Rakuten wesentlich besser als Rocket
https://www.snehabarman.com/rakuten-symphony
TIP Insights 2021: Accelerating Commercial Realities
Nov 17, 2021
Author: Attilio Zani
The last couple of years have highlighted the incredible potential for connectivity to transform our daily lives and brought into focus not only our growing dependence on technology, but also the persistent digital divide that still sees almost half of the world’s population lacking access to the internet. As we celebrate progress across various TIP initiatives, we know that the benefits of these advances in technology go beyond just the industry – the increased use of open, disaggregated network technologies has clear positive implications for greater society, enterprises, and national economies. This past year, research firm Analysys Mason illustrated this point in their study on the economic impact of open and disaggregated technologies, which concluded that OpenRAN alone could bring over USD285 billion in global GDP gains by 2030.
TIP’s unique collaborative model is harnessing the collective power of the entire telecoms ecosystem to drastically change how telecom technologies are created, deployed, and the business models that operate them. Operators, vendors, system integrators and other stakeholders are building, testing and deploying the open and disaggregated infrastructure that will continue to address the world’s growing and evolving connectivity needs, as well as innovating the business models that will support these network solutions and ensure that more people and communities around the world can benefit from the digital economy.
Through its end-to-end process, TIP provides an avenue to turn requirements into commercial realities while reducing industry fragmentation, enabling a shorter time to market, and accelerating commercial deployments.
This starts with the alignment of prioritized use cases and requirements from operators, combined with feedback from the broader community, to deliver technical roadmaps – in 2021, there were more than 40 project group deliverables informing product listings. Technology suppliers can then use these roadmaps to inform their respective product releases. These products progress through TIP’s Test & Validation framework, to assess their level of maturity against the technical requirements – with 35 trial activities this year alone. Eligible products and solutions are then awarded TIP Badges & Ribbons and showcased on TIP Exchange – we expect about 60 products listed from over 25 technology suppliers by year-end. The marketplace serves multiple purposes: it facilitates swift procurement processes for operators, strengthens the demand signal, as well as increasing awareness of the solutions listed for technology suppliers. Fundamentally, TIP Exchange reduces time-to-market for open and disaggregated solutions.
https://telecominfraproject.com/...accelerating-commercial-realities/
Before MWC Los Angeles 2021 commenced on October 26, Rakuten Symphony – the newly established Rakuten organization created to empower the global adoption of cloud-native open RAN infrastructure and services – introduced what could be one of the most innovative telco solutions in years: Symware.
Created in collaboration with Intel and Juniper Networks, Symware tackles some of the industry’s most difficult challenges. The carrier-grade Open RAN (Radio Access Network) solution is designed for mobile network operators that want to modernize radio cell sites by leveraging the latest cloud-native architecture. It’s a multipurpose edge appliance that provides operators with the flexibility to densify their network, accommodate various network topologies, and support new features while reducing the required hardware per site. What makes the solution even more impressive is its size. Symware comes in a small box, requires no cooling and is light enough to be carried and installed by a single technician.
https://rakuten.today/blog/symphony-mwc-los-angeles-2021.html
That opportunity to disrupt comes from the years of lessons learned in building the Rakuten Mobile network in Japan, packaged into solutions designed to deliver immediate benefits to the telecom industry.
https://rakuten.today/blog/symphony-mwc-los-angeles-2021.html
The Open RAN movement has come a long way in just a few years, surprising even the most ardent skeptics. The shift from proprietary RAN toward Open RAN became significant in 2020 and the momentum with both commercial deployments and the broader movement continued to improve during the first half of 2021, bolstering the idea that Open RAN is here to stay.
With Open RAN now projected to account for more than 10% of the overall RAN market by 2025, we also need to keep in mind that we are still in the early days of the broader Open RAN transition, especially with regard to brownfield networks.
Risks surrounding the growth projections remain significant and broadly balanced. The improved momentum combined with positive performance and TCO Open RAN developments could foster stronger market adoption than had originally been expected. Similarly, government funding focused on improving RU/DU/CU (silicon and software) technologies, accelerating interoperability testing, and incentivizing operators that embrace the Open RAN architecture could result in a more favorable outcome.
https://www.delloro.com/knowledge-center/...et-opportunity-and-risks/
Ausgehend von der Ausgangsposition als Alternative zu herstellerintegrierten proprietären Funkzugangsnetzen (RANs) hat Open RAN nun eine breite und tiefe Unterstützung im gesamten Ökosystem der Mobilfunknetze. Mit offenen Schnittstellen, kommerzieller Hardware und Cloud-nativer Software könnte es eines Tages der beste Weg sein, ein RAN aufzubauen.
Die Open RAN Digital Conference wird die wichtigsten Open RAN-Initiativen und -Einführungen in der ganzen Welt verfolgen. Sie wird die Fortschritte in der Open RAN-Technologie untersuchen und die Frage stellen, was als Nächstes kommt, um die Leistung von Open RAN so zu steigern, dass es mit den heutigen modernen RAN-Systemen mithalten kann.
Kommerzielle Netze gibt es inzwischen in allen wichtigen Regionen der Welt, weshalb sich das offene RAN zum Mainstream entwickelt. Diese Sitzung wird die Bereitstellungsfortschritte behandeln und erörtern, wie das Technologie-Ökosystem sich weiterentwickeln kann, um groß angelegte Hochleistungsnetze zu unterstützen.
https://5g.nrw/...gital-symposium-open-ran-market-status-and-outlook/
As more telecom operators move toward Open RAN deployment, the shift has reflected in revenue. Stefan Pongratz, vice president at Dell'Oro Group, wrote in a blog post how estimates showed Open RAN revenue has increased five times year over year in the first quarter of 2021 alone. Much of this increase is owed to operators in the Asia-Pacific region, Pongratz said, and Japanese operators, such as Rakuten, are optimistic about the benefits Open RAN will create in the industry.
Macro deployments are the largest source of revenue for Open RAN. According to Pongratz, the revenue numbers reflect "the state of the overall RAN market and the current focus by operators deploying Open RAN." In addition to the large dominance of macro deployments, Open RAN small cell investment is also increasing.
https://www.techtarget.com/searchnetworking/...loyment-is-on-the-rise
Another exciting and innovative technology in the 5G era is Open RAN. The market dynamics of open RAN are affected by multiple factors. For example, the geopolitical environment that resulted in the ban of Chinese infrastructure vendors, the performance of existing open RAN networks, and technological developments, will affect the technology’s penetration across the different regions. However, it is expected that the revenue of the Open RAN market will grow at a CAGR of 126.7%, representing approximately 17.6% of the total outdoor revenue reaching US$ 23.6 billion by 2026.
https://isemag.com/2021/05/telecom-2021-research-forecast-mmimo/
DIE JAPAN POST GROUP UND DIE RAKUTEN GROUP HABEN IM MÄRZ 2021 EINE KAPITAL- UND GESCHÄFTSALLIANZ MIT DEM ZIEL GESCHLOSSEN, DIE ZUSAMMENARBEIT IN VERSCHIEDENEN BEREICHEN WIE LOGISTIK, MOBILE UND DX ZU STÄRKEN. BASIEREND AUF DIESER KAPITAL- UND GESCHÄFTSALLIANZ ZIELEN DIE BEIDEN UNTERNEHMENSGRUPPE DARAUF AB, SYNERGIEN ZU MAXIMIEREN, INDEM SIE DIE MANAGEMENTRESSOURCEN UND STÄRKEN DER BEIDEN UNTERNEHMENSGRUPPEN EFFEKTIV NUTZEN, UM DEN KUNDENKOMFORT ZU VERBESSERN, ZU LOKALEN GEMEINSCHAFTEN BEIZUTRAGEN UND IHRE GESCHÄFTE AUSZUBAUEN.
im rahmen dieser bemühungen haben rakuten card und die japan post bank beschlossen, im finanzbereich zusammenzuarbeiten, um "rakuten card japan post bank design" und "rakuten card japan post bank shopping panda design" herauszugeben.
diese karte ist so konzipiert, dass sie für kunden mit konten der japan post bank freundlich ist, wobei die logomarke der japan post bank und die unternehmensfarbe als kartenbild verwendet werden. darüber hinaus haben wir durch die konsolidierung der wichtigen karteninformationen der kunden (kreditkartennummer, ablaufdatum, sicherheitscode) auf der rückseite der karte das risiko des diebstahls von karteninformationen bei der verwendung einer kreditkarte reduziert und den schutz personenbezogener daten verbessert. da es außerdem über eine touch-zahlungsfunktion verfügt, kann die zahlung schnell und sicher abgeschlossen werden, indem sie einfach den leiter an der kasse selbst berühren.
die japan post bank spielt eine rolle als unverzichtbare soziale infrastruktur für das leben der menschen, basierend auf einem landesweiten netzwerk von postämtern. auf der anderen seite arbeitet rakuten card seit der ausgabe der rakuten card im juli 2005 aktiv daran, cross-use zu fördern und bargeldlose zahlungen innerhalb und außerhalb der rakuten-gruppe zu verbreiten.
rakuten card und die japan post bank werden ihre dienstleistungen und funktionen weiter ausbauen, um den kundenkomfort und die kundenzufriedenheit zu verbessern.
https://www.rakuten-card.co.jp/corporate/press_release/20211201/
Audience of messengers in Russia 2021, by application
Published by D. Elagina
Nov 11, 2021
The most popular messenger application in Russia in August 2021 was WhatsApp, with an audience of nearly 77 million. Telegram, which was unblocked by the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media of Russia (Roskomnadzor) in June 2020, ranked second with around 38 million users visiting it at least once a month. Viber was placed third with approximately 34.8 million users.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1065027/...enger-audience-by-app/
13 OCTOBER 2021
The international payment brand Apcopay, a member of Apco Systems, announces its collaboration with the popular chat messaging platform, Rakuten Viber and brings payments through chatbots in Greece for the first time.
Apcopay works with Rakuten Viber, one of the safest and most modern call and messaging platforms, so that its users can purchase products and services for direct payment through the chatbots of merchants and businesses on the platform.
Payments through chatbots on Viber are an easy way for small, medium or large businesses to create an additional sales and marketing channel through which they are in constant contact with their customers to promote their services and products more efficiently.
All payments – initially by credit and debit cards and later through Apple Pay and Google Pay – are routed through Apcopay’s certified PCIDSS (level 1) payment platform.
https://emeastartups.com/...-viber-for-payments-through-chatbots/6393
Dec 1, 2021,02:30am
Jonathan Keane
Freelance technology journalist covering the gig economy.
While the world attempts to take stock of the omicron variant and its impact on travel, ride-hailing giant Cabify said it expects to close out the year with a profit.
Cabify is headquartered in Spain but its operations, which include grocery delivery and micromobility rentals, are largely in Latin America.
The company said in a statement that it expects to close the final quarter of 2021 with turnover of $167 million and full year revenue of $516 million.
"In addition, the company expects to reach profitability in December, demonstrating the ability to generate positive EBITDA and growth despite the pandemic," its statement said.
Cabify operates in seven countries in Latin America, including major markets like Chile and Mexico, as well as its native Spain.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathankeane/2021/...d/?sh=299a39de3202
https://seekingalpha.com/article/...of-gold-at-the-end-of-the-rainbow
„Rakuten presents a classic Warren Buffett “cigar butt” story.“
Why did Warren Buffett Move On from Cigar Butt Investing?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAVgMlI8MqA
ByPiyush Pandey Forbes Middle East Staff
Nov 18, 2021, 13:24 PM
Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten Group, owned by billionaire Hiroshi Mikitani, will price about ¥200 billion ($1.75 billion) of its multi-tenor bonds on November 26, a Bloomberg report said, citing underwriter Daiwa Securities Group. The Japanese firm is planning its biggest-ever yen bond sale as it looks to boost its mobile segment.
The Tokyo-based company plans to use the funds on operations, capital investment, and refinancing of existing debt, the company said in a regulatory filing earlier this month.
Heavy investments to establish the low-cost mobile communications network led to a $2.2 billion loss in that business last year. The company's mobile segment posted a $919.5 million loss in its third quarter ended September 30, wiping out profits made in the internet and fintech verticals.
Rakuten Mobile aims to cover 96% of Japan's population by the summer of 2021 but pushed the target to March next year owing to the global shortage of semiconductors. The company said it had switched to its own network, instead of leasing base stations from KDDI, in 39 out of the country's 47 prefectures, reported Nikkei Asia.
The company said in September that it was preparing for the listing of its online banking unit Rakuten Bank. In a statement, the company said that through the listing, "it will be possible to carry out management with a more autonomous perspective, and to consider various growth and financial strategies, including its own financing."
Rakuten shook up Japan's financial sector by simplifying credit card applications and garnering over 11 million current accounts and deposits of more than $54 billion, according to an earlier Reuters report.
https://www.forbesmiddleeast.com/money/markets/...as-biggest-ever-ipo
Japan Credit Rating Agency, Ltd. (JCR) announces the following credit rating.
Rakuten Group, Inc. (security code: 4755)
Bonds: A
JCR announced on October 4, 2021 the affirmation of the A long-term issuer rating on Rakuten Group,
Inc. with Negative outlook. Since then there have been no events affecting the rating.
Hiroyuki Chikusa, Akihisa Motonishi
Rating
Issuer: Rakuten Group, Inc.
Issue Amount (bn) Issue Date Due Date Coupon Rating
Bonds no. 15 JPY 75 Dec. 2, 2021 Dec. 2, 2024 0.500% A
Bonds no. 16 JPY 45 Dec. 2, 2021 Dec. 2, 2026 0.600% A
Bonds no. 17 JPY 10 Dec. 2, 2021 Dec. 1, 2028 0.800% A
Bonds no. 18 JPY 85 Dec. 2, 2021 Dec. 2, 2031 1.050% A
Bonds no. 19 JPY 40 Dec. 2, 2021 Dec. 2, 2033 1.300% A
Bonds no. 20 JPY 45 Dec. 2, 2021 Dec. 2, 2036 1.500% A
https://www.jcr.co.jp/download/...ab892b74f9691993812f9/21d0930_f.pdf
On October 14, 2021, Viber announced that the Viber messenger exceeded the mark of a billion downloads worldwide in the Google Play store. This happened at the end of September 2021.
The company noted an increase in user activity in early October 2021. There was an increase not only in the audience of the messenger among users, OS Android but also in user activity on all other platforms. According to the information company, on October 4, the number of user registrations in Viber around the world increased 5 times, and in peak hours - 10 times. Also in Viber, the number of messages increased by 75% and the number of calls increased by 2 times.
Activity growth was also observed in Russia: for example, the number of app activations increased by 106% per day, and the number of messages at rush hour - by 57%. Russians began to make 2 times more calls to Viber, and the number of message senders during peak hours increased by 38%.
The increase in user activity in Viber in Russia is also confirmed by data telecom the operators. In particular, according to the research service. Beeline Analytics, on October 4, the volume of traffic in the Viber messenger in Russia increased by 60%, and the number of users by 43%. The largest growth among Beeline subscribers occurred Lipetsk in (+ 201%), Voronezh (+ 151%), Kurskaya (+ 146%), Novgorod (+ 144%) St. Petersburg and (+ 139%) regions.
Tele2 also recorded a 150% increase in Viber traffic.
The reason for this increase in activity in the Viber application was, among other things, the situation of massive failures in the work of other social networks and communication applications on October 4. Viber recommends that its users have several applications for communication, since it is always important to stay in touch with relatives and friends, and emphasizes that it is necessary to pay attention to safety applications and their capabilities for protection confidential communication.
https://tadviser.com/index.php/...Viber_Out_Instant_Messaging_Service
Perhaps more significant than what it has done in its home market is the work Rakuten has done to productize and sell its approach to building a cloud-native network using Open RAN principles. In addition to development of the Rakuten Communications Platform, Rakuten Group recently created the Rakuten Symphony organization to drive global adoption of its telecom network infrastructure and services, including RCP. With operations across Japan, the Unit ed States, Singapore, India, Europe and the Middle East Africa region, Rakuten Symphony aims to bring together all of Rakuten’s telco prod ucts, services and solutions under a single global portfolio to offer 4G and 5G infrastructure and platform solutions to customers worldwide.
Rakuten has long promoted capex and opex savings associated with its approach to building a network rather than a more traditional build: a 40% capex reduction comes from lower deployment and hardware costs chalked up to virtualized network functions and pooling network resources, and a 30% opex reduction from less rent, less maintenance and more network automation. It’s worth noting that, in breaking out these reductions attributed to the RCP approach, Rakuten does project increased costs from data center capacity and data transmission which maps to an architecture involving distributed edge compute facilities.
U.S.-based vRAN software specialist Altiostar was a major vendor to Rakuten Mobile for its build in Japan, and the company is part of the tech stack included in Rakuten Communications Platform as sold by Symphony. In August, Rakuten Group announced it will acquire Altiostar based on a $1 billion valuation. Altiostar CEO Ashraf Dahod said the acquisition will help accelerate technology development and, in turn, time to innovation. “Open RAN architecture and virtualization are key to building software-centric networks that can scale and adapt to meet an explosion of devices and applications driving service velocity and profits.”
Altiostar’s Shabbir Bagasrawala, head of product go-to-market, said the company has evolved from a RAN software company to having a “portfolio we can present to customers, especially on the automation side. When we did Rakuten, we were focusing on automation. We were focusing on a lot of things that were innovative for the industry as a whole. With the acquisition, it allows us to offer this up to other customers. Previously we were thinking about deploying our RAN software and trying to retrofit some of that automation into an existing telco space. This is something we can give you and you can start using it immediately. You can get all these benefits. And we obviously get the scale of Rakuten.
https://f.hubspotusercontent40.net/hubfs/8928696/...rt%2520Update.pdf
17 hours ago
Rakuten Mobile’s world-first cellular network has once again been recognized by the global telecoms industry.
Announced November 23, Rakuten Mobile, in conjunction with Altiostar, a Rakuten Symphony Company, was named a Telecoms.com Global Telecoms (Glotel) Awards winner in two categories: Ground-breaking Virtualization Initiative for Rakuten Mobile’s 5G Open RAN on Kubernetes; and Best Operator 5G Innovation for Rakuten Mobile’s 5G Open RAN Cloud-Native Network.
“I’m honored for Rakuten Mobile to have won two Glotel awards for our achievements in Open RAN,” commented Rakuten Mobile CTO Tareq Amin. “When designing the Rakuten Mobile network in Japan, we brought together the brightest minds in tech to do something no mobile network operator has done before. I hope this recognition will also inspire telcos around the world to consider the potential of Open RAN to power the future of mobile network architecture.”
This year’s Global Telecoms Awards featured hundreds of submissions across 20 categories, with Glotel judging conducted by an independent panel of guest judges from within the industry.
“It was once more an immense pleasure to oversee the Glotel awards,” said Scott Bicheno, Editor of Telecoms.com. “No matter what challenges are thrown at the telecoms industry it just keeps innovating, progressing and succeeding. As ever, this year’s entries offered a fascinating snapshot of the very best our industry has to offer and the winners should feel very proud of prevailing over such stiff competition.”
Last week’s Glotel Awards are just the latest honors to be awarded to Rakuten’s trailblazing cellular network this year. Rakuten Mobile shined at GSMA’s 2021 Global Mobile (GLOMO) Awards at MWC Barcelona, taking home the award for “Best Mobile Technology Breakthrough” for its submission for 5G Open RAN on Kubernetes, as well as “CTO Choice: Outstanding Mobile Technology Award,” the highest level of recognition at these awards.
Rakuten Mobile was also recognized at the Opensignal 5G Global Mobile Network Experience Awards* for its 5G Network Speed, which ranked highly among global mobile operators, the GTI Awards 2021 for market development, and scored 920 points out of 1,000 for its network in Tokyo in a report by independent analyst company umlaut.
After a highly eventful 2021, Rakuten Mobile’s momentum shows no sign of slowing. With the recent launch of Rakuten Symphony and continued growth of Rakuten’s network in Japan, the Rakuten Group is poised to create even more disruption in the global telco space in 2022.
________________________________________
*Opensignal Awards – 5G Global Mobile Network Experience Awards 2021 based on independent analysis of mobile measurements recorded during the period January 1 – June 29, 2021.
https://rakuten.today/blog/...-two-categories-2021-glotel-awards.html
Marriott Bonvoy member benefits to be offered when eligible Rakuten members book Marriott Bonvoy hotels in Japan through Rakuten Travel
Tokyo, December 2, 2021 - Rakuten Group, Inc. today announced the launch of a loyalty program collaboration with Marriott International, Inc. Eligible Silver, Gold, Platinum and Diamond rank Rakuten members are now able to enjoy Marriott Bonvoy's member benefits in addition to receiving Rakuten Points when booking Marriott Bonvoy hotels in Japan through the travel reservation service Rakuten Travel.
Through this new collaboration, eligible Rakuten members can enroll in Marriott Bonvoy through a convenient, one-click process on Rakuten Travel, using their existing Rakuten member information. Once enrollment is completed, members can enjoy a plethora of benefits which Marriott Bonvoy has to offer in addition to Rakuten Points, including access to member rates, the ability to earn and redeem points, and other exclusive benefits when booking Marriott Bonvoy's hotels in Japan through Rakuten Travel.
https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/...Winning-Trave-37187681/
Open RAN: Big Opportunity, Big Challenges
https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/...es/?sh=6860ee6e63d5
Spanish delivery platform raised €450 million in a funding round led by New York-based Lugard Road Capital and Luxor Capital
By Adam Clark
March 31, 2021 1:02 pm ET
Spanish delivery platform Glovoapp23 SL said Thursday that it has raised €450 million ($527.9 million) in its latest funding round, led by New York-based investors Lugard Road Capital and Luxor Capital Group.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/...ation-with-latest-funding-11617210127
Posted By J'son & Partners Consulting
Tuesday 30 November 21
Implementation of highly autonomous intelligent end-to-end NMS/OSS/BSS processes by ICT-infrastructure operators and service providers enables extremely high economic benefits.
The transition from L0/L1 levels of autonomy to L2/L3 leads to a two-fold decrease of direct operational expenses on ICT-infrastructure management and services provisioning. On a scale of the global telecom services market, it means annual margin increase of telecom service providers to $144B.
Along with a decrease of direct operation costs, the transition enables telcos to provide Network as a Service (NaaS) together with the ability to keep the extremely high level of average ICT-resources utilization – up to 90%. Potentially, it will allow a new market segment to generate $900B of revenue annually and $585B of margin.
https://www.totaltele.com/511817/...l-revenue-may-reach-900B-annually
https://global.rakuten.com/corp/investors/stock/bond.html