In the world of VoIP, there’s no shortage of interesting stories making the news each week. At SpectrumVoIP, we like to stay informed about the latest developments and share our insights with our clients and partners. This is our voip news roundup for October 2017, in which we summarize the top headlines that grabbed our attention over the past month.
1. CenturyLink Gains Approval to Acquire Level 3 Telecoms
Telecoms giant CenturyLink has gained U.S. antitrust approval for its acquisition of Level 3 Communications, on the condition that it divest certain assets. Louisiana-based CenturyLink agreed to purchase Level last year at a value of approximately $24 billion, as it seeks to expand its presence in the communications market to compete with rivals like Verizon and AT&T. The deal is conditional on CenturyLink selling Level 3’s networks in Tuscon, Boise and Albuquerque.
2. Canadian Government Announces $140 Million VoIP Contract
As part of an ongoing process to modernize its telecommunications infrastructure, the Canadian government has awarded a major contract to national telecoms provider Telus. The seven-year contract, valued at over $140 million, will see Telus replace more than 80,000 government landlines with VoIP services. The deal also includes desktop video and instant messaging solutions. The Canadian government already operates over 100,000 VoIP lines.
3. European Regulators Agree to Strengthen VoIP Privacy Laws
European Union lawmakers voted this month to include online services like Skype, Google and WhatsApp under stringent privacy rules to restrict the tracking of users. The decision was welcomed by privacy activists but criticized by the industry for being excessively restrictive. Under the ePrivacy policy, telecoms operators and Internet providers would be required to guarantee the confidentiality of customer communications, and gain consent before tracking users for advertising purposes.
4. Tata to Sell India Telecoms Service to Bharti Airtel
Indian conglomerate Tata Group has agreed to sell its troubled consumer telecommunications business, Tata Teleservices, to industry leader Bharti Airtel for an undisclosed sum. Under the deal, Airtel will absorb Tata’s national telecom operations, gaining 40 million customers and boosting its mobile spectrum footprint with the addition of Tata’s 178.5 Megahertz spectrum. The sale is part of Tata chairman N Chandrasekaran’s vision to shed struggling assets that are impacting profitability.
5. Sprint and T-Mobile in Rumored $88 Billion “Super-Operator” Merger
After several years of discussion, Sprint and T-Mobile are believed to be on the verge of an $88 billion merger, subject to regulatory approval. Sprint chairman Masayoshi Son has been eyeing T-Mobile for some time, as part of his strategy to compete with Verizon and AT&T. T-Mobile and Sprint have the lowest market share of US mobile subscribers, with 36.2 million and 31.5 million respectively. Their combined 67.7 million subscribers would begin to challenge market leaders AT&T and Verizon with 77 million and 109 million subscribers respectively.