Briefing Desk
Latest Briefings
Concise reporting on the developments shaping internet governance and infrastructure. Browse each area for recent news, context and watchpoints.
GlobalFoundries expands chip capacity for Marvell
The multi-year deal adds SiGe manufacturing capacity in Vermont for 200G-per-lane optical components used in AI data-centre networks.
China proposes BRICS open-source AI community
Beijing also wants a BRICS digital ecosystem cloud platform, but neither proposal yet has funding, infrastructure or an implementation timetable.
MTN partners UAE investor on African data centres
MTN Digital Infrastructure has partnered with a UAE-based investment platform to develop AI-ready data centre capacity across Africa.
VodafoneThree puts Ericsson 5G core live
VodafoneThree has activated Ericsson's cloud-native 5G core as the merged UK operator moves from shared infrastructure towards a single core platform.
Theseus names Raval to lead Anthropic build-out
The former CyrusOne and Equinix xScale executive will lead a Macquarie-GIC-owned platform developing US data-centre capacity for Anthropic.
Tencent Cloud, U Mobile partner on 5G and AI
Tencent Cloud and U Mobile will develop and test enterprise 5G and AI applications in Malaysia through U Mobile's Enterprise Innovation Platform.
Community Fibre launches 8.5Gbps in London
Community Fibre has installed its first 8.5Gbps residential connections in London, raising its fastest home broadband tier from 5Gbps.
Openreach finds London behind on PSTN migration
London has 12.92% of WLR lines still to migrate, more than double Liverpool's share as the January 2027 PSTN deadline approaches.
Meta raises Utah data centre spend to $3bn
Meta has increased its planned Utah data centre investment to $3bn, but has not disclosed the capacity, cooling design or power arrangements behind the higher figure.
Nokia links network data to Microsoft Fabric
The integration gives telecom operators a common data layer for network automation, reducing the need to build separate pipelines for each AI use case.
German telecom groups urge EU to protect fibre competition
VATM, BREKO and ANGA want the Digital Networks Act to keep regulation tied to actual market power and preserve a predictable copper-to-fibre transition.
FCC lines up spectrum auctions after C-band
Upper C-band has auction rules and a deadline, while the 1.6GHz, 2.7GHz, 4.4GHz and 7GHz bands remain at different identification and study stages.
Hutchison Telecom corporate revenue rises 43%
Local service revenue stayed flat even as 5G penetration reached 64%, leaving corporate services and roaming to provide much of Hutchison Telecom's growth.
AWS cannot restore data kept only in Bahrain
AWS says resources and data stored only in its Bahrain Region cannot be recovered, while one of three UAE Availability Zones is also beyond restoration.
Optus outage tests emergency-call failover
A 76-minute hardware failure disrupted voice calls and left 46 Triple Zero calls unable to connect. The unanswered question is whether emergency camp-on worked as intended.
EU high-risk vendor plan draws telco pushback
Connect Europe and GSMA Europe oppose proposed EU rules that could force designated high-risk equipment out of mobile networks within three years.
Khazna and Siemens explore 800VDC AI power
A new MoU covers digital twins, 800VDC power and technology testing for future AI data centres, but names no facility, capacity or deployment date.
Loudoun advances 12-month data-centre pause
Loudoun supervisors voted 7-1-1 to draft a 12-month pause on legislative data-centre and substation applications, with a final vote expected on 20 October.
Kenya opens fibre framework to multiple providers
ICTA can appoint up to 28 providers across two lots, then compete individual backbone, metro and cross-border requirements through later call-off contracts.
AirJoule buys BitSink for data-centre cooling
The acquisition gives AirJoule an operating cooling business and a route to test whether data-centre waste heat can support on-site water generation.
TotalEnergies, Mistral build oil-and-gas AI models
The partnership brings a European model developer into TotalEnergies' subsurface work, where control of data and deployment matters alongside model performance.
WRC-27 weighs new spectrum rules for D2D
WRC-27 will consider new spectrum rules for satellite links to ordinary mobile devices as regulators work through interference, licensing and cross-border coordination.
Onsemi unveils wafer-level power platform for AI racks
Its Embedded Power Platform integrates power devices into a silicon wafer-level package, targeting denser power delivery as AI racks consume more electricity.
US data-centre moratoriums delay 2.3GW
SemiAnalysis mapped more than 300 US data-centre moratoriums but estimates only about 2.3GW of planned capacity is genuinely delayed.
Oracle Cloud’s automation promise meets the limits of deployment
Oracle Cloud Infrastructure is more than a transit-routing service: it offers code-driven provisioning, event-triggered operations, recovery orchestration and specialized AI capacity. The practical question is not whether these controls exist, but how much operational work they remove once permissions, quotas, hardware availability, application dependencies and testing are included.
ICANN’s Authority Is Layered—and So Are Its Remedies
ICANN does not exercise one undifferentiated kind of power. Its authority is assembled from corporate instruments, Bylaws, policy procedures and private contracts; the route for challenging an action depends on which layer produced it.
6G plans shift towards reusing 5G spectrum and radios
Early 6G designs favour reusing 5G infrastructure, which could reduce opportunities for operators to switch suppliers.
SD-WAN strengthens as SASE growth tops 20%
Dell'Oro says SASE revenue reached $3.5bn in Q2 while SD-WAN strengthened as enterprises selectively replaced ageing branch infrastructure.
European telcos push EU on consolidation
European telecom CEOs want merger rules to give more weight to scale and investment as Brussels rewrites its competition framework.
FCC opens five-year rural wireless test zone in Iowa
Iowa State's ARA testbed can now run wireless experiments across Ames and surrounding farmland under a five-year FCC Innovation Zone designation.
Harmonic expands beyond DOCSIS with fibre and AI
Harmonic is pushing further into PON and AI software as cable operators add fibre, aiming to stay relevant as the physical access network changes.
Cox and Verizon outages reach global customers
ThousandEyes saw 14-minute Cox and eight-minute Verizon Business outages affect partners and customers across multiple countries despite their brief duration.
CMA reviews £2bn Nexfibre-Netomnia deal
The deal could expand VMO2 and Nexfibre's combined footprint towards 10 million premises, while the CMA's Phase 2 review runs to 15 December.
Huawei sets out 'Nvidia of ICT' ambition
Huawei chairman Guo Ping says the company wants to become the "Nvidia of ICT", putting computing and connectivity at the centre of its AI strategy.
Spectrum reaches 11m former Cox locations
Spectrum pricing and packages are now available across former Cox markets, while Charter continues integrating sales, service and operating processes after the merger.
Cricket launches 5G home internet on AT&T network
Cricket has launched fixed wireless home internet over AT&T's 5G network, extending the prepaid brand into broadband without building a separate access network.
FCC gives four carriers more time for rip-and-replace
Four US carriers received deadline extensions as labour, logistics, equipment shortages and ransomware replaced funding as the main barriers to completing rip-and-replace work
Anthropic signs Queensland lease before approvals
Anthropic has committed to the first stage of Zerra DC's Western Downs campus while local planning and foreign-investment approvals remain outstanding.
CoreWeave brings up multi-rack Vera Rubin cluster
CoreWeave linked hundreds of Rubin GPUs and added storage changes aimed at reducing cross-region write delays for AI workloads.
Digital Parks Africa plans Lagos data centre
Digital Parks Africa has announced NDC1 in Lagos and engaged Uptime Institute for a Tier IV assessment, but no certification, capacity or opening date has been disclosed.
Nokia names eight operators testing AI-RAN
Eight operators are testing Nokia and NVIDIA AI-RAN technology, but none has announced a commercial deployment.
CRA secures fibre routes for Prague Gateway DC
CRA has contracted optical connectivity from five partners for Prague Gateway DC, combining existing, leased and newly built routes while construction continues.
Schneider launches 2.5MW prefabricated power modules
Schneider Electric's 2.5MW prefabricated power modules move more electrical assembly and testing into the factory, reducing work that must be completed on site.
Gabon signs 20-year backbone deal with Gabon Fiber
Gabon Fiber will operate and expand the national backbone under a 20-year concession, with more than CFA41bn sought for 1,651km of new fibre.
Microsoft files wetlands permit for Virginia campus
Microsoft has filed with the US Army Corps for a two-building Virginia data-centre campus with an on-site substation.
Serverfarm lifts credit facility to $3.89bn
Serverfarm has expanded its revolving credit facility to $3.89bn for North American data-centre development, but has not disclosed how much is drawn.
Scotland votes on hyperscale data-centre moratorium
MSPs are debating a moratorium as Scotland adds mandatory environmental assessments for data centres above 50MW but has yet to publish a national strategy.
Cambium UK subsidiary enters administration
Cambium's UK subsidiary entered administration days after the group cut 260 jobs, leaving customers waiting to see how product support and warranties will continue.
Japan's four operators study shared 28GHz infrastructure
KDDI, NTT DOCOMO, SoftBank, and Rakuten Mobile will study shared 28GHz infrastructure while continuing their own deployments.
Norway charges Telenor over Myanmar data disclosures
Norwegian authorities charged Telenor in two Myanmar-related investigations, including alleged disclosures of historical customer traffic data to the military regime.