- Ericsson’s contract portion is worth $1.33 billion, under VodafoneThree’s wider deal with Nokia.
- The project aims for near-nationwide 5G Standalone (SA) coverage in the UK by 2034 and includes upgrading RAN across thousands of sites.
What happened: Swedish firm to supply VodafoneThree with core and radio network gear
VodafoneThree, the new joint venture created after Vodafone UK merged with Three UK, has signed one of the country’s largest telecoms infrastructure contracts. The deal splits between Ericsson and Nokia, with Ericsson acting as the main vendor.
It will supply both the radio access network (RAN) and the core systems needed to run advanced 5G services. Its portion is valued at about US$1.33 billion.
Nokia will handle the supply of RAN and core technology to around 7,000 sites across the UK, providing wider coverage and acting as a balancing vendor. The contract runs for eight years and sits within VodafoneThree’s larger plan to invest £11 billion over the next decade to deliver a full nationwide 5G Standalone network.
Ericsson is expected to introduce AI-powered and energy-saving radio hardware, as well as new smart antennas, with rollout focused first on London, Edinburgh, Cardiff, and Belfast. This move will improve network speeds and reliability for millions of UK users.
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Why it’s important
This deal is central to VodafoneThree’s goal of delivering 5G Standalone coverage to nearly the entire UK population by 2034. It shows serious investment to upgrade both core networks and radio sites.
For Ericsson, this offers a strong win amid global market slowdowns and pressures from tariffs, especially in the US. It helps secure long-term revenue.
For the telecom sector in the UK, the pact underlines how infrastructure scale is now critical. Having fewer vendors (Ericsson, Nokia) but deeper investment across core and edge network elements reflects a strategy to deliver both speed and coverage. It may also raise stakes in competition, regulatory oversight, and how consumers experience 5G rollout in less-served regions.
