CANTO WEEKLY NEWSLETTER – BNAMERICAS

El Salvador nearing completion of digital TV draft plan – El Salvador

Widespread hacker attacks the ‘new normal’ – Regional

AWS: no commitment on Chile’s Red Austral participation – Regional

IoT: WND prepares Sigfox arrival in five LatAm countries – Regional

Brazil’s São Paulo state government invited eligible companies to express interest in a tender for the development of management software for the public agency (DER) in charge of the administration of state highways.

The government is using the proceeds of a loan received from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). The tender is for operational management of SIGOA, which is a system to control road works.

The services to be performed include upgrading technologies for studies and projects, engineering services to adapt and update management, development of a computerized management system, and integration of these solutions with existing systems in DER / SP.

Interested consultants may obtain further information by writing to rcahin@sp.gov.br, on the website www.der.sp.gov.br, or personally from Monday to Friday at the address shown below.

Expressions of interest should be sent to the same address or to the email smi@derucp.com.br, before 4pm local time on August 8.

Unidade de Coordenação de Programas Rodoviários – Departamento de Estradas de Rodagem do Estado de São Paulo” (on behalf of Engenheiro Rubens Cahin)

Avenida do Estado, nº 777 – 2° andar – sala 2123 – Ponte Pequena, São Paulo/SP

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The Costa Rican government is seeking a mitigation module for the country’s national climate change metric, currently housed at the ministry of environment and energy (MINAE).

The module will support measuring, reporting, verifying (MRV), register greenhouse emissions and reductions for the country, and track progress towards the achievement of Costa Rica’s nationally determined contribution, a tender notice said.

The module will be supported by a digital platform solution to collect, register and process national information related directly and indirectly to climate change. The selected consultant group/consortium will be expected to provide both climate change mitigation and reporting as well as information technology expertise.

Interested firms are invited to submit expressions of interest, in English, through World Bank Group eConsultant2 (https://wbgeconsult2.worldbank.org/wbgec/index.html), by July 15.

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El Salvador nearing completion of digital TV draft plan – El Salvador

El Salvador is close to completing the first draft of its national plan to migrate to digital TV after holding a public consultation with local TV broadcasters.

“Once the public consultation process has been finalized, incorporating the training elements that we have received, we will publish the finalized plan,” Blanca Coto, head of telecoms regulator Siget, was quoted as saying by local newspaper El Mundo.

Earlier this year, El Salvador decided to adopt the ISDB-Tb standard, also known as the Japan-Brazil standard, for the transition to digital TV. In addition to providing the necessary training to achieve this goal, Japan will share best practices and policies related to ICT development.

In May, El Salvador’s telecom regulator Siget signed a memorandum of understanding with Japan’s ministry of communications to promote the technology transfer needed to carry out the Central American country’s transition.

Coto has said that the digital switchover will take place in 2018, but the analogue blackout will take longer.

According to Siget, some 5.5mn people will benefit from digital TV and it will also help with education, health, and security services.

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Widespread hacker attacks the ‘new normal’ – Regional

Global ransomware cyber-attacks, such as WannaCry and Petya are the “new normal” and tend to become more and more common with the evolution of Internet of Things, with variations only in the format of the attacks and the security breaches used.

“These attacks draw the attention to the importance of cybersecurity, with the news breaking the boundaries of specialized media and reaching the public in general,” Arthur Capella, Brazil country manager of corporate security solutions firm Palo Alto Networks told BNamericas.

The risk will be greater in particular for industries relying heavily on the automation of their factory floor.

Just a few days before the Petya outbreak, Palo Alto announced a US$20mn venture capital fund alliance in partnership with Greylock Partners and Sequoia Capital to encourage the development of security applications with a cloud-based and multi-vendor approach.

To date, more than 30 security vendors have committed to developing applications for the new Palo Alto Networks framework, including Accenture, ForeScout, and VMware, according to the company.

Security startups will be a key focus, as well as country-specific team-ups, Capella said.

The company operates in the entire Latin American region, with Brazil and Mexico standing out as the main markets, said the executive.

Both the private and public sectors are clients. According to Capella, the political environment in Brazil did stall some of the government projects, but Palo Alto Networks is currently involved in multiple tenders.

Despite the political and economic climates, the group has decided to maintain its investment plans for Brazil, which Capella says underscores “long-term commitments”. Hard figures could not be disclosed.

In their fiscal Q3, which ended April 30, Palo Alto Networks’ global revenue grew 25% year over year to US$431.8mn. Non-GAAP net income reached US$57.1mn, from US$$42.3mn the year-before.

As per geographies, the Americas region grew 22%, while EMEA grew 32% and APAC grew 33%.

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AWS: no commitment on Chile’s Red Austral participation – Regional

Global cloud provider Amazon Web Services (AWS), the data infrastructure arm of internet giant Amazon, has not yet made a decision on potential participation in Chile’s proposed Fibra Austral project, which is expected to be tendered in October.

The 3,000km, US$100mn fiber optics cable connecting Chile’s deep south was relaunched in May; revamped to make it more attractive to potential investors, after a previous auction attempt failed to generate interest.

Marcos Grilanda (pictured), head of AWS for South America, told BNamericas there is no confirmation on the participation in the Austral project or for the construction of a local data center.

Currently, AWS maintains data centers in South America just in Brazil.

Reports on potential participation started to emerge following the June 7 visit of Chilean President Michelle Bachelet to the CEO of Amazon Web Services, Andy Jessy, in Seattle, where the two discussed ways for AWS to increase its investments in Chile.

“Eventually, all major countries will host an AWS data center. However, there is no binding date and the company continues to evaluate and re-evaluate the possibilities for expansion. This is true for Chile and for the rest of Latin America,” said Grilanda.

AWS plans on opening new offices across the region in the near future. This year, in the space of one week, the company opened units in Bogotá and Santiago. Those offices support local partners and serve as a hub for neighboring countries, the executive explained.

AWS’s first LatAm office was opened five years ago in Brazil. A second one followed in Mexico.

GOVERNMENT DEALS

This February, Honduras became the first Latin American country to sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with AWS, with the objective of fostering cloud adoption in the public sector, and training professionals.

A similar agreement was signed later with the government of Chile, where 155 professionals were trained in AWS technology two weeks ago,

It does not end there: other deals with Latin American governments are in the pipeline, Grilanda said.

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IoT: WND prepares Sigfox arrival in five LatAm countries – Regional

Global internet of things connectivity provider Sigfox, through its Latin American partner WND, plans to roll-out networks in Chile, Peru, Uruguay, Paraguay and Costa Rica this year, WND COO Alexandre Reis told BNamericas.

Currently, Sigfox’s network is present across Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, and Argentina – the latter had been added in December.

With the addition of Argentina, Sigfox said its network would geographically cover 71% of Latin America and 74% of its GDP. Argentina was Sigfox’s 29th country.

The company plans to be in 60 countries by 2018, up from the current 32, and Central America is a key pillar in the strategy to achieve this goal.

According to Reis, WND and Sigfox use non-licensed spectrum, such as the ones employed by Wi-Fi networks, in the low 900MHz band in the vast majority of the LatAm countries where the network is active, which favors scale and leverage.

Good battery life and low cost of equipment are, in the executive’s opinion, the main prerequisites for the IoT ecosystem market to flourish.

WND started deploying Sigfox’s low-powered, wide-area (LPWA) dedicated IoT network in Latin America in April last year, starting with Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo in Brazil, with local channels. Currently, coverage in Brazil spans across 12 urban areas, via 280 partners, Reis said.

In Argentina, Velocom is WND’s exclusive channel for the Sigfox roll-out, connectivity services and to drive the overall growth of Sigfox’s IoT ecosystem in the country. Velocom is a subsidiary of IT and Telecom group Grupo DATCO.

WND and Velocom are also in talks with local authorities for a national public roll-out of an IoT network.

In Mexico, IoTNET is the exclusive Sigfox network operator, while in Colombia

After a global deal was struck last February, to integrate Sigfox’s low-powered connectivity into its managed connectivity platform, Telefónica became Sigfox’s preferred networking partner. But the deal did not come by accident, as the Spanish operator is a major stakeholder in the company.

With the deal, Telefónica also acts as marketing partner for the LPWA services.

The information presented and opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of CANTO and/or its members