07 March 2019

JAPAN - Finnish giant Nokia has partnered with the Rakuten Group to build a new mobile network in Japan.

Nokia “will provide full turnkey services” to plan, manage, deploy and integrate cloud RAN, AirGile cloud-native core network technology and various Nokia software functions.

Based in Tokyo, Rakuten offers services in e-commerce, fintech, digital content and communications to over 1.2 billion members worldwide.

Rakuten said it will use its experience as an IT specialist and exploit its membership base of 100 million+ users in Japan as it enters the market as a greenfield mobile operator and digital service provider.