• Spain’s MásOrange to be owned outright by Orange
• Millicom adds Ecuador’s Otecel to its portfolio 
• VodafoneZiggo targets greener RAN operations

In today’s industry news roundup: Orange looks set to take full control of Spain’s largest telco (by subscriber numbers) by acquiring the 50% of MásOrange it doesn’t already own; as Millicom grows its presence in Latin America, so Telefónica retreats further; Ericsson is helping Dutch operator VodafoneZiggo cut its RAN energy consumption as part of a broad network upgrade; and much more!

Orange has decided to press ahead with highly anticipated plans to buy the 50% stake in Spanish joint venture (JV) telco MásOrange that is currently held by Lorca, the private-equity consortium of Cinven, KKR and Providence Equity Partners. In a statement, Orange said it has reached a “non-binding agreement” with Lorca to acquire full ownership of MásOrange, meaning it will splurge €4.25bn on the 50% of the JV that it does not already own. The signing of a binding agreement is expected to take place before the end of 2025, and the transaction is then likely to be completed in the first six months of 2026. According to Orange, the deal will “accelerate” its Lead the Future strategic plan, and further strengthen its position in Spain, the group’s second-largest market in Europe. “With full ownership, Orange confirms its long-term industrial commitment in Spain, and its confidence in MásOrange and its management to create value for all stakeholders,” the operator said. The move comes more than a year after the formation of MásOrange through the merger of Orange Spain with MásMovil. The shareholder agreement formed at the time contains clauses enabling MásOrange’s owners to instigate an initial public offering (IPO) under certain conditions after April 2026, and allowing Orange to take control of the business at the proposed IPO price. However, it has been speculated for some time that Orange and the private equity funds behind Lorca were keen to reach a deal before a possible IPO could take place. MásOrange is the largest telco in Spain by customer numbers, ending September this year with 26.2 million mobile connections and 7.2 million fixed broadband connections. It reported revenues of €5.66bn for the first nine months of 2025, up 3.7% compared with the same period a year earlier, and adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of almost €2.2bn, up by 8.3%. MásOrange ended September with net debt of €12.5bn.  

Meanwhile, there are ongoing rumours about further market consolidation in Spain, with MásOrange and Telefónica said to have held informal discussions over buying and dividing up Vodafone Spain, which itself was acquired by Zegona Communications in 2024. 

As for Telefónica, the Spanish group has completed the sale of yet another business in Latin America. Millicom announced last week that it has purchased 100% of Telefónica Ecuador (known as Otecel) for $380m. The move comes less than a month after Telefónica completed the sale of its business in Uruguay to Millicom for $440m. In this statement, Marcelo Benitez, CEO of Millicom, said the acquisition “underscores our long-term confidence in Latin America and further consolidates Millicom’s leadership as a premier digital connectivity provider in the region. By entering Ecuador, we strengthen our platform to expand digital access, empower communities, and drive economic and social progress”. Alfonso Gómez, CEO of Telefónica Hispam, added that Ecuador “showed us the power of technology when it is put at the service of people. We leave grateful and proud to have contributed to the country’s digital development for more than two decades, supporting its cities and communities in crucial moments, and to leave behind a solid, modern operation ready for the future. We wish Millicom every success in this new stage”. Headquartered in Luxembourg and 40% owned by French billionaire Xavier Niel (via Atlas Investissement, which in turn is owned by Iliad Holding), the expansive Millicom (which operates under the Tigo brand) is now present in 11 markets – Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Uruguay, and now Ecuador. In contrast, Telefónica is seeking to exit the region (apart from Brazil), and has also sold its operations in Argentina, Colombia and Peru (see this article).

Dutch telco VodafoneZiggo announced it has signed a three-year agreement with its long-term technology partner Ericsson to upgrade and expand its mobile network across the Netherlands. According to this release, 3,000 sites are involved in the programme, including the rollout of VodafoneZiggo’s newly acquired 3.5GHz spectrum, modernisation of the existing network infrastructure and performance management of the upgraded network. Ericsson will provide and deploy its latest “ultralight” TDD massive MIMO radio, the AIR 3255, which “offers up to 63% reduction in energy consumption and is 58% lighter than its predecessor, weighing only 12kg”. Ericsson added that other network solutions will be introduced to “further reduce energy usage, streamline installation processes and ensure high performance remains uncompromised”. Ericsson also recently announced a five-year programmable networks partnership with Vodafone, which owns 50% of VodafoneZiggo. The Dutch JV launched a new strategic plan earlier in 2025 and in October said the new strategy was helping to improve commercial momentum. 

The Joint Open Infrastructure for Networks Research (JOINER), a key telecom research hub in the UK, has announced that its first international connection is now live at Trinity College Dublin in Ireland, with further international expansion said to be already in the pipeline. The international node is located in the Open Ireland testbed, which was launched by the Connect Centre and has been headquartered at Trinity College Dublin since 2020. Funded by Research Ireland, Connect brings together 12 universities and telecoms research institutes from across Ireland and includes around 200 researchers. As explained by Professor Dimitra Simeonidou, director of Joiner and Smart Internet Labs at the University of Bristol, “In the two years since this venture began, incubated through the EPSRC future telecoms hubs, we’ve stacked up a growing pile of milestones. At first, scaling across the UK felt ambitious. We soon realised that our foundation was strong enough to extend Joiner’s reach even further. With the addition of a new node in Ireland, based at Trinity College Dublin, our footprint has gone international. Later this year, we’ll expand to new continents, with demonstrations planned through Joiner with Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute”. Joiner is led by the University of Bristol alongside three core partners that represent three other telecom hubs – Cheddar, HASC, and Titan – and is supported by the UK Research and Innovation’s (UKRI) Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). It brings together the capabilities of over 15 universities and labs in “one ecosystem” to “[accelerate] the process of validation and co-creation of 6G technologies and applications, coordinating and federating new future networks testbed initiatives for research, innovation and adoption trials”. You can find more details about the telecoms hubs here, and how they collaborate on a federated basis to drive telecoms innovation.

Beleaguered Australian operator Optus is accelerating the process of bringing the management of its networks back in-house following its recent high-profile and damaging service outages. The telco had outsourced network management operations to Nokia in 2018 but decided in May this year, months before the outages, to bring that work back in-house. Following the recent disruptions, Optus is now speeding up that transfer process to gain greater control over its networks as quickly as possible, reports Australia’s ITnews. The news came as Optus came under even more pressure about how it reacted to the emergency services outage in September that was linked to four deaths. 

When national leaders of democratic countries are ousted by their electorates, most want to leave some kind of a legacy for people, or history, to remember them by. In the US, it’s Presidential Libraries of varying opulence, accessibility and relevance: In the UK, in the case of former prime minister Tony Blair anyway, it is his “think tank”, the modestly monikered “Tony Blair Institute for Global Change (TBI)”. That organisation has just published a readable and relevant report on quantum computing in the UK. Authored, at least in part, by Blair himself and former leader of the Conservative party and professional Yorkshireman, William Hague (who harboured unfulfilled aspirations to be a prime minister himself), A New National Purpose: A UK Quantum Strategy for Sovereignty and Scale warns that “history won't forgive us” if Britain fails to grasp a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and thus drops down the field in the global race to master and dominate quantum computing. Noting that the UK has had a similar opportunity where AI is concerned but seems instead to be settling for niche positions in some, but by no means all, of what AI can and might do, the report calls for immediate development of a UK national strategy for quantum computing and points out several specific capabilities that the country must have (or acquire) if it is ever to be a world force in quantum technologies. The report further argues that Britain’s current quantum strategy will not “scale national champions capable of reaping the economic rewards and building the necessary sovereign capability” unless the UK quickly comes up with a fully agreed and properly formulated strategy to scale and commercialise quantum computing. It adds that, “as market consolidation accelerates and early-mover advantages set in, the UK must connect its R&D ecosystem to industry, mobilise capital, drive adoption and ensure that its companies have access to enabling infrastructure.” The question is, how to go about it. The quantum market is in flux, both growing at phenomenal speed and consolidating rapidly while the estimated value-add from quantum computing across vertical market sectors, such as automotive, comms, chemical, financial and life-sciences industries, will be more than $1tn by 2035. The EU has already published its quantum strategy for just about everything from telecom infrastructure to military applications, while China is ploughing upwards of $15bn a year into quantum R&D. However, for the UK, a strong research and development base, which the country certainly does have, will, alone, not be enough to keep the country in the top echelons. Indeed, Britain’s quantum ecosystem is strategically exposed – it is home to the second-highest number of quantum startups in the world but lacks the necessary high-risk capital and infrastructure to scale those startups into world-beating companies. However, as the report emphasises, the UK does have the tools to enable success provided they are used properly, coherently and quickly by, for example, investing in applied research to free engineering bottlenecks, mobilising high-risk capital, securing infrastructure and supply chains to ensure scalability and security, as well as creating early demand at home through procurement reforms and incentives for UK companies to adopt quantum technologies. The government too has a major role to play across departments and agendas, but for this to be effective, quantum must not be relegated to a separate, niche policy area but must be an integral part of a much broader technology strategy and perceived as a catalyst for other crucial emergent technologies. The time to strike is whilst the iron is hot – and at the moment it is incandescent.

The US regulator, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), has bowed to intense lobbying on the part of American ISPs and is to repeal its own “declaratory ruling” of January this year requiring telcos and operators to properly secure their networks. The regulation was adopted as a reaction to Chinese-sponsored cyberattacks on major telecom providers, including AT&T and Verizon, by the likes of Salt Typhoon. Indeed, the then chair of the FCC, Jessica Rosenworcel, said the agency had to update regulations because Salt Typhoon had “breached nine domestic telecommunications and internet service providers” and “compromised devices like routers and switches by exploiting old equipment, facilities that had not been updated, and network components that lacked basic cybersecurity protocols”. It should also be remembered that granular level attacks on Call Register Index abstracted voice and video calls made by the likes of President Trump and Vice President Vance, among other politicians. However, as specialist tech site Ars Technica reports, the newish chairman of the FCC, Brendan Carr, justifies the upcoming action on the grounds that the regulation was introduced immediately before Trump took presidential office for the second time and it was, therefore, invalid because it “exceeded the agency’s authority and did not present an effective or agile response to the relevant cybersecurity threats.” The late Biden-era FCC’s decision to issue a declaratory ruling was based on the FCC board’s majority view that the US Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) requires telcos to secure their networks from unlawful access to or interception of communications and that carriers could be in breach of their statutory obligations if they fail to adopt certain cybersecurity practices. It ruled that “network segmentation” was central to its decision as had been discovered in the case of just one telco, a single administrator account had access to over 100,000 routers. This allowed the Chinese hackers to gain sweeping access across the entire network. Earlier this year, a Democrat senator, Ron Wyden, representing Oregon, said the Salt Typhoon incursions were, “the direct result of US phone carriers’ failure to follow cybersecurity best practices, such as installing security updates and using multi-factor authentication, and federal agencies failing to hold these companies accountable.” Now the Republican-dominated “new” FCC says the former board’s decision was “legally erroneous” as well as “unnecessary”. And what will replace it? Exactly what the ISPs wanted – a “collaborative approach voluntary agreement via federal-private partnerships” whereby ISPs will “implement additional cybersecurity controls to harden their networks.” No worries then?

– The staff, TelecomTV