What’s up with… Samsung & KDDI, Rakuten, Bouygues & Aduna

• KDDI optimises its 5G SA with Samsung’s RSO
• Rakuten set to lead new Japanese LEO satellite initiative
• Bouygues Telecom joins the Aduna gang

In today’s industry news roundup: KDDI achieves significant gains in its 5G standalone network performance during a trial of Samsung’s 5G RAN Speed Optimiser (RSO); Rakuten Group is set for a major subsidy to build out a sovereign Japanese low-earth orbit network; French operator Bouygues Telecom is the latest to partner with network API aggregator Aduna; and much more!

KDDI and Samsung have completed a trial of AI-powered network optimisation technology on a commercial 5G standalone (5G SA) network in Japan, demonstrating how AI can deliver benefits to daily network performance. The test, which began in late 2025 and lasted several months, saw KDDI deploy Samsung’s AI-powered 5G RAN Speed Optimizer (RSO) on its commercial network in and around Tokyo, leveraging 100MHz of 3.7GHz TDD spectrum across hundreds of cells in dense urban, suburban and rural areas. According to Samsung, its RSO delivered an average increase of 31% in 5G downlink throughput across the trial area, hitting maximum gains of 52% in some of the denser urban areas. KDDI chief network officer Kazuhiro Furuhata said the trial “proves that individual tuning for cells… has now become a reality through the integration of AI”.

A consortium led by Rakuten Mobile’s parent company, Rakuten Group, is on course to land a 150bn yen ($924m) subsidy from the Japanese government to help fund a sovereign low-earth orbit (LEO) constellation of 150 satellites capable of providing direct-to-device (D2D) services across the country, according to Nikkei Asia (subscription required). The Japanese government is keen to have a domestically owned LEO network that can provide critical communications services from space and doesn’t have to rely on overseas companies, such as SpaceX’s Starlink, which is already enabling the D2D services on offer from Japanese telco KDDI. Rakuten Mobile is on course to offer D2D services using  the LEO network being deployed by US firm AST SpaceMobile, in which Rakuten Group is an investor, and as part of the consortium’s efforts Rakuten Group plans to create a new Japanese joint venture with AST SpaceMobile to develop and build the sovereign LEO network. The Japanese government is expected to allow D2D services to be offered using 700 MHz spectrum. 

French telco Bouygues Telecom has struck a strategic partnership with Aduna, the network API aggregator owned by Ericsson and a dozen major telcos. “This agreement marks a decisive step for Bouygues Telecom – that of an operator playing a central role in addressing key digital challenges,” noted Aduna. Chrystel Abadie Truchet, deputy MD for strategy, development and communication at Bouygues Telecom, noted: “Against a backdrop of rapid AI development and in the face of growing cyber risks, digital trust is being built in a sovereign manner on a global scale. By becoming one of the first French operators to formally announce its operational launch with Aduna, Bouygues Telecom is taking a groundbreaking step. Our ambition is clear: To harness the unquestionable reliability of our network data to protect consumers. This strategic partnership offers all sectors – including finance, e-commerce and social media – a unique technological foundation that is easy to integrate, enabling them to secure and streamline their customer journeys from start to finish.” The first network APIs to be made available are primarily aimed at sectors where the security and smooth flow of customer journeys are most critical: Banks, insurance companies, credit organisations, major e-commerce platforms and social media networks.

Ahead of its recently announced $20m takeover of Nokia’s fixed wireless access (FWA) customer premises equipment (CPE) business, San Diego-based Inseego has appointed two former Nokia executives, Ossi Korpela and Pranav Shroff, to lead its sales push in the Europe, Middle East and Asia (EMEA) and Asia Pacific (APAC) regions respectively as it expands beyond its current main North American market. Meanwhile, Inseego’s CFO, Steven Gatoff, will broaden his role to lead the company’s international expansion: He will oversee its global operating structure, support integration activities, and work closely with regional sales leadership to scale the business across EMEA, APAC and other international markets. The vendor will also invest in its international development centre in Athens, Greece, and has selected Amsterdam as its main international base, it noted in this announcement. Inseego’s CEO, Juho Sarvikas, noted recently that the M&A deal will “roughly double the size of the company, give us presence in larger markets around the world, and position us as a global leader in wireless broadband”. Inseego expects the acquisition to double the $190m in revenues the company is expecting to generate this year.  

With Wimbledon now underway, VodafoneThree (which is also still using the Vodafone UK nomenclature) is using the UK’s tennis grand slam tournament to showcase its 5G standalone network by offering fans the opportunity to come up against a real serve, recreated live from the tournament. The UK operator is the official connectivity partner for The Championships (the official name for Wimbledon). To mark its partnership with the event, Vodafone has built a pop-up stand at nearby Wimbledon Park where a robotic arm captures live service data from the Wimbledon broadcast feed and streams it over a dedicated 5G+ network slice in real time. The robotic arm can then replicate the on-court position, angle and trajectory of each serve as it leaves the player’s racquet, allowing fans to attempt to return the serve in real time. Vodafone says the demonstration shows off its 5G+ local slicing capability, which it launched earlier this year and helps deal with bandwidth issues in high-traffic, high-density situations.

German internet exchange DE-CIX has expanded its presence in the Nordics after launching what it claims is the first AI-ready internet and cloud exchange in Stockholm, Sweden. DE-CIX first expanded to the Nordics in 2023 after deploying internet exchanges in Denmark (Esbjerg and Copenhagen), Norway (Kristiansand & Oslo), and Finland (Helsinki), but from September it will begin offering its interconnection services for enterprises, network operators and cloud service providers from the Swedish capital. The new exchange will be integrated into DE-CIX’s existing global interconnection ecosystem and deployed across multiple datacentres in the Stockholm metropolitan area. DE-CIX said the exchange will be “AI-ready from day one” and designed to support data-intensive workloads and cloud-based AI applications.

– The staff, TelecomTV