Iliad confirms Nokia for France and Italy 5G push

In a much needed win for Nokia, the Finnish network vendor will be the central cog to the Iliad 5G deployment strategy across France and Italy.

In recent months, Nokia has at times looked like a bit of a suspect partner to work alongside, though that doesn’t seem to bother Iliad that much. In South Korea during April, unnamed officials said all three operators were told to expect delays in receiving 5G base stations, while Sprint in US it was also suggested delays were down to the Finnish vendor’s tardiness.

CEO Rajeev Suri acknowledged the delays, suggesting they were only ‘short-term’ issues, in April’s earnings call, though the chief also tried to shift the blame onto ‘instabilities’ in consumer chipsets. The fact that these issues were not reported by Nokia’s competitors says more than Suri would like.

However, Iliad is an important win for the vendor.

After partnering with Iliad for both its 3G and 4G networks, Nokia would have been confident in retaining the relationship, though it has been losing out over the last 12-18 months. The telco is currently planning its 5G roadmap, with the first base stations set to go live in 2020.

This is somewhat of an important juncture for the telco, which has been licking its own battle wounds over the last couple of financial periods. Despite taking the French market by storm in the early years, Iliad has been suffering at the hands of competition as rivals stepping their own promotional games, chasing down Iliad during the race to the bottom.

The last financial period looked much more promising, though it still has some work to do to repair the damage. In May, Iliad reported an increase in mobile service revenues in France of 2.3%, however the total number of subscribers decreased by 50,000, down to 13.4 million.

The damage was most notable across 2018. Across the first half, Iliad was beaten at its own game, being undercut by rivals and being forced into announced a reduction in profit forecasts. Q1 in 2018 saw churn of 200,000 mobile subscriptions, the first net decline since the introduction of Iliad in 2012. The broadband business suffered the same fate, resulting in roughly a 40% share price crash across the whole of 2018.

Looking at the most recent numbers, there is a bit more stability and perhaps this is where the greatest enthusiasm for an aggressive 5G rollout will emerge from. In both France and Italy, Iliad has an opportunity to generate momentum through the new connectivity euphoria. This is an era which, once again, looks perfect for aggressive pricing and the first to scale 5G across a nation will reap the profits.

The opportunity for Iliad to get back on track is certainly there, it just needs the right partner to help facilitate the rollout and get the company back on track in the 5G world. Iliad executives will be hoping Nokia’s troubles are in the rear-view mirror.