What’s up with… Lumen, Infobip, Vodafone

• Lumen closes $475m Alkira acquisition
• Infobip warns of worsening cyber fraud environment
• Vodafone signs up to UK’s Cyber Resilience Pledge

In today’s industry news roundup: US network operator bulks up its NaaS portfolio by completing $475m Alkira acquisition; cloud comms platform specialist Infobip doesn’t have any good news about digital fraud trends; Vodafone is among 60 organisations to promise to strengthen their cyber defences; and much more!

US long-distance network operator Lumen Technologies has completed its $475m all-cash acquisition of cloud-native network-as-a-service (NaaS) platform specialist Alkira in a move that Lumen hopes will help it build its B2B customer base. “By combining Alkira’s technology with Lumen’s physical infrastructure, programmable network, and partner ecosystem, Lumen aims to simplify how enterprises build and manage their networks as environments grow more complex,” noted Lumen in this announcement. “Unlike providers that offer only connectivity or orchestration, Lumen now brings together both the physical network foundation and an on-demand platform to accelerate a more programmable, AI-ready network experience. The Alkira acquisition strengthens Lumen’s position as the trusted network for AI, while expanding the networking, cloud, security and AI services customers need to run more agile, connected operations,” Lumen added. The deal was first announced in early May, when Lumen CEO Kate Johnson noted: “For decades, networking ran in the background. Today, it’s the central nervous system, determining how fast you can move, how much you spend and whether your AI investments produce value. With Alkira, Lumen will pair the trusted network for AI with a cloud-native control plane, which will give customers a programmable network designed for the AI era. It’s what the market needs, and it’s what we’re building at Lumen.”

New figures from cloud communications platform Infobip reveal that the global fraud and spam environment in 2025 was more intense than in previous years, as both the sophistication and geographic reach of attacks grew. In its 20th Fraud Security Trends report, Infobip shared figures – recorded using its own fraud detection platform – that showed blocked traffic had grown 77% from 2024 to 2025, due to an increasing number of attacks and expanded detection capabilities. Phishing made up the majority of blocked pattern-based attacks (around 50%) and was also the dominant attack blocked due to URL detection. Overall, phishing accounts for 49% of all blocked messages. Using AI-powered detection, however, highlighted gambling and other scams much more. Infobip also broke down the data regionally, with the most drastic growth seen in North America (223%), Europe (119%) and Africa (118%).

Vodafone Group is among the first 60 businesses to sign up to a new UK government pledge to boost cyber defences. The voluntary Cyber Resilience Pledge has been designed for medium and large businesses and asks signatories to take three key steps to boost cybersecurity within their organisations: Make it a board-level responsibility; register for the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) free Early Warning tool, which alerts organisations to potential threats on their network; and take a risk-based approach to certification across their entire chain. The pledge was officially launched at 10 Downing Street by UK Technology Secretary Liz Kendall on Tuesday and is a central part of the UK government’s National Cyber Action Plan, in a bid to curb cyberattacks, which cost the UK almost £15bn every year. Alongside Vodafone Group, and its UK joint venture VodafoneThree, other signatories in the tech sector include Microsoft UK, Cloudflare, Accenture, Capgemini and TechUK, as well as organisations across several other sectors – the full list is available from the UK government website here.

Irish core network software firm Druid Software is to acquire the team and intellectual property of Munich-based RAN specialist Node-H for an undisclosed sum. Druid claimed the deal will add complementary RAN-related software expertise and IP to the company’s private networks portfolio. It also expands Druid’s engineering capacity, while the acquired IP assets will be used in Druid’s ongoing development of a unified management platform. Druid, which was founded in 2001, also said it will look at opportunities to license selected software assets to other companies operating in the Open RAN and RAN spaces. The deal adds some 20 new staff to Druid’s existing headcount of around 100 employees.

Neocloud Nscale has teamed up with existing partner Nordkraft, a regional energy company based in the Narvik region of northern Norway (inside the Arctic circle), to establish a joint venture, Nordscale Operations AS, that will manage Nscale’s AI datacentre facilities in Narvik. The formation of the venture combines “Nscale’s global AI infrastructure experience with Nordkraft’s regional expertise to deliver reliable, efficient and sustainable datacentre operations,” the partners noted in this announcement. In May, Nscale secured $790m in financing to help fund the deployment of the Narvik facility, which the neocloud claims is the largest AI infrastructure investment in Norway. 

Still with Nscale… It has also closed a $900m revolving credit facility that will help the neocloud “accelerate its AI datacentre build-out and capital deployment across the US, Europe and APAC,” the company noted in this announcement. Josh Payne, CEO and founder of Nscale, stated: “We are building the infrastructure that the world’s largest technology companies depend on to train, deploy and scale AI, and this facility increases our flexibility to do that at speed and at scale.” In March, Nscale, which is working with BT on planned AI factory deployments in the UK, closed a $2bn Series C funding round – investors in that round included Dell Technologies, Nokia and Nvidia – while it secured a $1.4bn delayed draw term loan in February to help finance “multiple cluster deployments across Europe”. 

Philippines operator PLDT has struck a deal with DITO Telecommunity to expand network coverage across the country as part of an infrastructure-sharing agreement. The agreement will see the two telcos share infrastructure on a reciprocal basis, meaning no fees are involved, with three network domains involved; eligible telecom towers;  in-building solution colocation, “enabling the parties to share telecommunications infrastructure within commercial buildings and other indoor locations”; and submarine cable capacity, through indefeasible right-of-use (IRU) arrangements. The partnership means PLDT and its mobile subsidiary Smart, as well as DITO, can focus capital on expanding coverage while reducing the duplication of sites, the two operators noted. “Connecting the country is a responsibility that we all share as Philippine telcos,” stated PLDT chairman and CEO Manuel V. Pangilinan. “This agreement reflects that, even as we compete in the marketplace, we can collaborate where it matters the most: Accelerating digital inclusion, helping connect every Filipino, and creating greater opportunities for our people and our nation,” he added.  

As the speculation continues to swirl about a potential tie-up between SpaceX/Starlink and US cable giant Charter Communications, industry analyst and Unthinkable brainiac Dean Bubley has applied his grey matter to how such a relationship might work and, importantly, what it isn’t likely to include. Check out Dean’s thoughts in this LinkedIn post. 

– The staff, TelecomTV