Ericsson’s latest Mobility Report contains a forecast of 26 billion connected devices by 2020, seemingly a big cut to its well-publicised previous vision of 50 billion in that timeframe.

The network vendor first outlined its vision for 50 billion connected devices in 2009, and has repeated the claim for more than five years as part of its Networked Society ideology.

Ericsson is now claiming the 50 billion number was a vision rather than a specific forecast, which it made before 4G was rolled out and smartphones had become ubiquitous.

Today, Ericsson says the industry is “well on the way to reaching the vision of 50 billion connected devices”.

No timeframe for that goal was mentioned in the report, but the company said that “50 billion connected devices is a good milestone that we believe will be reached sometime after 2020”.

Today’s market stands at around 13.5 billion, according to Ericsson, including (in order of size) mobile phones, PC/laptop/tablets/routers, connected consumer electronics, M2M, and fixed phones.

Ericsson was the first of the big network vendors to forecast huge growth in the connected device and Internet of Things space. Cisco also said there will be 50 billion “connected things” in the next five years, while Huawei forecast there will be 100 billion terminals interconnected by the Internet by 2025, as ICT becomes more embedded in everyday life and across all industries. 

Ericsson also forecast that 70 per cent of people globally will be using smartphones, and 90 per cent of the world will be covered by broadband networks, by 2020.

In the same year, it forecasts smartphone subscriptions will reach approximately 6.1 billion globally.

Nokia today announced having effectively merged the IT and telco cloud domains with the launch of its AirFrame Data Centre Solution. According to the vendor this is the first offering that combines the benefits of cloud computing technologies with the stringent requirements of the core and radio in the telco world.

The Nokia AirFrame Data Centre Solution is 5G-ready and supports the vision of a more flexible and distributed cloud architecture, which is the foundation to deliver the latency and data processing requirements of the future.

In developing AirFrame, Nokia Networks has invested in further advancing the data centre hardware technology. The company believes its innovations will deliver acceleration capabilities that will help operator customers be more efficient and differentiate themselves in the market. To continue advancing its solutions, Nokia Networks has opened a dedicated R&D facility for data centre technology development.

Vodafone Group has offloaded its 4.2 per cent stake in Bharti Airtel for US$200 million to conform with new regulatory requirements in India.

A Bharti representative confirmed that Bharti Enterprises had bought the stake through one of its companies, the Economic Times said.

The sale follows new regulations under the unified licence regime that prohibit a company from holding an interest in more than one licensee company in the same service area. India has 22 service areas, or circles.

Vodafone India is the country’s second largest mobile player with a 19 per cent market share. Airtel is the market leader with a 23 per cent share, according to GSMA Intelligence.

Vodafone bought a 10 per cent stake in Airtel in 2005 and sold part of it in 2007 after its acquisition of Hutchison-Essar, which was later renamed Vodafone India.

Vodafone has faced multiple tax issues in India since that purchase. In April it hit another hurdle after the country’s income tax department asked the operator to re-file its 2009-10 tax return for re-assessment.

Following the appointment of new government representatives onto the board of state-controlled Telecom Egypt (TE), the incumbent voted for a new CEO – existing board member Osama Yassin – sparking speculation that a change in mobile direction might be on the cards.

Ousted CEO Mohamed el-Nawawy, who appeared keen on pursuing a mobile path through a unified licence – so allowing the landline monopoly to compete directly for the first time with the country’s mobile operators – had not made much progress.

TE was given the go-ahead by the government last year to acquire a unified licence – for which TE agreed to pay US$350 million – so giving it the opportunity to offer mobile services over operators’ existing infrastructure.

Local media, however, cite ongoing disputes about licence details between TE and the country’s mobile operators (Vodafone, Orange, and Etisalat), which seems to have prevented the launch of the incumbent’s branded mobile services.

It is not clear if the new CEO will push more aggressively on mobile, or signal a change of direction altogether.

Another issue is whether or not TE will need to sell its 45 per cent stake in Vodafone Egypt should it enter the mobile market directly.

As well as the appointment of Yassin, TE’s new-look board of directors appointed former minister of communications, Mohammed Salem, as chairman.

MTN Zambia is reported to now have plans to list on the Lusaka Stock Exchange (LuSE) in order to comply with its local licence conditions.

The move follows fears that the country’s regulator, the Zambia Information and Communication Technology Authority (ZICTA) might impose sanctions on the company for failing to comply with the regulation.

ZICTA regulation compels foreign-owned telecom companies to have at least 10 per cent of shares held by Zambians through the stock exchange.

MTN is, to date, the only foreign owned mobile phone operator.

In 2009, MTN said it was set to finalise the issuance of the shares through a private placement arrangement in the first quarter of 2010.

MTN Zambia currently enjoys a 51.4 per cent market share, counting 10.5 million mobile subscribers, followed by Airtel Zambia and government-owned Zambia Telecommunications Company (Zamtel).