Three Ireland signs five-year managed services deal with Nokia

17 May 2016

Three Ireland has signed a five-year managed services deal with Nokia

Three Ireland has signed a five-year managed services and upgrade deal with Nokia for its radio access network in Ireland.

Three will contract Nokia to manage all of its multi-technology, multi-vendor radio access network operations.

In 2014, Three acquired O2’s Irish operations from Telefónica for around €850m. However, in recent days, it has emerged that Three and O2’s £10.5bn merger in the UK has been blocked at the final hurdle by the European Commission.

As well as in-country management, Nokia will manage the network from its Global Network Operations Centre in Lisbon, Portugal.

The deal extends an existing network management contract with Nokia and will see the Finnish telecoms technology giant deploy NetAct technology to capture data insights.

“By moving to one managed services supplier across our radio access network, we will have a more transparent structure, simplifying operations and enhancing network performance,” said David Hennessy, chief technology officer at Three Ireland.

Nokia will provide Three Ireland with real-time support to manage the new consolidated Three/O2 radio network and enable new technologies to be added.

Last year, Nokia acquired Alcatel-Lucent for €15.6bn.

Cell tower image via Shutterstock

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com