• ATIS gathers supporters to grab the 6G initiative
• Telefónica turns three into one
• Disney looks to a streaming future

The ‘race’ to lead the world in 6G and strategic consolidation at one of the world’s biggest telcos are the lead items in today’s news roundup.

ATIS (Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions) has pulled together an impressive collection of names to launch a new industry initiative (because we need some more…) called the Next G Alliance: Much like the Open RAN Policy Coalition, it is very much focused on putting North America at the centre of next gen communications networking developments (ie. instead of China or any place else), this time with a focus on 6G.  The alliance is “an industry initiative that will advance North American mobile technology leadership in 6G and beyond over the next decade. The Next G Alliance will encompass the full lifecycle of research and development, manufacturing, standardization and market readiness.” The launch members are AT&T, Bell Canada, Ciena, Ericsson, Facebook, InterDigital, JMA Wireless, Microsoft, Nokia, Qualcomm Technologies Inc., Samsung, TELUS, Telnyx, T-Mobile, UScellular and Verizon.’ For more details, see this press release. 

Telefónica has merged three existing business units -- wholesale, roaming, and multinational customers businesses – to form a new unit called Telefónica Global Solutions. “The new unit, part of Telefónica’s transformation and action plan, integrates these three businesses, whose teams are now joining forces to increase their capacities and continue to support their partners and customers, with a range of consistent and comprehensive services and a single goal, namely to offer innovative and global solutions to Telefónica’s customers, wherever they are.” Find out more here.

Fans of the cinema look away now… Disney is reorganizing its entertainment business to focus more on its direct-to-consumer (DTC) opportunities following what it calls “the rapid success of Disney+,” its streaming service that launched earlier this year, just as people spent more time at home due to the Covid-19 pandemic. “Under the new structure, Disney’s world-class creative engines will focus on developing and producing original content for the Company’s streaming services, as well as for legacy platforms, while distribution and commercialization activities will be centralized into a single, global Media and Entertainment Distribution organization,” noted the company in this statement.

Let’s get physical: According to UK-based Juniper Research, the subscription model for selling things online may be in the process of flipping from being mostly (and most lucratively) about digital services – video channels, for instance – to being most lucratively about physical goods. The research house expects the provision of physical goods via subscription to be growing from about $64 billion this year to $263 billion in 2025. Of course, the trend has been accelerated by the pandemic. Why brave a trip to the shops through clouds of Covid-19 when you can order up just about anything with a click of the keyboard?

Nokia says it has won a deal to provide Taiwanese operator Chunghwa Telecom with non-standalone (NSA) 5G small cells. 

- The staff, TelecomTV