demand.  

Guinea’s telecom market is dominated by MTN and Orange. After the entry of these regional players, the number of mobile subscribers grew strongly while revenue also increased steadily.

Mali’s topography includes large tracts of sparsely populated desert, with many settlements being hard to reach and thus rendering it difficult and expensive to provide effective fixed or mobile networks.

Telecom services in Madagascar have benefited from intensifying competition between the main operators, including Orange Madagascar, Airtel, and the incumbent telco Telma.

Zimbabwe’s telcos continue to be affected by the country’s poor economy. This has been exacerbated by the significant economic difficulties related to the pandemic.

The partners in the South East Asia Hainan – Hong Kong Express Cable System (SEA-H2X) cable project have reaffirmed their partnership to construct and operate the system and say that it is targeted to be ready for service in 2024.

Laos joined the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in 2013. One of the conditions of admittance was to establish an independent regulator for its telecom sector within two years.

Cloud banking platform provider Temenos has signed up Saigon-Hanoi Bank (SHB) for its digital banking platform, a move for the lender to meet the rising demand for electronic banking in Vietnam.

The Kyrgyz Republic (more commonly known as Kyrgyzstan) has enjoyed relatively strong economic growth over the last decade – at least in terms of other Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries in Eastern Europe and Asia that formed following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Hungary has commenced the next stage of its device replacement subsidy programme, which offers mobile users HUF20,000 (US$63.4) towards the cost of a 4G or 5G device if they currently only have access to a 2G or 3G handset.

The past week has seen some strong measures from Costa Rica’s incoming president directed at Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (Grupo ICE) the Costa Rican government-run electricity and telecommunications services provider.

Vodafone Idea (Vi) has selected Nokia’s DWDM solution in the access layer to upgrade its network to 5G for meeting future service capacity and reliability needs.

Liquid Intelligent Technologies and PEACE Cable Company have partnered to introduce 800Gbps of additional subsea capacity in Mombasa on the latter’s global submarine cable.

There’s been good news at last for cash-strapped Indian operator Vodafone Idea as recent results still indicate a net loss – but a slightly less worrying one than the results from the previous quarter.

The Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (POTRAZ) announced that Telecel, NetOne and Econet are now sharing 267 sites.

Angola Cables, a multinational ICT solutions and network service provider, and Flexential, a provider of data centre colocation, cloud and connectivity, have announced a partnership to drive colocation and interconnection options for customers in Southern and West African markets.