New Zealand Boosts Digital Economy with Telecoms Reform
New Zealand is overhauling its telecommunications regulations, with a review recommending 22 changes to replace legacy rules designed for copper networks. The reforms aim to streamline levy calculations, modernise access and fibre rules, and cut bureaucratic overhead, potentially saving providers an estimated NZ$35‑45 million (about $21‑$27 million USD) over ten years. By reducing compliance costs, the government expects to spur investment, improve competition, and accelerate the rollout of high‑speed digital infrastructure. The changes are pending Cabinet approval and are part of a broader push to strengthen the country’s digital economy.
Court Asked to Pause DEA-Related Lawsuit Against Trump, Pending Key Court Decision
The National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA) filed a motion to pause its lawsuit against former President Donald Trump over the suspension of Digital Equity Act (DEA) grants. The DEA, a $2.75 billion program created under the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs...
E-Power Inc. And Raytel Electronics Announce Strategic Alliance to Launch Next-Generation 800G and 1.6T High-Speed Optical Modules for U.S. AI...
E-Power Inc. and Raytel Electronics have formed a strategic alliance to co‑launch 800‑gigabit and 1.6‑terabit optical modules for U.S. AI data centers. The partnership blends Raytel’s high‑speed optical technology with E‑Power’s microgrid and anode‑based storage solutions, creating a combined data‑flow...
UK Tightens National Security Rules for Telecom Infrastructure
On 12 March 2026 the UK government issued its response to a July 2025 consultation, tightening the National Security and Investment Act (NSIA) rules through revised Notifiable Acquisition Regulations (NARs). The revisions break down the advanced‑materials schedule, add water to the scope, and...
NTIA Planning to Finish BEAD Approvals by May
The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has set a May 2026 deadline to approve the remaining state broadband spending plans under the $42.45 billion BEAD program. California, Illinois and Oklahoma are the only states still awaiting approval, while 45 states...
House Committee Approves FirstNet Reauthorization
The House Energy and Commerce Committee voted unanimously (51‑0) to advance the First Responder Network Authority Reauthorization Act, extending FirstNet’s authority through 2037. The bill adds National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) approval authority, appoints an associate administrator, and reserves...
Lawmakers Weigh Updates to 1996 Telecom Act at House Hearing
Lawmakers convened a House Communications and Technology Subcommittee hearing to examine the Telecommunications Act of 1996, acknowledging that the law’s original competition‑boosting framework has not kept pace with broadband, mobile and digital platform evolution. Chairman Rep. Richard Hudson and former...
NTT East Goes on Private 5G RIC Roll
NTT East, a unit of Japan’s NTT conglomerate, completed a landmark private‑5G laboratory trial using O‑RAN Alliance‑defined RAN Intelligent Controllers (RICs) with 26 vendor partners. The multi‑vendor tests achieved a 98.5% success rate across 335 device combinations, validating interoperability and...
The FCC Must Choose: Enforce the Rules or Preserve LEO Competition
The FCC faces a pivotal choice between enforcing its LEO deployment milestones and preserving competition in low‑Earth‑orbit broadband. Amazon has asked for a two‑year extension to meet its 1,618‑satellite Leo deadline, citing launch bottlenecks despite a $10 billion investment and a...
Telenor, GlobalConnect Fibre Deal Facing Hurdles
Norway’s competition authority has raised red flags over Telenor’s planned purchase of GlobalConnect’s fibre business, warning that the deal could lift broadband prices and degrade service quality by curbing competition. Regulators highlighted that many households might be left with only...
Frequency Matters, March 27: Cables/Connectors Section, Industry News/Events
Microwave Journal’s Frequency Matters episode on March 27 spotlights the March Cables and Connectors special‑focus section, with host Pat Hindle reviewing the latest industry articles, news and events. The show is sponsored by RFMW, a leading RF component supplier, and...
Comcast Business Powers 2026 THE PLAYERS Championship Network and Broadcast Infrastructure
Comcast Business installed a massive network for the 2026 THE PLAYERS Championship at TPC Sawgrass. The deployment featured roughly 600 miles of fiber, 400+ Wi‑Fi access points and connected 58,000 devices, supporting up to 16,500 concurrent Wi‑Fi users and 40 TB...
Strengthening Subsea Cable Security in the Indo-Pacific
The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) proposes a cooperative framework to bolster subsea cable security across the Indo‑Pacific, a region that now carries roughly 95% of global data traffic. Japan alone operates at least 20 landing stations, underscoring...
Tonga Gains New Transpacific Cable Link via Hawaiki
BW Digital announced the landing of a 383‑km spur of the Hawaiki subsea cable in Tonga, creating the nation’s second international fiber link and its first direct connection to a trans‑pacific backbone. The cable ties Tonga to Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii...
Eurobites: CityFibre Hopes for Trenches without Tailbacks
CityFibre will pilot BUKO Digital’s traffic‑management system in Worthing, using satellite‑navigation interception and social‑media alerts to smooth trench‑digging and cable‑laying during a ten‑day road closure. The trial aligns with a local‑authority scheme that rewards minimal disruption. Meanwhile, Spanish tower operator...
Deadline for Simba Telecom's M1 Acquisition Pushed Back
Keppel and Simba Telecom have agreed to push back the long‑stop date for Simba's acquisition of M1's telecom business to May 21 2026, after the Infocomm Media Development Authority extended its regulatory review. The transaction, announced in August 2025, values M1's enterprise...
Virgin Media Business Wholesale Accelerates High-Capacity Delivery in the UK
Virgin Media Business Wholesale announced a major milestone in its Project Spark network transformation, completing national upgrades to its high‑capacity core, metro and MPLS layers. The new National High‑Capacity Services core now spans 23 sites, supporting 83% of demand, while...
Virgin Media O2 Reaches 1 Million Milestone in UK Digital Inclusion Drive
Virgin Media O2 announced that it has connected one million digitally excluded people across the UK, fulfilling a core target of its Better Connections Plan. The effort combined free mobile data, device donations and expanded 4G coverage, while also delivering...
Mobile Network Spending to Fall 29% in 2026-31, Says ABI Research
ABI Research forecasts global outdoor mobile network spending to peak at $92 billion in 2026, stay flat in 2027, then tumble 29% to about $65 billion by 2031. The decline follows near‑complete 5G rollouts and early 6G planning, with 5G‑Advanced expected to...
India Can't Let BSNL Fail but It Seems Incapable of a Turnaround
India’s state‑run telecom operator BSNL has absorbed three government‑funded revival packages totaling roughly $38 billion yet remains loss‑making, with its wireless market share slipping to 7.44% in January 2026. The latest 4G rollout, delayed by an indigenous‑technology mandate, arrived only last year...
5G Deployment Drives Rural Development in Guangxi China
China Mobile and Huawei have rolled out a 5G information superhighway across Chongzuo, Guangxi, giving 94% of its natural villages 5G coverage. In Buhua Village, the upgrade has lifted collective annual income to roughly $69,000 and raised per‑capita earnings by...
Viasat & QEST Explore Next-Generation Multi-Band Antenna
Viasat and antenna specialist QEST have begun a joint study to create a dual‑band X‑band/Ka‑band airborne terminal that builds on Viasat’s Hybrid SATCOM Approach platform. The project will replace the GAT5530’s Ku‑band aperture with QEST’s TRL‑9 X‑band hardware, enabling aircraft...
MWC Barcelona 2026 Through Comarch Communications’ Eyes: Agentic AI, Satellites, and Cross-Industry Convergence
At MWC Barcelona 2026 the telecom sector signaled a pivot from pure 5G rollout to extracting commercial value through agentic AI, open network APIs and satellite‑terrestrial convergence. Operators are recasting themselves as orchestrators of digital ecosystems that serve energy, logistics,...
Telecom News: Comporium, T-Mobile, Spirent Communications
Comporium announced a $4.7 million fiber rollout in Transylvania County, North Carolina, aimed at closing broadband gaps in rural communities. T‑Mobile’s Hometown Grants program has now surpassed $21.5 million, funding infrastructure projects in 475 small towns across 49 states and Puerto Rico....
BSNL to Add up to 60,000 More Towers, FY26 Operating Profit to Grow in Double Digits: Scindia
State‑run BSNL will add 50,000‑60,000 new mobile towers, bringing its total to roughly 1.6 lakh sites, to strengthen its 4G network before a rapid upgrade to 5G. The telecom ministry highlighted a record capital outlay of ₹20,000 crore (about $2.4 billion) for the...
Telcos Navigate Subsea Cable Risks; Centre Asks for Analysis, Fallback Options as War Rages
India’s telecom regulator has asked carriers and subsea‑cable operators to produce a risk analysis and fallback plans as the war in West Asia threatens undersea data pipelines. The Strait of Hormuz carries roughly one‑third of India’s westbound traffic to the...
American Airlines in Talks with Starlink and Amazon for Wi-Fi Upgrade, Weighs Return of Seatback Screens
American Airlines is negotiating with SpaceX’s Starlink and Amazon’s Leo platform to overhaul Wi‑Fi and entertainment on its narrow‑body fleet, while also weighing the re‑installation of seat‑back screens. The carrier, which removed screens a decade ago to cut weight and...
Telstra to Add Flink to Its Event Streaming Capabilities
Telstra announced it will integrate the Apache Flink stream‑processing engine with its existing Kafka‑based event streaming platform, launching the project in the coming months. The pairing, delivered through Confluent’s managed services, aims to boost real‑time analytics across Telstra’s network observability...
USSI Global Opens Media Transport Solutions Lab
USSI Global has opened its Media Transport Solutions Lab in Melbourne, Florida, offering a platform‑agnostic environment to test alternatives to the FCC’s C‑Band media transport. The lab lets broadcasters, MSOs and network operators configure and re‑configure satellite, IP and cloud...
ORAN Development Company Lands $45M
ORAN Development Company (ODC) closed a $45 million Series A funding round, led by a consortium of technology and telecom powerhouses. The round featured investors such as Booz Allen, Cisco Investments, Nokia, NVIDIA, AT&T, MTN, and Telecom Italia, alongside Phoenix Venture Partners...
RCS 4.0 Finally Fixes the One Thing that Made Me Consider Buying an iPhone
The GSMA unveiled RCS Universal Profile 4.0 on March 26, 2026, introducing native video calling directly within messaging apps. The update also adds rich‑text formatting and enhanced Rich Card video streaming for businesses. By allowing a seamless transition from chat to video, Android...
World Cup 2026 to Test Mobile Networks Across North America
The 2026 World Cup will stretch mobile networks across the United States, Canada and Mexico as 16 stadiums host millions of fans. Ookla data shows U.S. venues delivering the fastest median mobile download speeds, with Canadian sites trailing and Mexican...
NCC Unveils Framework to Curb Fraudulent SIM Activities
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has opened a stakeholder consultation on its new Telecoms Identity Risk Management System (TIRMS) aimed at blocking fraudulently registered SIM numbers. The framework proposes amendments requiring a 14‑day notice before a line is churned and...
Verizon Customers Get a Budget-Friendly Unlimited 5G Escape With This $10/Month Plan
Noble Mobile is offering Verizon Wireless customers a limited‑time promotion that provides three months of its unlimited No Bull plan for just $10 per month, after which the price rises to $50 per month, taxes included. The plan delivers unlimited...
UK Warns 2G Shutdown Could Leave Older Devices Offline by 2033
UK regulators have announced a phased shutdown of 2G mobile networks slated for 2029‑2033, following the earlier retirement of 3G services. Any device that only supports 2G will lose voice, SMS, and data connectivity unless upgraded to 4G or 5G....
MTN Invests in AI Network Start-Up Alongside Nvidia
MTN’s digital infrastructure arm has joined a $45 million Series‑A round for US‑based ORAN Development Company (ODC), alongside Nvidia, Cisco and other telecom giants. ODC’s AI‑RAN platform will embed AI processing into radio access networks, turning traditional cell towers into edge‑computing...
World IoT Day: Wireless Logic on Data Sovereignty, Reaching 1bn Connections and the Next Phase of IoT
World IoT Day highlights that global NB‑IoT and LTE‑M connections have topped one billion, marking a decade of collaborative network expansion. Cyril Deschanel of Wireless Logic warns that the focus is shifting from merely linking devices to managing them over...
FCC Approves Order to Accelerate High-Speed Network Rollouts
The Federal Communications Commission unanimously approved a network‑modernization order that streamlines the retirement of copper telephone lines and accelerates the rollout of high‑speed fiber and wireless networks. The rule eliminates filing requirements, simplifies upgrade applications, and preempts state or local...
VectorWave Emerges From Stealth with Breakthrough Neuromorphic Analog Platform
VectorWave Corp launched a neuromorphic analog compute platform that processes raw RF signals directly in silicon, bypassing traditional digital conversion. The chip cuts inference latency from milliseconds to nanoseconds, enabling ultra‑fast, resilient communications in crowded wireless environments. The company secured...
Tech Issues Continue to Haunt 911 Systems
A Idaho Legislative Oversight report warns that the state’s 911 call‑centers and radio networks will reach end‑of‑life within two years, prompting a call for a unified statewide program. The analysis notes that 88% of U.S. emergency centers suffered a technology...
China Unicom Bets on AI Cloud Services to Break Telecoms Revenue Ceiling
China Unicom is accelerating AI deployment across consumer, enterprise, and home services, targeting 2026 as a launch point for new revenue streams beyond traditional voice and data. Its flagship AI Cloud Phone, built with Huawei, already has 18 million users and...
Colt Secures Capacity on Juno Subsea Cable
Colt Technology Services has secured capacity on NTT’s Juno subsea cable, adding a new trans‑Pacific backbone that links Los Angeles to Tokyo. The 11,700‑km Juno system, operational since last year, expands Colt’s network to include ten subsea cables and connects...
HTS Market Set to Reach $76B as Industry Enters Terabit Era
Novaspace’s latest HTS report projects global high‑throughput satellite demand to reach 218 Tbps and service revenues to climb to $76 billion by 2034, more than double current levels. The surge is fueled by rapid NGSO constellation growth, especially Starlink, which has reset...
ST Engineering iDirect and G&S SatCom Win Satellite Innovation Group Cooperation of the Year Award for Advancing Unified Network and...
ST Engineering iDirect and G&S SatCom have been honored with the Satellite Innovation Group Cooperation of the Year award for integrating G&S SatConnect® into iDirect’s next‑generation Intuition ground system. The combined platform unifies network operations, service management, and OSS/BSS through...
Cybersecurity Tops List of Infrastructure Deal Risks
Research by S‑RM shows cybersecurity has become the top reason digital and telecom infrastructure deals collapse, with 76 % of 150 global investors citing cyber concerns as the primary blocker. Over the past three years, 65 % of those investors experienced at...
Comcast's DOCSIS 4.0 Deployment Now Covers 'Millions' Of Homes
Comcast announced that its DOCSIS 4.0 rollout now serves "millions" of homes, expanding far beyond the ten markets and roughly one‑million premises covered in 2024. The carrier has installed about 225,000 digital nodes and 300,000 full‑duplex amplifiers, many of which are...
Wi-Fi 7 Phase 2 Trials by WBA Validate Wi-Fi 7 MLO for Enterprise Wi-Fi Reliability, Bandwidth and Performance
The Wireless Broadband Alliance released Phase 2 field‑trial results showing that Wi‑Fi 7’s multi‑link operation (MLO) with enhanced multi‑link single‑radio (eMLSR) dramatically improves enterprise Wi‑Fi performance. Tests with AT&T, RUCKUS Networks and Intel recorded up to 116% uplink throughput gains and 66%...
OrbitsIQ Global and Wrocław Tech Validate E-SSA Waveform for Space-Based IoT
OrbitsIQ Global announced the validation of its Enhanced Spread Spectrum Aloha (E‑SSA) waveform, co‑developed with Wrocław Tech and backed by ESA. The new protocol lets up to 500 devices share a single 4 MHz channel, processing roughly 30,000 frames per second...
Chinese Hackers Caught Deep Within Telecom Backbone Infrastructure
Rapid7 disclosed that a China‑linked state‑sponsored threat actor has embedded kernel‑level implants and passive backdoors deep within global telecom backbone infrastructure. The campaign leverages the BPFdoor Linux backdoor, CrossC2 beacons and the TinyShell framework to achieve long‑term, stealthy persistence across...
Eurobites: Vodafone Claims Irish First with Satellite Video Call
Vodafone Ireland completed Ireland’s first mobile video call routed through an AST SpaceMobile satellite using a regular smartphone, showcasing a sovereign‑network alternative to Starlink. Meanwhile, KKR and Global Infrastructure Partners have tabled bids of €6‑8 bn (≈$6.9‑$9.2 bn) for Patrick Drahi’s XpFibre...
