Telekom Austria has selected Ericsson for its multi-standard radio network and LTE.
Telekom Austria Group's decision to sign a multi-standard radio access network contract with Ericsson will benefit its 23 million customers in Austria and Croatia.
The operators will also benefit from having a flexible 2G/3G/4G RAN solution underpinned by RBS 6000 multi-standard base stations.
Hans Pichler, group chief technology officer, Telekom Austria Group, said its users always come first and that's why we're so committed to continue enhancing the customer experience for our subscribers.
Huawei, a leading global information and communications technology (ICT) solutions provider, on Thursday announced a new proposal for the LTE-Advanced Multi-Stream Aggregation (MSA) technology standard that is capable of increasing data rates at the cell's edge.
With the development of mobile broadband, operators are mostly concerned about user experience. With mobile coverage, should able to enjoy the same quality of services no matter where they are. However, with mobile communication systems, the most challenging issue is system performance at the cell's edge.
The concept behind Huawei's MSA technology is that the user is always able to receive downlink data and aggregate downlink data streams from a cell or cell group with the best signal quality. A similar method applies to uplink data, where the user always transmits uplink data to a cell or cell group with the best signal quality. The uplink data streams are aggregated on the network side.
Mobile equipment major Alcatel-Lucent has decided to slash 5,000 jobs.
The telecom equipment maker will restructure unprofitable markets as part of a program to lower costs by 1.25 billion euros ($1.52 billion) by the end of next year.
Alcatel-Lucent will miss its 2012 profit margin target and pre-announced an adjusted operating loss of 40 million euros on sales above 3.5 billion in the second quarter.
The job cuts will affect 6.4 percent of Alcatel-Lucent's 78,000 employees. The group will also seek to get rid of unprofitable services contracts in which it manages networks for operators, squeeze more money out of its patent portfolio, and exit or restructure in countries where it is weak.
Alcatel-Lucent also gave a new annual profit target of posting a second-half adjusted operating margin better than the first half when it stood at minus 3.7 percent. It confirmed its prior target of aiming for a strong positive net cash position at the end of 2012.
Recently, Nokia and RIM announced their plans to cut jobs.
Alcatel-Lucent said sales in its wireless and optic divisions had a double-digit decline in revenue because of moderate spending from service providers. Sales in its software, services and solution segment also declined, and the services business was almost flat, it added.
Revenue in North-America, Europe and the Asia Pacific region witnessed a double-digit decline, the company said, adding that the decline in Asia was mainly driven byChina, where sales fell by 21 percent.
Competitive pricing was one of the main reasons that eroded profitability, the company said. Overall revenue was €3.5 billion, down 7.1 percent year-over-year.
"These times demand firm actions," said Alcatel-Lucent's CEO Ben Verwaayen in a statement. Besides cutting 6.6 percent of its total of 76,000 employees the company also plans to exit and restructure unprofitable markets and is planning to manage its patent portfolio as an independent profit center, it said.
Huawei is set to retain top telecom equipment vendor position in coming quarters, thanks to its growing revenue from enterprise and mobile phone businesses.
Its main rivals - Ericsson and Nokia Siemens - do not have this big opportunity to compete with the Chinese telecom equipment maker.
Chinese telecoms giant Huawei Technologies on Tuesday reported a 5.1 percent rise in sales to 102.7 billion yuan (US$16.1 billion) for first-half 2012, ended Jun. 30, which surpassed Ericsson's 106.3 billion kronor (US$15.25 billion) over the same period.
Since 2011, the slowdown in the global market have seen telecom operators worldwide reporting lower income and profits, resulting in even greater competition between telecom equipment manufacturers.
"[Huawei] continues to maintain robust growth momentum, although the global economic situation and telecom equipment market remains a significant challenge," said the company.
The Chinese telco player was "relatively optimistic" about the operating performance and profitability for the remainder of 2012, said its CFO Meng Wanzhou.
According to Ying Weimin, President of Huawei GSM&UMTS<E Network, Huawei helped Deutsche Telekom, Telefonica, Telenor, TeliaSonera, and Vodafone launch their LTE services commercially.
Nokia Siemens Networks has deployed a telecoms operating system for Japanese mobile operator KDDI to create intelligent, self-organizing network. According to the company, the intelligent Self Organizing Networks (iSON) approach automatically manages KDDI’s 3G and 4G LTE networks to ensure people receive a consistent voice and data service, irrespective of the network they are using. This approach from Nokia Siemens Networks operates country-wide, across networks built with equipment from multiple vendors.
The iSON solution allows the operator to automate and optimize its network operating processes across multiple technologies and vendors, said the company. iSON is a key part of Nokia Siemens Networks’ Liquid Net-based approach to efficiently managing the demands of delivering efficient mobile broadband, whilst delivering and managing a valuable customer experience.
Nokia Siemens Networks further adds that it’s multi-vendor iSON provides KDDI with a unified and flexible platform as well as an integration layer for dynamic and cost efficient multivendor operations. Consolidating the OSS landscape across networks, NetAct automatically tunes the networks to be more responsive to traffic fluctuations. This saves manual effort and improves network availability. It also increases the interworking performance across 3G and LTE by automatic adaptations of the system linkage parameters such as Self configured Circuit Switched FallBack (CSFB).Mobility Robustness Optimization (MRO) automatically adapts and speeds up LTE network optimization and improvement cycle.
Ericsson has been ranked second in Operation and Business Support Systems (OSS/BSS) and next generation Service Delivery Platforms.
Gartner, in its latest report, said Ericsson has been ranked #2 worldwide on Telecom Operations Management Systems (BSS, OSS and SDP) 2011 based on revenue.
Gartner ranks Ericsson #2 in this growing market and states that had Ericsson's numbers included the performance of recently acquired Telcordia's solutions and services - the company would have topped the worldwide chart in 2011.
"With the increased need for operators to rapidly respond to changing consumer demands and the need for increased efficiency and innovation, Operations and Business Support Systems are a key element of any operator's network strategy. We already have a leading position in key areas such as charging and billing, where we serve 1.7 billion people with our solutions," said Per Borgklint, head of Ericsson's Support Solutions business.
Through the acquisition of Telcordia, completed on January 12, Ericsson has strengthened its position in service fulfillment, assurance and network optimization.
Through Ericsson's consulting and systems integration engagements, Ericsson offers end-to-end solutions to service providers that cover business processes, competences and technologies in OSS, BSS, and next-generation Service Delivery Platforms. This enables business innovation, improved customer experience, and operational efficiency.
In total in 2011, Ericsson signed 33 new significant contracts for OSS, BSS, SDP and Data Center build, out of which 26 were for OSS and BSS.
Ericsson will strengthen its multimedia business by focusing on OSS/BSS, TV & media and m-commerce. The company is re-strengthening the multimedia business after reporting 66 percent decrease in Q4 2011 profit at SEK 1.5 billion from SEK 4.4 billion in Q4 2010.
