What’s up with… Telstra, Swisscom, Small Cell Forum

• Telstra boasts its green credentials
• Swisscom preps another DevOps centre
• Small Cell Forum predicts influx of new entrants

Telstra’s ongoing efforts to limit its impact on the environment and Swisscom’s search for DevOps expertise outside of its domestic market are the top picks in this bag of tasty news morsels.

• Telstra says it has been certified carbon neutral in its operations, receiving Climate Active’s largest certification in Australia. The operator added in this blog that it is “continuing to work to reduce our overall emissions by 50% in 10 years and while we do that, we’re purchasing carbon neutral credits to counteract our environmental impact.” As part of its efforts, Telstra says it has saved more than 13,000 MWh of energy through energy efficiency initiatives and more than 18,000 MWh through “decommissioning old equipment.” Earlier this week, Orange announced it had struck a renewable power purchase agreement with an onshore wind power specialist: Telcos are very keen these days to make themselves more environmentally friendly and also lower their costs at the same time, as we heard during the recent DSP Leaders World Forum session on Digitalisation for Sustainability. 
• Swisscom says it is planning to open its second DevOps centre outside of Switzerland, having opened its first in Rotterdam nine months ago. That site has grown from 30 developers to 60, and now the operator is in the process of building a second such site in Riga, Latvia, where it plans to employ 40 software specialists during 2021.  “It is still proving impossible for Swisscom to find enough DevOps specialists in Switzerland,” the operator notes in this announcement.
• Here’s an interesting piece of crystal ball-gazing from the Small Cell Forum that will raise a few eyebrows at the mobile operators: It believes that, by 2026, “as many as 30% of the installed base of outdoor small cell networks, and 71% of indoor enterprise systems, are likely to be operated by new entrants to the cellular segment. Not all will be new companies – there will be incomers from the cloud, Wi-Fi, tower and enterprise/private network spaces, among others. But there will also be increasing opportunities for innovative new players, such as neutral hosts, private network operators, city or enterprise specialists, who will favour flexible mobile infrastructure with end-to-end security offered by small cells.” Find out more by reading this announcement.
• Amazon Web Services has announced the general availability of AWS IoT SiteWise, a managed service that “collects data from the plant floor, structures and labels the data, and generates real-time key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics to help industrial customers make better, data-driven decisions.” SiteWise is available in the US East (N. Virginia), US West (Oregon), Europe (Frankfurt), and Europe (Ireland) AWS regions, with additional regions being added soon. AWS cites the Volkswagen Group as a customer: It is using SiteWise as part of its Volkswagen Industrial Cloud.
• Droning on… Following trials, a drone delivery service is being initiated in Scotland for transporting NHS medical supplies, test samples, PPE etc to and from remote medical practices. The flights, which use a drone fleet, satellite and mobile comms, an automated flight system and predefined routes, can take 30 minutes rather than up to 48 hours with conventional transport options. If and when it all goes well, the intention is to scale the system, developed by Skyports, Vodafone and Deloitte, to become a regular part of the NHS infrastructure. 
• What’s being touted as the world’s first 5G eSIM service has been launched by European-based Mobile Virtual Network Operator eSIM.net. Its online eSIM store’s flagship product, the Pay As You Go eSIM plan, can now operate over 5G networks in nine countries, with more being rapidly added, eSIM.net claims. The 5G eSIM service is only compatible with 5G-supported devices that also support eSIM, including selected Samsung S20, Fold and Flip models, and select Huawei P40 devices.
• BT and Vodafone have warned of potential mobile coverage “blackouts” if the UK authorities give them three years or less to rip and replace the Chinese vendor’s gear from their networks, reports the BBC.
• Meanwhile, Samsung is pitching itself as an alternative 5G vendor that can step up to the plate in the UK and be an alternative to Ericsson and Nokia, reports Reuters.
• SD-WAN services specialist Aryaka has teamed up with cloud conferencing services firm 8x8 that will see the latter’s Open Communication Platform made available over the former’s managed SD-WAN service. For more details, see this press release.
• French optical and IP systems vendor Ekinops has managed to grow its business despite the challenges of the current pandemic. It has reported a 1.7% year-on-year increase in revenues for the first half of the year to €45.8 million.
• Canadian test and analytics vendor EXFO, though, has taken a bit of a sales hit as a result of Covid-19, as revenues for its fiscal third quarter (to May 31) dipped by 10.1% to $66.1 million.

- The staff, TelecomTV