Nokia won a five-year deal to upgrade and expand the 5G RAN of Ice Norway, building on an existing relationship with the mobile operator.

In a statement, the Finnish vendor explained deployment is already in progress and will continue until 2026. Nokia noted about 3,200 base stations will be modernised and 3,900 additional sites are to be deployed.

Ice CEO Eivind Helgaker stated Nokia “has been our technology partner from the very beginning and through active competition they have again convinced us that they are still the right choice”.

The operator claims more than 700,000 customers and stated its 4G/5G network covers 95 per cent of the population in Norway.

Industry group Lyse completed an acquisition of Ice in March 2022.

Lyse indicated Ice and its fibre broadband provider Altibox are in a position to add new services to their fixed and mobile offer, such as 5G fixed wireless access.

Growing share
Norwegian telecoms regulator Nkom placed Ice’s mobile market share at 12.1 per cent by end-2021, compared with 11.7 per cent in 2020.

Telenor Norway’s share amounted to 43.9 per cent and Telia Norway 34.7 per cent.

In terms of fixed and mobile revenue, Ice accounted for 5.3 per cent of the market in 2021, while Altibox was the third-largest group with a 10.7 per cent share.

Telenor Norway and Telia Norway were the largest on 45.2 per cent and 23.3 per cent, respectively.