Ericsson/Nokia could fill Huawei vacuum

The exclusion of Chinese technology giant Huawei from Portugal’s 5G market has paved the way for the telecoms duo Ericsson/Nokia to enter the Portuguese market say sources in the telecoms sector.

Altice Portugal, one of three major telecoms providers in the country along with Vodafone and NOS, has already chosen the Finnish company Nokia to develop the core of its 5G network in Portugal, an important step to unlock the potential of 5G.
And the United States, through its ambassador in Lisbon, has already welcomed the Government’s decision to effectively shut Huawei out of the Portuguese market as a core technology developer of its 5G infrastructure after pressure from Brussels that telecoms operators in Portugal should avoid using equipment from Chinese manufacturers in their telecoms networks.
Three years ago Huawei was excluded from Portugal’s 5G core development over cybersecurity fears and it was announced that Altice Portugal would carry out tests with various companies including Ericsson and the US company Cisco.
In 2020 NOS had already confirmed that it would not be using Chinese technology from Huawei in its 5G core development.
A report from the Portuguese Higher Council of Cybersecurity (CSSG) decided that the Chinese telecoms giants ZTE and Huawei would not be allowed to be involved in developing Portugal’s 5G core infrastructure technology and preferred operators such as Nokia, Ericsson and the US company Mavenir.