The content team at Channel Partners tracks stories of interest to the technology advisor and wider channel communities. Anyone selling communication and connectivity solutions will want to stay abreast of these developing stories or catch up on ones they have missed. All links are valid as of April 29.
Is Comcast-Charter Merger Coming?
New Street Research has floated the idea that Charter and Comcast could potentially merge, citing comments from Charter CFO Jessica Fischer at an NSR investor conference. When NSR analyst Vikash Harlalka asked Fischer if the cable company would be interested in any further acquisitions after closing the $34.5 billion Cox deal, she indicated that the company looks at opportunities at a good price and with growth potential. In a note to investors, Harlalka wrote, “We continue to believe that a Comcast-Charter merger should and can happen. The industrial logic and synergies would be transformative for both companies. Not least among these would be the potential to acquire at least a 50% share of T-Mobile and create the country’s third converged player to stand up to AT&T and Verizon in a facilities-based way.” Read the Fierce Network Story.
Verizon CEO Teases More Fiber Appetite, Multibillion-Dollar AI Revenue Opportunity
Verizon CEO Dan Schulman hinted that the carrier was open to more fiber acquisition possibilities and touted robust AI-related network cost savings during Verizon’s latest earnings call. Schulman told analysts that Verizon remains on track to hit 32 million fiber passings by the end of the year, with opportunities for inorganic expansion. Schulman’s fiber appetite comes on the heels of reports that rival T-Mobile US was eyeing the acquisition of Uniti Group’s fiber assets, a deal that would build on that carrier’s already closed joint venture agreements of Lumos and Metronet. Fellow telecom giant AT&T also recently completed its own expansion through the acquisition of Lumen Technologies’ consumer fiber business. Read the SDxCentral story.
Omdia: Neoclouds have a Network Problem
Neolclouds have yet to build networking strong enough to handle AI workloads, according to recent research by Omdia. As compute demand hits connectivity constraints, partners have an opportunity to help these GPU-specialists build out their networks. Omdia analyzed 50 neocloud providers, targets network operators and large enterprises, and found infrastructure gaps that partners with networking, interconnection and sovereignty expertise can surmount. Read the Channel Dive story.
T-Mobile and Starlink Pitch Businesses on Blended Broadband
T-Mobile and Starlink have partnered on "SuperBroadband," a new offering that uses 5G as the primary connection and satellite broadband as the fallback. SuperBroadband also offers options in which a wireline link from T-Mobile or another ISP serves as the primary connection, with T-Mobile's 5G network as the secondary, redundant connection, with satellite broadband as the tertiary fallback option. T-Mobile said the 5G/satellite combo can also be used to optimize connectivity by load balancing traffic between 5G and satellite. See the Light Reading story.
Iridium Plays it Cool Amid Heated Satellite M&A
Iridium is one of few satellite operators that has global rights to mobile satellite spectrum (MSS) that is in hot demand for direct-to-device services. As recent M&A shines a light on satellite spectrum, Iridium remains coy about potential partnerships and focused on carving out a complementary role to bigger D2D players. Amazon's agreement this month to acquire Globalstar for $11.6 billion is the latest satellite M&A move with access to prized MSS spectrum at the heart of it. It follows SpaceX splashing nearly $20 million to acquire EchoStar's AWS-3, AWS-4 and H-block spectrum; and AST SpaceMobile's deal with Ligado for L-band and S-band spectrum. Read the Light Reading story.
OpenAI Misses Key Revenue, User Targets in High-Stakes Sprint Toward IPO
OpenAI recently missed its own targets for new users and revenue, stumbles that have raised concern among some company leaders about whether it will be able to support its massive spending on data centers. OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar has told other company leaders that she is worried the company might not be able to pay for future computing contracts if revenue doesn’t grow fast enough, people familiar with the matter told the Wall Street Journal.
Telcos Must Get a Handle on Data to Make Agentic AI Work
A Cloudera survey revealed how difficult it can be to deploy AI at scale. The vendor recently surveyed 1,300 global IT leaders, including telcos, about their AI adoption and data strategies. The results, compiled in its Data Readiness Index, showed most telecoms have complete visibility into where their organization’s data resides and can access their data at any time regardless of format or storage location. However, 60% of telecommunications respondents said infrastructure performance hinders their operational initiatives and only one-third said all of their data was fully governed. Read the Fierce Network story.
SpaceX Aims at Amazon Over Satellite Deployment Requirements
SpaceX filed a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) over Amazon's deployment of its Amazon Leo constellation. Elon Musk's SpaceX wrote to the FCC earlier this week, highlighting its frustration over Amazon's request for a two-year extension for the deployment of its LEO (low-Earth orbit) fleet. Amazon had initially said it would operate at least 50% of its planned 3,236-strong LEO fleet by July 2026. But in January, Amazon Leo sought a 24-month extension to its satellite rollout due to launch shortages. The company had agreed to deploy 1,600 satellites by the original deadline, but that figure is estimated to be around 241 at present. Read the SDxCentral story.