What’s up with… Vodafone, BT, T-Mobile US

• Vodafone’s admirable sustainability goal
• BT confirms and denies M&A
• T-Mobile US takes on scammers and its rivals

Vodafone’s environmentally-friendly efforts and M&A action at BT sit atop this pile of news scree.

• Vodafone says its European networks (fixed and mobile) will be 100% powered by renewable energy no later than July 2021. Such green announcements often sound familiar so you wonder whether they’re being re-announced. A quick check in the archive, however, appears to show Vodafone’s targets were less ambitious earlier this year. So congratulations Vodafone – sorry we doubted you.
• BT is selling its French unit to Computacenter: The two parties opened talks on the deal in March. BT is retrenching (which could be seen as a FTTx joke, but it isn’t…)
• Still with BT and M&A… The UK national operator has dismissed rumours that it plans to sell a stake in its Openreach fixed broadband division, reports The Times, with chairman Jan du Plessis affirming that “Openreach remains an important part of the BT group.” Media reports had suggested that BT may be looking at the potential sale of a multibillion-pound stake in the business to fund the expansion of its full fibre broadband network, with which it aims to connect 20 million premises.
• T-Mobile US has launched Scam Shield, in an efforyt to protec its customers from robocalls and other nasties. And, as ever, it has a go at its rivals at the same time as launching something new. “T-Mobile’s latest Un-carrier move, Scam Shield, takes on scams and unwanted robocalls with an unparalleled series of bold solutions to protect T-Mobile, Metro by T-Mobile and Sprint customers for free. AT&T and Verizon make millions charging for protection, and the Un-carrier is challenging them to stop profiting from fear.”
• Here’s a sign of what’s to come… The SD-WAN market may be already crowded (more than 50 companies) but here’s a new one that could be disruptive. Cloud security specialist Barracuda has launched a secure SD-WAN service called Barracuda CloudGen WAN that has been built natively on the Microsoft Azure cloud and runs inside Azure Virtual WAN Hubs that can be interconnected through the Microsoft Global Network. 
• One of Wi-Fi’s successes is the apparent consumer satisfaction around Wi-Fi calling. According to a US study by JD Power, the pandemic has exposed the value of customers being able to offload calls to Wi-Fi when the cellular signal is weak: 42% of cellular customers using Wi-Fi calling were more satisfied with their service than were those who didn’t use it, according to the research.
• Apparently undaunted by its recent setback, Huawei has announced it's investing in three "state-of-the-art" Experience Stores and Service Centres in the UK. Including its first ever own-brand store in London’s Olympic Park. 

- The staff, TelecomTV