• Apple does “what it does best” at WWDC25
• AT&T goes turbo, hits FTTX milestone
• Is Mike Sievert heading for the T-Mobile US exit door?

In today’s industry news roundup: Apple unveils new software, interfaces and developer tools at its annual tech conference; AT&T targets B2B and hits the 30 million premises passed mark for its fibre access network; speculation mounts that the T-Mobile US chief might take an early bath; and much more!

In the wake of the news that Jony Ive, the iPhone design guru, is cooking up new device form factors under the umbrella of Sam Altman’s OpenAI (which acquired Ive’s io startup for a reported $6.4bn), Apple has opened its annual WWDC (Worldwide Developer Conference) with a slew of new launches and updates designed to keep its large customer base engaged and enthralled. Among the launches are: A new operating system, iOS26, with a “liquid glass” interface and new app designs; new Apple Intelligence (AI) features across its devices, as well as an expansion of the number of languages supported by the company’s version of artificial intelligence; and a slew of “new technologies and enhancements to its developer tools to help developers create more beautiful, intelligent and engaging app experiences across Apple platforms.” Anisha Bhatia, senior technology analyst at GlobalData, noted in this announcement that “Apple did what Apple does best – simplifying user interfaces for daily use and enhancing the seamless integration and uniform appearance of its devices across various platforms. The key highlights from the event included a streamlined operating system naming convention aligned with the current year, improvements to continuity features across its ecosystem, and the introduction of a new design aesthetic known as Liquid Glass across products… Apple Intelligence was peppered throughout the announcements. The Cupertino-based company acknowledged the need for additional time to meet its quality standards – the nonchalant manner of the announcement reflected Apple’s confidence in its ongoing development, despite recent discussions around AI advancements in the industry,” added Bhatia. 

The quest to generate incremental and profitable revenues from the enterprise sector continues… AT&T has launched Turbo for Business, a service “designed to deliver a prioritised treatment of your business data” and “provide a more consistent network experience and data connectivity,” though it sounds to us more like a 1990s movie starring Tom Cruise. “Turbo for Business helps give applications on mobile business devices the edge they need by offering the highest data priority treatment commercially available on AT&T’s wireless network,” stated the operator in this announcement. “This means essential operations – large data transfers, point-of-sale transactions, high-speed financial trading, and dispatch systems – stay fast, reliable, and consistent.” 

And still with AT&T… The operator boasts in this announcement that it has “further cemented its position as the nation’s leading fibre internet provider by achieving its goal of passing more than 30 million consumer and business locations across the US with its fibre broadband network ahead of plan.” The operator’s fibre access network passed 29.5 million premises at the end of March, so it has added about 500,000 new locations in the past 10 weeks or so. AT&T’s CEO John Stankey noted: “We’re proud to now pass more than 30 million fibre locations – halfway to our goal of reaching approximately 60 million homes and businesses across America,” a target that the telco plans to reach by the end of 2030. AT&T aims to add to its current total through the acquisition of Lumen’s Mass Markets fibre broadband access business in a $5.75bn cash deal announced in May – the Lumen fibre access network currently reaches 4 million premises and already connects 1 million fibre broadband customers.  

German business and financial newspaper Handelsblatt has reported that Mike Sievert, the president and CEO of T-Mobile US, is expected to depart the company either later this year or early in 2026. Sievert joined the operator as head of marketing in 2012, became COO in 2015 and has been at the helm of the so-called “Un-carrier” since May 2020. After 13 years of intense work, Sievert has reportedly complained of fatigue and a desire to take a break from his all-encompassing daily toil and step down well before the end of his current contract expires in 2028. Sievert has presided over a very successful era as T-Mobile US has grown quickly, made good use of its early 5G standalone (SA) investments and grown its subscriber base to 131 million as of the end of March this year. The operator’s share price, at $237.95, is more than 132% higher than it was five years ago when he began his tenure as CEO. Responding to the Handelsblatt article, a T-Mobile US spokesperson said, “We don’t comment on rumours or speculation… [Mike] loves his job.” Hmm... that doesn’t mean he wants to stay in it forever, or even until 2028, does it? Meanwhile, Deutsche Telekom (DT), which owns a majority stake in T-Mobile US, has declined to comment. If Sievert, who earned more than $30m in 2024 and more than $37m in 2023, was to step down, he is most likely to be succeeded by Srini Gopalan, who was parachuted into T-Mobile US in January this year as chief operating officer (COO). At the time, we noted that the move “strongly suggests that Gopalan, who is 54, is being lined up as Sievert’s successor”. That day might come sooner than many had expected. 

The latest European telco M&A speculation comes from Spain where, according to Bloomberg, Telefónica and MásOrange have been plotting to acquire and split up Vodafone Spain, which was acquired by Zegona Communications for €5bn in May 2024. But such a move would require an enormous change of heart from regulators, who were keen to ensure that Digi Spain was in a position to be a credible fourth infrastructure-based competitor when MásOrange was formed through the merger of Orange Spain and MásMóvil in March 2024. Those regulators, though, are under constant pressure from telcos such as Telefónica – particularly under new CEO Marc Murtra, who is planning a major overhaul of the telco – to allow in-country and cross-border consolidation in Europe to enable telcos to gain greater economies of scale and become more financially stable, though antitrust concerns are always an issue in such instances. And according to Expansion, Telefónica has hired AZ Capital to explore the pros and cons of acquiring Vodafone Spain. As our wise elders used to say, there’s no smoke without fire!

With an eye on growing revenue-generating opportunities in the enterprise services sector, telcos are set to ramp up their investments in AI-enabled security systems from $2.5bn this year to $4.6bn in 2029, according to a new forecast from Juniper Research. The analyst firm has “attributed this expected additional spend to operators’ greater focus on growing their B2B revenue streams for industries such as transportation, healthcare and energy, where the security of networks is imperative,” noted Juniper Research. Juniper noted that while AI is already being used to analyse data and automate manual security operations, it believes telcos need to “orient their strategies on autonomy, with technologies such as agentic AI being key to creating intelligent and autonomous network security systems” that will meet the needs of enterprise users. Juniper Research analyst Alex Webb noted: “Agentic AI will enable operators to inject autonomy into their network security operations, responding in real time to threats to the network while retaining efficiency. These systems will better position operators to protect enterprise traffic, providing the foundation for strong B2B revenue growth.” 

Despite a great deal of development having taken place over recent years, the telecom sector in Africa still faces massive challenges. In many countries across the continent, network infrastructure is still incomplete and sometimes absent altogether, the price of computers and information services can be astronomically high, the manufacture of advanced technology equipment is difficult and expensive and many of the best scientists and researchers even leave their home countries to take up opportunities in other parts of the world. Various initiatives to improve the situation have been tried, with varying degrees of success, and now, according to Financefeeds, the African Telecoms Union (ATU) is initiating a new one. It has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the London, UK-headquartered Metaverse Institute (MI), which was founded in 2022, “to promote the adoption and regulation of metaverse technologies across the continent.” At first sight, it seems strange to attribute such high credence to an overhyped concept and generally unrealised virtual environment that has already been put on ice in other parts of the world as investments in AI and cloud platforms grow and technologies such as quantum computing attract increasing R&D resources. However, according to the MI, “enough metaverse potential remains for organisations, including governments, research institutes, institutional investors and corporations, to identify the relevance of the metaverse to them and develop strategies to begin using the technology to achieve their goals.” John Omo, the current secretary of the ATU, says the MoU is an “historic step in our digital journey that positions Africa to lead in the next generation of internet platforms” as “Africa’s youth is marching toward a new world of digital opportunities… we must act now to build safe, inclusive virtual economies and communities”. The ATU is a bureaucracy of five internal divisions: The Conference of Plenipotentiaries (CPL), the Administrative Council, the Technical and Development Conference, the General Secretariat, and Non-Permanent Units. The CPL convenes every four years and is attended by the Ministers of Communications from across Africa: It has 46 member states and 16 associate members. Meanwhile, according to its website, the Metaverse Institute (MI) comprises “a group of leading pioneers and thought leaders in the metaverse, artificial intelligence, and related technologies.” It adds, “The benefits of the metaverse promise to deliver step changes in increased revenues alongside reducing cost, leading to effective and efficient profits.” The MI works with “educational institutions and businesses to develop and implement their metaverse strategies, with a strong focus on their training needs in this fast-changing new ecosystem – and how they can use these to drive real-world benefits using proven measures.” The institute notes that despite the metaverse having had many billions of dollars spent on it, to minimal effect, “metaverse technologies still hold great promise”. Thus, “over $5tn will flow toward training humanoid robots in safe metaverse-based virtual environments alone.” It doesn’t say when, but perhaps they’ll have legs this time around? Zuckerberg’s development staff tried to fix that particular problem and failed, even though he changed Facebook into Meta. The CEO of the Metaverse Institute, Christina Yan Zhang, commented, “We are honoured to comprehensively evaluate the impact of emerging technologies and the virtual worlds ecosystem on the continent, delivering pragmatic recommendations to maximise Africa’s global competitiveness. Together, we envision a digitally empowered Africa by 2063.” So in 38 years then? The metaverse will need regulating rather sooner than that – and new technologies will emerge.

– The staff, TelecomTV