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Strand Consult has followed the global mobile telecom industry for more than 28 years and published predictions for the last 24. See the collection. At the close of each year, we review the predictions we made for that year to see whether we got it right, and we let the reader judge. Then we make predictions for the coming year.
RELATED: Strand Consult: Germany is taking a step in the right direction for network security
In 2024 Strand Consult has been been honored to engage with operators, policymakers, and stakeholders around the world. Strand Consult team members conducted workshops for dozens of the world’s telecom operators and presented to national leaders at more than 50 events on all continents except Antarctica. Themes included security, geopolitics, broadband internet economics, spectrum, and 5G. Check our events page for the archive.
How does Strand Consult predictions?
Strand Consult’s predictions are based on assessments of technology, politics, and the market. We review technological trends and developments. We examine the level and type of regulation in various countries, the associated policies, and leaders’ ideology about telecommunications. Then we look at the mobile telecom industry, its structure and consolidation, its products, services, and pricing, and new commercial initiatives and whether they can succeed. We study whether investors find an industry or company interesting, at what price, and at which return.
In some parts of the world, primarily in Europe, telecom operators and their trade associations have been unable to improve the framework for telecommunications for some two decades, making it a region unattractive for investors. Many see former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s report The future of European competitiveness as the lifeline published by the European Commission.
In Strand Consult’s view the document is too little, too late. Each new Commission presents a glorious vision of the future and an accurate depiction of the problems, but European leaders are unwilling and/or unable to make the necessary changes for growth: to allow robust in country-consolidation and remove misguided regulation. The proof is in the “Christmas pudding” policy: The European Union economy has not grown meaningfully in a decade while the United States’ has doubled.
Many in the European Commission have a naïve view of reality. The Draghi report is one of an many documents produced by the EU that identify the problems that exist in large parts of Europe. This assessment applies to other high technology and network sectors which are under-consolidated and over-regulated: energy, rail, aviation, information technology and so on. The European Union is a region where one can enjoy tourism, luxury goods, and football/soccer, but starting and growing a new, innovative enterprise is difficult.
What Strand Consult got right in 2024
Read for yourself Strand Consult’s 2024 Predictions. Strand Consult made observations on Geopolitics, Interest Rates, Misguided Regulation, China, OpenRAN vs. 3GPP 5G RAN, Broadband business models and cost recovery, the Satellite Industry: Musk vs. Bezos and more.
2024 – Geopolitics
2024 was an election year in which more than half of the world’s population voted. There was an election in Taiwan on January 23; General elections in India in April-May; the European Parliament, 6 -9 June; and the US Presidential election on November 5. Russia’s Vladimir Putin got a 5th term, essentially unopposed. General Secretary Xi Jingping has been in power since 2012, and China’s one-party state elections are a contradiction in terms.
Four years ago, few would have believed that North Koreans would fight on European soil, but they wage war against Ukraine at the behest of Russian and China. Indeed China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea have grown an alliance whereas before they were discrete adversaries to the West.
China continues its support of Russian warfare in the Ukraine. China suppresses free speech and human rights amongst its own people and conducts lawfare against critics abroad.
Europe’s inability to solve its own challenges
European elections were not surprising in wanting change and rejecting incumbents. Strand Consult described what this means for the telecommunications industry. Europe’s inability to solve its own challenges and that of neighboring areas is discouraging. Europe needs the United States, probably to a degree not seen since the Cold War. The no confidence votes against the governments of Germany and France, the very pillars of the EU, shows that the challenge in Europe goes beyond the war in Ukraine and the black eye of Brexit, now 8 years hence.
Given the increasingly threatening situation for Europe, Strand Consult would expect national leaders to take network security more seriously, but many did not. Germany’s allegiance to China increases. As Strand Consult has documented, Germany refuses to remove malicious Chinese network equipment from mobile telecom and rail networks, putting its own people and the continent at risk to espionage, surveillance, kill switching, and other forms of intrusion from the Chinese government.
Strand Consult’s new study China’s share of 4G and 5G RAN in Europe maps the share of network vendors by country and operator and reports on the implementation of the EU 5G security toolbox. China’s best friend in Berlin, the Federal Minister of Transport and Digital Affairs Volker Wissing, went to China to communicate that EU import tariffs on Chinese cars would not be enforced. Then he signed he a memorandum of understanding with the director of China’s Cyberspace Administration Zhuang Rongwen on the “dialogue on cross-border data traffic.”
Germany at odds with rest of EU
Subsequently Wissing and the German government made policy to enable Chinese suppliers Huawei and ZTE in German networks to 2030 and possibly beyond, putting Germany at odds with the rest of the EU nations, the US, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Korea, and other democratic nations which promote policy to secure networks from Chinese intrusion. Germany’s decision reflects the cooperation of the German government and operators, whose parameters for the amount of equipment and install period exceed what all security experts recommend. The policy endangers the safety and security of some 85 million Germans and given the size of the country, the largest economy and most populous nation, puts the rest of the continent at risk.
A related and unappreciated issue of pervasive Chinese network equipment is the violation of data protection, which does not facilitate Europeans to opt out of processing, a key tenet of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). After all, it was Germany which pushed for the draconian regulation. Outside of TikTok, there are no meaningful EU enforcements of Chinese companies’ violation of GDPR, meaning that the much-vaunted policy is a political charade. The silence of GDPR advocates on China’s abuse is deafening. The point of the policy is not to protect Europeans’ data but to wield geopolitical influence.
As for the rest of Europe, 10 EU countries have implemented the EU’s 5G toolbox, 6 have partially implemented it, 5 countries are in the process of implementation, and 6 (including Germany) have not started implementation. The outcome flies in the face of a broad EU political consensus that the 5G toolbox should be implemented in the 27 member states and the 10 enlargement nations.
EU promoting ICT infrastructure in other third-countries
Looking beyond the EU neighboring countries, the EU promotes ICT infrastructure in other third-countries through the Global Gateway and its regional initiatives such as EU-LAC. The EU funds investments in digital transformation in Latin America and the Caribbean. The Global Gateway creates the opportunity to condition EU’s funding for ICT infrastructure with adherence to EU 5G toolbox. The prerequisite for participating in these projects is that they live and are compliant with the EU 5G toolbox.
The new study follows Strand Consult’s earlier report Understanding the Market for 4G RAN in Europe: Share of Chinese and Non-Chinese Vendors in 102 Mobile Networks published in 2020. The report The Market for 5G RAN in Europe: Share of Chinese and Non-Chinese Vendors in 31 European Countries was published in December 2022.
Many Germans opposed the Huawei policy, but their calls were unheeded. Some believe that the next Trump Administration could help improve European security. Indeed, his first administration succeeded to get Germany and other EU nations to increase their contributions to NATO. It called for energy diversification in Germany, away from Russia, and even sanctioned firms engaged with the Nordstream pipeline.
Strand Consult chronicled the US election and expected Trump’s win on account of many Americans feeling the pain of inflation and dissatisfaction with incumbent policy, the increasing percentage of the electorate favoring his policies, and over-regulation of the economy. Strand Consult conducts a popular presentation for its clients and stakeholders on The Trump 2.0 administration’s proposed policy. Simply put, operators which prioritize network security make preferable decisions for their shareholders.
In 2024, the telecom world qas divided into two camps; those which understand the risk of using Chinese technology to build networks and those who don’t. For the latter camp, it’s a costly for shareholders to be beholden to decisions which involve purchasing from companies under the influence of China.
What will happen in 2025 – Geopolitics
2025 will be exciting. Donald Trump will be back in the White House with a new cast of characters and some veterans from the prior administration. Indeed, many interpret that Trump is already the de facto President as world leaders pivot to him. The European Commission had bid farewell to its most powerful player, Margrethe Vestager. There is an opportunity to reset with the nations of Europe and European Commission President van der Leyen.
As for telecommunications, the new American administration promises to make deregulation cool again. Already the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an ad hoc group led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, carries out its activity on X, promises to trim one-third of the federal budget, reduce headcount, and cut regulation. This means that misguided telecom regulation adopted on a partisan basis from the current administration is on the chopping block, if the courts don’t strike it down before. Network security policy is essentially bipartisan and will continue, if not strengthen, and indeed it spans many years across both parties.
Strand Consult have described US telecom network policy in detail for years and what it means for the rest of world. See this note from 2018 on Huawei. Predicting what Trump 2.0 will do in the next four years is informed by Trump 1.0 when arguably the world was moving in the direction of greater security and stability. There has been backsliding since then, with the protracted conflict in Ukraine, and Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran having become friends.
Strand Consult’s workshop “President Trump 2.0” is tailormade for operators around the world. It provides insight into the politics in USA, how it impacts countries in Europe, Latin America, Asia and Africa, and opportunities for mobile telecom operators. Contact Strand Consult to know more.
China’s debt trap
Now matter how China policy is characterized, whether as a trade war, an attempt to decouple, derisk, or recalibrate, the fact remains that mobile telecom networks are critical infrastructure on which every nation’s digital economy and information society depends. Nations must make essential decisions to protect the safety of their people and enterprise and the integrity of the their property.
Strand Consult expects that the conditions in China will not change, and hence foreign actors will shift production and investment away from China and to other parts of the world. China will continue to make financial and geopolitical offers to nations which are difficult to refuse (“debt trap”). However, trade between democratic nations can grow and bring prosperity without dependence on China.
Strand Consult expects that China will defend itself more aggressively. They will do this by building on the narrative that it is a peaceful nation that wants enterprise and that the US and others should not meddle in what they sell to who. Similarly, China will claim that the free world should not interfere in how it treats its own population, including the citizens of Hong Kong and the Uyghur population in the north-western region of Xinjiang.
The government and enterprises of China will continue lawfare in the US, EU, and around world–litigation campaigns directed at silencing critics of China’s practices. Read the account by Bethany Allen in The Wire China Libel Lawfare: Is there a legal risk to criticizing Chinese companies? showing how journalists, academics, security experts, think tanks, and other critics are sued for libel when they state the facts about security risk, repression, and unfair business dealings.
The return of Clean Networks
2025 should see more focus on network security and reducing risk. Strand Consult expects the return of Clean Networks, an initiative launched during the first Trump administration by Ambassador Keith Krach, the Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment. It brought together nations and companies representing more than half of the world’s gross domestic product (GDP) and promised a network experience built on trust with components from providers from democratic countries.
The Biden Administration scrapped Clean Networks in favor of “vendor diversity,” the value proposition was the so-called OpenRAN (radio access network). OpenRAN has failed as a commercial and security solution. Its interoperable interfaces and software are not 1:1 substitutes for classic network technologies, and the effort includes participation of Chinese government companies, making it insecure.
Trump will likely restore Clean Networks and promote a Trusted Vendors program around the world. Without a sustained State Department effort, many of the countries and companies which promised a Clean and Trusted Network experience did not follow through. This is one priority which the new Administration probably will pick up, a no-brainer for security in an unstable world.
Clean Networks is consistent with the EU 5G toolbox, so the US and Europe can build on one important area with natural alignment.
CEOs and boards members of mobile telecom companies are eager to see how the next administration takes shape as geopolitical change is all but inevitable in Asia, Africa, Latin America and Europe. This will impact policy for mobile telecom networks. A Strand Consult presentation can help your team get up to speed.
What happened in 2024 – Interest Rates
Rising interest rates affected telecom companies’ investments as well as valuations in 2024.
When the cost of capital goes up, so do investors’ expectation of return of investment. An increasing yield requirement is a bigger problem for those operators with high debt and difficulty making money compared to those with low debt and ease of making money. Here’s an example for what it meant for the market in 2024.
Telecom Italia spun off split NetCo, its fixed landline network and sold it to US investment firm KKR & Co. for €22 billion ($24 billion). O2 in Czech Republic (part of the PPF Group that trades under the O2 brand) made this move in 2014, the first operator to do it. They split the business in two parts, network and service. Denmark’s TDC Group (the former Danish incumbent) did the same 2018. In 2020, PPF Group announced it would divide operators in Bulgaria, Hungary and Serbia into retail and infrastructure firms under the CETIN Group.
Strand Consult described the split of TDC in Denmark into separate service and network companies (Nuuday and TDC Net respectively) as financial acrobatics. To assess the success of the move, look at the results of the four owners (ATP, PFA, PKA og Macquarie). The majority of earnings have been transferred to the infrastructure company, which will be valued at a higher multiple than the service company.
A May 24 article in Danish newspaper Børsen summed up the performance with the headline PKA opens up about their investment in TDC: Will probably not be a “top scorer, Michael Nellemann, Investment Director at PKA, said that PKA, which owns 16.7% of TDC Group, injected DKK 4.038 billion into the company and that their share ohas now been written down to DKK 0. The only asset is a loan of DKK 4036 million to TDC. The interest on the loan is added to the debt with hope that TDC can repay it someday.
The financial figures of the TDC deal are frightening. Dividends were paid out in 2019 and aside from a small accounting profit, the total return to PKA for the period 2018 – 2023 is DKK 57 million or 1 percent. The TDC deal was wrong, and this was not hard to see in advance in a market in which TDC held a primary position amongst overcapitalized competitors–cooperative energy companies–which had heavily invested in fiber.
What will happen in 2025 – Interest Rates
Strand Consult expects the price of capital will be volatile in 2025 with operators experiencing different prices in financial markets around the world.
After a period of mobile operators selling off their towers and splitting their businesses into separate service and infrastructure companies, many will question the wisdom of these deals and look for other ways to create long term value for shareholders, rather than a one-time profit.
Depending on the country, if the parent company sells the service company, then the competition authorities may prevent the network company from forcing the service company to buy their services. In practice, this can mean that the services that the infrastructure company sells are exposed to massive competition.
There is also a risk that the infrastructure company will postpone investments in new technology to wring return from existing networks. Postponing the launch of 6G for two to three years could increase the return on the 5G investment.
The price of capital and technological development is increasingly complex, and there’s a debate about how capital expenditure (capex) will develop in future among different operators. To sort it out, Strand Consult’s team and Kim K. Larsen, PhD published the report The Nature of Telecom Capex until the End of the Decade which comprehensively analyzes capex trends in the Western European telecommunications industry, examining the forces driving investments, emerging challenges, and projections for the coming years. This report describes what drives investments in the industry and how it will develop in 2025 and beyond. Contact Strand Consult to get a copy.
What happened in 2024 – Misguided Regulation
As mentioned, the Mario Draghi’s report The future of European competitivenessdescribes the failure of EU policy to create innovation and growth. However, Draghi has not written anything new. Other prominent Europeans and Commissioners have said the same, and nothing has changed. It amounts to 15-year-old wine in new bottles.
Of course, more spectrum harmonization would improve the telecom market in EU, but this requires a change in the EU and member states’ constitutions, something highly unlikely in the next 10 – 15 years. Strand Consult details that here. Consolidation would also help the industry, and Draghi agreed. This requires a monumental shift at the European Commission, which is also unlikely as Strand Consult describes.
Strand Consult does not see meaningful change for EU telecom investors in 2025, unfortunately. It is difficult to see the EU’s new competition commissioner Teresa Ribera presiding over a period of radical in-market consolidation. The synergies that exist across the countries have already been harvested by large international operators like Telefonica, Vodafone, T-Mobile, etc. Ironically, in-market consolidation would be a boon to smaller local players to join forces to challenge the incumbents and large firms, just what the competition doctor ordered. But don’t expect EU competition authorities to agree; their religion is counting the number of firms in the market, regardless of price, level of technology, or investment.
Meanwhile consolidation has proceeded in other parts of the world, and many have resulted in better networks and financial returns for the companies. These deals took place in India, Africa and Latin America in which markets consolidated from, 4, 5, or 6 operators down to markets of 3.
Most recently, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) approved the merger between Hutchison and Vodafone on the grounds that it will give them a better opportunity to compete against the other two operators in the market. While the UK case seems positive for operators outside the UK, bear in mind some unique factors in the UK which Strand Consult described in its research note 5G rollout slowed while mobile operators await merger approval. Case in point: the slow rollout in the UK. For the bigger global picture, order Strand Consult’s comprehensive report Understanding 4 to 3 mobile mergers.
Misguided regulatory ideology is on display with the EU’s foolish game to regulate “Big Tech” on the premise that it would stimulate innovation in European firms, and the related pathology that regulating the telecom space under net neutrality benefits consumers and innovation. 2025 marks a decade of these foolish polices, and Europe has nothing to show for it. Its internet sector has shrunk in the last decade and is now eclipsed by Africa, which will also eclipse Europe in GDP in coming years. EU policies have succeeded in raising costs for European firms, and that has been a gift to Big Tech, which has greater ease to absorb such costs and thus exclude competitors. As for net neutrality, it reduces operators’ ability to price flexibly, manage networks efficiently, and bargain with customers for the data that consumers want. It should surprise no one that investors look elsewhere to put their money. See Strand Consult’s knowledge center on regulation, net neutrality, and other policy topics.
What happened in 2024 – RAN market
There has been a hype cycle about the RAN market for some years with OpenRAN being touted as the solution that would increase vendor competition, reduce operators’ costs, and improve security. None of this came to pass.
Strand Consult has published many reports on OpenRAN, testing the claims of its evangelists. 2024 delivered cold hard numbers to prove Strand Consult right in its skepticism. OpenRAN’s market share was already marginal, and OpenRAN players lost market share in 2024. Data from Omdia shows the world’s seven largest RAN vendors accounted for as much as 97.3% of last year’s market. This means that the many small OpenRAN players will have a market share of 2.7 percent. After 7 years of proselytizing, high priest John Baker departed Mavenir. Strand Consult’s research details wht perators around the world decline multivendor OpenRAN solutions. Modern, competitive, and commercially driven operators do not want to buy components from a universe of small suppliers with limited local presence and then mix and match them for a solution.
What will happen in 2025 – RAN market
2025 will continue the reckoning for OpenRAN. The story that operators replace Huawei and ZTE with OpenRAN no longer holds. Operators like Vodafone and T-Mobile pledged to buy OpenRAN, but they have not followed through.
US restrictions on Chinese chip companies also impact the equipment Chinese network suppliers can deliver. As the West moves towards 5 nanometer chips, China remains on an older platform. Chinese firms have tried workarounds to the restrictions, for example tweaking hardware and software to compensate for better processing, but that only goes so far. Meantime China’s domestic market for 5G RAN equipment is close to saturated. Hence Strand Consult predicts Chinese suppliers to dump prices in parts of Asia, Latin America and Africa.
What happened in 2024 – Broadband business models and cost recovery
Strand Consult is the leading expert on broadband business model for cost recovery and has documented problems and solutions. There are particular challenges in emerging countries and remote parts of world where broadband economics become difficult for low populations and challenging geography. Strand Consult is pleased that policymakers are increasingly aware of these challenges and willing to explore solutions.
The fact that broadband business models have broken down is no secret. Broadband is priced as if traffic is symmetrical, and email is the killer app. Business models have not caught up with the reality today that most traffic is video, and its costs to deliver grow. This is exacerbated by the fact that broadband providers cannot raise prices in competitive markets, and they face systematic market failures in attempting to negotiate with Big Tech for cost recovery.
Strand Consult’s new report Gigabit Caribbean: Closing the Investment Gap in Fixed and Mobile Networks demonstrates one of the world’s most severe examples, likening Big Tech’s free riding on Caribbean broadband networks as digital colonialism. Like colonizers of old, Big Tech claims it is doing good while it extracts revenue and data from an impoverished region without paying tax, regulatory license fees, or local salaries. Caribbean policymakers should take action to secure the digital future of the region.
Broadband and the emerging Caribbean region
Strand Consult explores these issues in this important emerging region of some two dozen nations and 45 million people. Its new report Gigabit Caribbean: Closing the Investment Gap in Fixed and Mobile Networksdescribes the economic challenges, quantifies the Gigabit broadband investment gap, and suggests policy solutions. The Caribbean Gigabit Society defines universal connectivity for all people of the Caribbean at 100 Mbps for the purpose of enabling employment and economic development through the take up of advanced digital goods and services; global competitiveness in making the region attractive for investment; and the rollout of high capacity fixed and mobile networks.
The report puts the set of sovereign yet interdependent Caribbean nations in geopolitical and economic context. The United Nations categorizes the Caribbean as Small Island Developing States (SIDS), a distinct group of nations which face unique social, economic and environmental vulnerabilities. These challenges are described in part in Strand Consult’s research note The Caribbean is a microcosm of Big Tech’s digital colonialism. Small and medium-sized emerging countries are profitable to exploit.
Uncovering abuses by Big Tech
A similar abuse by Big Tech is underway in USA which Strand Consult has documented in the new report Ending Big Tech’s Free Ride on USF: Reforming the Universal Service Fund to Serve Consumers and America. US internet companies Alphabet, Meta, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, and Netflix (“Big Tech”) derived an estimated $58 billion – $115 billion in revenue in 2023 from users connecting to the internet through the Universal Service Fund (USF) and the now-ended Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). With each new household connected, Big Tech earned on average $1515 in 2023. Some 5 million businesses in a USF-funded areas drove an average of $19,000 per firm to Big Tech in 2023, some $95 billion. Altogether, Big Tech enjoyed $58 billion – $210 billion from consumers and enterprises in USF-funded areas.
While profiting significantly from the $9 billion USF, Big Tech does not contribute to the program and engages to deter its participation. In addition, Big Tech avoids compensating most broadband providers for use of their networks. Big Tech generates more than 60 percent of total internet traffic on US broadband networks and occupies most of America’s bandwidth, creating significant downstream costs for broadband providers which remain unrecovered. Strand Consult has yet to find broadband providers which have increased revenue or profitability by providing access to Big Tech’s services. Rather, broadband providers experience increasing competition from new technologies and have difficulty increasing price, making the case for network investment increasingly difficult.
Meanwhile 25 percent of internet traffic is Big Tech’s advertising, an element which consumers neither request nor control, and yet, increases with all internet traffic at 20-30 percent yearly. Broadband subscribers pay the same for advertising data as the data they request, an anti-consumer policy norm implemented by Big Tech lobbying.
Policymakers, including the incoming Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr increasingly recognize that the status quo is no longer acceptable and that Big Tech’s free ride on USF must end. Strand Consult´s report describes proposed reforms to modernize USF, how to incorporate financial contributions from Big Tech, and reduce cost to consumers
What will happen in 2025 – Broadband business models and cost recovery
In 2025 Strand Consult will continue its research in this field as there is growing interest and is invited by policymakers around the world to present its research and explore solutions.
The US Supreme Court will hear a critical case about the constitutionality of the current contribution process of the USF. This puts Congress in the hot seat to reform a program which helps some 100 million Americans connect to the internet each year. A range of factors support USF reform happening in 2025 including but not limited to the Trump Administration campaigning on lowering costs to consumers and holding Big Tech accountable, the fallout of the Biden Administration’s Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program which has soured policymakers and the public on giant deficit spending packages which fail to deliver, and the groundswell of support in USA to modernize the funding of broadband subsidies, including a bill sponsored by Senator, now Vice President Elect J.D. Vance. Moreover bipartisan bills have already been proposed to reform USF and can be repackaged for the next Congress.
Only the US is likely to succeed in incorporating Big Tech into USF. However other nations and regions can and should pursue market-based cost recovery, like efforts underway in Caribbean, Latin America, Africa and Asia. Big Tech won’t give up its free ride easily, and they had help globally from the Biden Administration. Strand Consult has documented Big Tech’s tactics and patterns so that policymakers and operators have transparency. Operators should order Strand Consult’s reports so that they are ready for 2025.
Satellite Industry – It’s a fun and wild story
In its 2024 predictions, Strand Consult compared Elon Musk’s Starlink to Jeff Bezos’ Kuiper, observing that Bezos had just opened a burger bar while Musk runs an interstellar McDonald’s. The year proved the assessment correct, and the picture doesn’t change when Eutelsat’s OneWeb is included.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Starlink are light years ahead of their competitors. This is due to, among other things, the fact that SpaceX has a global network of over 6000 satellites which are planned to expand to 14,000 satellites (if not more) at an altitude of almost 600 km and which have a lifespan of 5 – 6 years. This is all the more audacious considering that Musk built the network without having access to the spectrum.
The year was a good year for Eutelsat’s Danish CEO Eva Berneke. She received a salary increase at the November board meeting, despite the fact that, as one of Putin’s technological supporters, she disregards the sanctions the EU has made against Russia. The diligent people from the Denis Diderot Committee and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) have campaigned tirelessly to stop the aid that Eutelsat provides to Putin in the war against Ukraine.
Some poetic justice was Air France choosing Starlink as their inflight broadband provider over the partly French state-owned Eutelsat. When products and services become good enough, even politics cannot cover for the obvious.
The average revenue per user (ARPU) for a Starlink customer is higher than that of a mobile or fiber broadband customer. However, it takes more money to build and operate a satellite network. In general, it’s a low margin business. Strand Consult predicts that the market will be unable to support two lesser global satellite players, and that players like Kuiper and OneWeb do not have the muscle to challenge Starlink.
Jeff Bezos (Kuiper) and Eva Berneke (OneWeb) will likely be spectators in the back row of the sold-out Elon Musk (Starlink) concert. Policymakers will increasingly review the conditions for satellite operations. Starlink has built up political goodwill in many places, though Musk has been maligned in others. Starlink is likely to develop into a new Over the Top (OTT) service in the coming years, creating another risk for broadband incumbents.
AI, AI and AI – Don’t be stupid
AI will get even more hype in 2025. The hype will shift from ChatGPT to the vertical solutions that will pop up on top of the classic AI platforms. We are talking about the vertical AI solutions that are being developed for specific customer segments like lawyers, consultants, the healthcare industry and others. We go from talking about AI to talking about how specific industries can save time and money by developing and using industry-specific AI solutions.
Larger companies will increasingly implement AI solutions as a standard tool on an equal footing with the Office suites that many use. The knowledge that companies buy will be put into a central AI solution where employees not only retrieve knowledge from the “corporate library” but get access to an AI-processed version of the knowledge that the company has in their knowledge “library.”
2025 will bring focus on how to trust AI solutions and how they can be used and misused. Personally, I think it will take a few years before AI solutions can make the predictions that Strand Consult makes every year.
Safety, security and security.
The year 2024 was the year when authorities around the world put extra focus on the security risks associated with building the vital digital infrastructure using Chinese equipment. Some countries focus more on this topic than others, however most countries have some focus on this area.
The European Commission’s Directorate General released in 2024 a 700-page report on the economic distortions created by the Chinese government. This fact-based report, which updates analysis from 2017, has more 3500 authoritative references citing official Chinese documents and information from the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the World Trade Organization, and other authorities. The report examines China’s economic distortions on three fronts: the role of central planning and state ownership of enterprises and resources; the control of factors of production land, labor, and capital; and its direction of industrial sectors of chips, telecommunications, railways, steel, aluminum, chemicals, ceramics, renewables, and electric vehicles. The document is a must-read for policymakers, business leaders, journalists, students, and others. The information on telecommunications appears on p. 518-548, and Strand Consult offers highlights below.
Some dismiss concerns about China’s economic practices as irrational, unfounded, or driven by politics in the USA. The evidence compiled by European Commission analysts using official Chinese government materials shows systematic, persistent, and comprehensive distortion directed by the Chinese state. Importantly, the EU document provides only facts; there are no recommendations, guidance, or conclusions.
The European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA) held the 2024 Telecom & Digital Infrastructure Security Forum, a key annual event for cybersecurity policymakers and professionals. A key presentation was held by Melanie Scheidt, policy officer from DG CONNECT in the European Commission, called EU policy on the cybersecurity of 5G networks.
Risks of cyber-attacks on the EU’s communications networks
The presentation emphasizes the importance of the report on the cybersecurity and resiliency of the EU communications infrastructures and networks The report examines risks of cyber-attacks on the EU’s communications networks and infrastructures by hostile third countries, i.e. nation state actors, but also organized crime groups and hacktivists acting in support of nation states. The report identifies 10 threats, including supply chain attacks, nation State interference on suppliers, and network intrusion.
At Strand Consult we published the research note: Eight risks for the 5G supply chain from suppliers under the influence of adversarial countries like China that describes the challenges in a simple and straightforward way.
In our research note: Latin America’s Digital Development – This century’s strategic choice for securitywe have described this based on Latin America, which we believe is a region where there will be a lot of focus on this.
The year 2025 will be the year where there will be a lot of focus on safety, from some very broad considerations. We can feel from our customers that their interest in this topic has increased considerably after the election in the United States.
Wrap up – Conclusion for 2024. Welcome 2025
2024 was a critical year for elections, the market, and technological developments. Strand Consult predicts it presages an exciting period of 4 to 5 years for the USA and other regions but not the EU unfortunately.
The EU is still light years away from finding solutions to its economic challenges and needed reforms to telecom policy. While the rest of the world makes consolidation happen, the EU sits on its hands. The great synergies come from in-country consolidation when a technology shifts e.g. like 4G to 5G. This is when operators must replace all their active equipment. That window closed in most European countries 3 to 4 years ago.
A moment of truth is at hand for TikTok on January 19, 2025, when its divestiture is due, and when the US could block the app. The Supreme Court agreed to hear an 11th hour appeal from ByteDance, TikTok’s parent. Moreover, President-Elect Trump weighed in, noting his popularity on the platform and suggesting that the app should not go dark. The proposed divestiture and possible ban represent an important bipartisan policy agreement in an election year and commitment to protect Americans’ security and privacy. Keeping to the status quo creates rippling problems.
Strand Consult directs readers to its assessment of TikTok’s Senate testimony in which it stated that children were better in Singapore than in the USA on the platform. Earlier this year in Romania, TikTok was used to manipulate voters, causing the government to cancel and postpone the election due to disinformation and outside influence. The story did not receive much coverage outside Romania, but it is a harbinger if the TikTok status quo remains.
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