What’s up with… Ericsson, Athonet, Jabil and Open RAN

• Ericsson’s Vonage buyout delayed 
• Athonet gathers the greats for private networks push 
• Jabil survey finds broad support for Open RAN

In today’s industry news roundup: Ericsson-Vonage merger hit by delays; Athonet creates 5G Consortium for private network deployments; Jabil survey finds positive vibes for Open RAN; and much more!

Ericsson’s acquisition of Vonage, which was due to complete during the first half of this year, has been delayed until at least next month as a review by the US Committee on Foreign Investment is still underway. “The merger has cleared all other requisite foreign and US regulatory approval requirements, and the parties are working to conclude the regulatory process as expeditiously as possible. Ericsson and Vonage remain fully committed to this transaction and are working towards closing before the end of July, 2022,” noted Ericsson in a statement. Ericsson announced the $6.2bn deal in November last year as part of its plan to boost its enterprise tech portfolio – see Enterprise ambition drives Ericsson’s $6.2bn swoop on Vonage.

Sensing the opportunity in the private wireless networks sector, virtualised mobile core developer Athonet has formed what it is calling the 5G Consortium. This is, effectively, a group of companies that have proven compatibility and interoperability with Athonet’s core platform, so are ready and packaged for pre-integrated deployment in a 4G, 5G or CBRS private network. Cleverly, Athonet has not started this consortium in the hope that others will join – it is launching with a bevy of big names already on board, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Federated Wireless, Google Cloud, KVM, Microsoft Azure, Syniverse and VMware, along with a number of technology specialists. “We are seeing an immense increase in interest to explore the benefits of private networks,” noted Simon O’Donnell, president of Athonet USA. “However, some companies aren’t sure of what technologies are needed, the products that are available and work together, or the companies that are available to help design, implement and maintain a private network. The 5G Consortium simplifies the process and helps enterprises understand what is needed and find the right solution.” Expect this model to become prevalent, not only to address private network deployments but for Open RAN opportunities too – see 5G Consortium Promotes Solutions for Private Mobile Networks with Athonet Mobile Core.  

An industry survey of 193 telecom industry executives involved in “the development, implementation or adoption of 5G technologies” by giant contract manufacturer Jabil has found growing confidence in the industry that Open RAN will have a significant impact on the mobile networking sector. According to the findings of the survey, “most of those polled (57%) believe Open RAN will be ready for widespread deployment alongside 5G within the next two years. In fact, 55% of survey respondents report they are seriously considering an Open RAN strategy while another 22% report already having a viable strategy in place. Across the board, survey participants believe that Open RAN will reduce capital and operational (capex/opex) expenditures.” See Jabil Announces Results of See Global Survey on 5G Technology Trends. 

Swedish operator Tele2 has expanded its relationship with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to “enhance the cloud services and cloud management portfolio that Tele2 offers its customers to enable fast and flexible access to the cloud,” noted the service provider in this announcement. “Tele2 will leverage AWS cloud capabilities to support growing customer needs in the public sector and across different industry verticals and will assist them with digitalisation of processes to enable optimised manufacturing, efficient distribution and improved customer service experiences.” Tele2 has been using the AWS cloud for “its own enterprise IT transformation, leveraging compute, analytics, and database capabilities, for several years,” and believes it can use that experience to help its customers with their cloud-related decisions and needs.

- The staff, TelecomTV