Telecom news

• Capturing new opportunities in the subsea market

  12-05-2022 02:00
  EXA Infrastructure, previously the infrastructure unit of GTT Communications, was acquired by I Squared Capital in September 2021, bringing with it all of GTT’s inter-route terrestrial footprint in Europe, three Hibernia transatlantic cables, and its network in the northeast US and Canada. Now, less than one year on, large-scale investment is beginning to be poured into the business, with numerous projects underway in Europe and beyond.“We’re seven months into EXA now and
  
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• Photographers launch appeal for east London community hub

  02-10-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  A community photography centre could open in Haggerston under plans by the Association of Photographers (AOP) to turn its east London premises into a place for photographers to work, meet and share ideas.The AOP already owns the property, which it has rented out since 2012 to help fund its work. With the premises now available again, the association wants to use them as a hub for its members and the wider photography and image-making community.
  First, it needs to raise £75,000.
  The AOP say
  
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• Richmond’s draw-off dates confirmed for 2026

  02-10-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  The dates for Richmond’s annual draw-off have been confirmed, offering visitors a chance to see the River Thames exposing its riverbed at very low tides.
  Richmond draw off 2025 (c) ianVisits
  Ordinarily, the low tide would look just like you’re seeing, but that would be a big nuisance for boats, so the Port of London Authority (PLA) uses the Richmond and Teddington locks to manage the river height and maintain a minimum level at low tide so the river can remain navigable.
  But turn the
  
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• Urgent closure of the Victoria line confirmed for Saturday evening

  02-10-2026 13:45 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  There is going to be an urgent partial closure of the Victoria line on Saturday evening to carry out repairs to the track outside Brixton station.
  Brixton tube station
  The fault, a points failure at the junction outside Brixton station, was detected a week ago and has meant trains crossing the junction had to slow down more than usual. The speed restriction means they can run only 24 trains per hour, instead of the usual 36 during rush hour. This has caused delays on the line because they can&rs
  
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• Salman Toor brings love, loneliness and green paint to the Courtauld

  02-10-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  An American-based artist you might not have heard of is currently filling a gallery space with a series of paintings ranging from life as a migrant to being alone in a pub surrounded by people.The artist, Salman Toor, was born in Pakistan but moved to the USA and is now based in New York City, focusing his work on the intimacy of a night out and the unease of being an outsider.
  Lauded in the USA – he even painted New York’s mayor Zohran Mamdani (before he was a politician) – an
  
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• UK watchdog signals it may block major broadband deal

  02-10-2026 09:16 via ft.com
  CMA move over Nexfibre-Netomania tie-up could delay consolidation in fragmented sector
  
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• BT seeks government nod for potential TalkTalk takeover

  01-10-2026 17:02 via ft.com
  Telecoms group holds talks with UK officials over possible antitrust issues involved in buying smaller competitor
  
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• New Shakespeare library and research centre opens at the Globe Theatre

  01-10-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  The Globe Theatre at Bankside has opened a public Shakespeare library and research centre, giving visitors access to more than 6,000 books and a collection of rare Renaissance texts.
  Shakespeare’s Globe / James Newton
  The Globe describes the collection as the closest surviving resemblance to Shakespeare’s bookshelf.
  The new Research & Collections Centre includes the Audre D. Carlin Reading Room, whose books cover Shakespeare, early modern literature and culture, and the history o
  
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• Tickets Alert: Tours of the RNLI base at Waterloo Bridge

  01-10-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  If you missed out on the RNLI’s recent exhibition, or fancy seeing more of their floating base, they offer occasional tours of the building.Each tour at RNLI’s Tower Lifeboat Station lasts approximately 60 – 90 minutes. During your visit, you will be guided around the station and learn about the lifesaving work carried out on the River Thames.
  The tour offers insight into lifeboat operations, the RNLI’s history and mission, and the station’s role today as the busies
  
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• Romance beneath the brollies: Renoir’s Paris comes to the National Gallery

  01-10-2026 14:15 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  The man who painted Sunday afternoons is the subject of a new exhibition at the National Gallery, exploring twenty years when Pierre-Auguste Renoir captured the pleasures of Parisian life — and the flirtations beneath its respectable surface.At a time when most artists and writers focused on the dire state that Paris and France found themselves in, Renoir turned his back on the gloomy Monday to Saturday and focused on the day off instead. Only the richer folk though, as poor people didn&rs
  
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• Australia’s banks show how to prepare for cable blackouts

  01-10-2026 14:03 via ft.com
  The country is making its financial system resilient enough to withstand the cutting of undersea lines
  
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• TfL updates the small print behind London’s big transport hubs

  01-10-2026 12:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Whenever something is built in London, an army of armchair warriors love to point out how stupid the designer was – and don’t stop to think that maybe there’s a really good reason it was done that way.
  Bakerloo line entrance at Paddington station (c) ianVisits
  And while such people will never deign to check the facts first, there are policies governing what goes up and down, and how it does so. If only they read them.
  And Transport for London (TfL) has refreshed its own guideli
  
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• Shinto ceremony marks start of British Library extension and Crossrail 2 station

  01-10-2026 11:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  A Japanese Shinto ceremony has marked the start of construction on the British Library’s £1.1 billion extension, a development that will also reserve underground space for a future Crossrail 2 station.
  Schematic of old and new site and Crossrail 2 – Source: British Library planning application
  The ceremony – which incorporated a series of Shinto rituals to prepare the site for construction work and to ask the ‘kami’ or guardian spirits of the land for good luc
  
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• The London Buzz – 29th Sept 2026

  29-09-2026 18:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Old London – Station Parade on Horn Lane in Acton
  Today’s London news round-up:
  Wandsworth Council took four months to visit a tenant after she complained about a lack of heating in her temporary accommodation, a watchdog has found. Putney SW15
  Lord Sadiq Khan’s move to bring some London buses back into public ownership for the first time in 30 years has triggered a heated political row. Standard
  A Metropolitan Police officer has become the first person to be charged as a resul
  
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• Tickets Alert: Barbican ghost tours of their empty library and The Pit

  29-09-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  The Barbican is hoping for concrete evidence of the supernatural this autumn as it launches its first Ghost Tours of the arts centre.
  (c) Barbican arts centre
  Expanding on their existing architecture tours, the Barbican Ghost Tours will take visitors on a journey through nearly two thousand years of history, exploring legends of Roman ruins, plague pits and staff ghost stories.
  The 75-minute tour journeys through the highwalks and subterranean corridors of the Barbican, taking in the empty Libra
  
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• Tickets Alert: Halloween-themed tours of Clapham’s WWII tunnels

  29-09-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Eleven floors beneath Clapham Common, a wartime shelter is preparing to tell a few ghost stories.The London Transport Museum is launching its first Halloween-themed Hidden London tour, taking visitors through the Clapham South WWII shelter’s deserted tunnels with accounts of wartime life, Underground legends and supernatural experiences reported by railway staff.
  The tours will use lighting, sound, projections and guides in character to lead visitors through the shelter. The route includes
  
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• HS2 solves the Elizabeth line’s step-free problem at Old Oak Common station

  29-09-2026 14:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Elizabeth line passengers will be able to board trains at Old Oak Common without the usual step up from the platform, after the government approved a redesign that lowers the tracks serving the station’s four Elizabeth line platforms.
  Old Oak Common surface platforms concept image (c) HS2
  Conventionally, national rail platforms are set to a standard height above the rails of 915mm, to allow for a wide range of trains to be able to use them – from passenger to freight to engineering.
  
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• Apollo and Oaktree sue Patrick Drahi over US telco restructuring

  29-09-2026 13:42 via ft.com
  Bondholders argue billionaire is liable for ‘brazen’ plan to move Optimum Communications’ most valuable cable TV assets out of reach
  
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• White porcelain sculptures invade the Wallace Collection

  29-09-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  A collection of bright white porcelain sculptures has appeared in the Wallace Collection’s richly decorated galleries, their twisting forms contrasting in rooms filled with Old Master paintings, gilded furniture, and decorative arts.These are nine works by the ceramic artist Rachel Kneebone, including two made for the installation and shown for the first time.
  Kneebone’s sculptures use a material often associated with smooth, perfect objects, but their forms are crowded and restless.
  
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• Improved ticket gate access complete for Peckham Rye station

  29-09-2026 08:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Although Peckham Rye station’s main upgrade is on hold, Network Rail has carried out some modest improvements to the station, including a wider ticket gateline.
  The gateline had four barriers, but during busy times the station often ended up with queues on both sides. This has now been widened to six gates. It’s not the huge upgrade that was planned, but as a retailer might say – every little helps.
  July 2026 (c) ianVisits
  September 2026 (c) ianVisits
  In addition, new passenger
  
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• Oxford Street pedestrianisation to start from late October

  28-09-2026 20:50 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  The date that road traffic will be banned from a large section of Oxford Street has been announced – as Monday 26th October 2026.From that date, almost a kilometre of Oxford Street will be pedestrianised, from Orchard Street to Great Portland Street. From then, buses, taxis, bikes and other vehicles will be diverted onto nearby roads, which will be monitored to ensure traffic moves effectively during the transition.
  Pedestrian areas overlay on OpenStreet Maps, with gaps for the north-south
  
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• The London Buzz – 28th Sept 2026

  28-09-2026 18:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Olde London – Electric Avenue, Brixton
  Today’s London news round-up:
  Banana trees that were adopted ten years ago by a day centre for people living with advanced dementia have produced fruit for the first time this summer. Tower Hamlets Council
  The Prince of Wales pub in Putney has been named the borough’s best business in bloom at the Wandsworth in Bloom awards last week. Putney News
  Major disruption to last all day at London Victoria after fire near tracks Metro
  Inside Met Po
  
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• Fresh dates announced for lunches in the City’s grand Livery Halls

  28-09-2026 17:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  If you fancy lunch in one of the City of London’s livery halls, it’s possible.
  Livery Halls are usually only open to members or hired out for events, but Butchers, Founders and Watermen offer semi-regular public lunches in their halls.
  Note: They generally have a smart dress code.
  Ironmongers’ Hall (c) ianVisits
  Butchers’ Hall
  A carvery lunch with three courses. Guests are welcomed with a drink reception from 12:15pm on the Ground Floor, before ascending to the Great Hall
  
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• Great British Railways to rethink how new trains are paid for

  28-09-2026 16:40 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  The government is considering buying new trains for public ownership instead of routinely leasing them from private companies, after rail operators spent £2.7 billion on train leases in a year.Since rail privatisation, most passenger trains have been owned by rolling stock companies, known as ROSCOs, and leased to the operators that run them. Under its new rolling stock and infrastructure strategy, Great British Railways (GBR) will assess public ownership, leasing and other financing
  
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• Apax nears deal to buy Warburg Pincus out of €6.5bn telecoms group Odido

  26-09-2026 06:00 via ft.com
  Purchase would follow private equity owners’ decision to shelve planned listing of Dutch operator due to market instability
  
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• The London Buzz – 25th Sept 2026

  25-09-2026 18:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Old London – Beckenham High Street / Church Hill in 1979
  Today’s London news round-up:
  A theatre-goer fell victim to a “sophisticated phishing attack” after booking a “luxury” London apartment, only to discover the address was a Wetherspoon pub. BBC News
  ‘Unless the Greens get a grip, government will step in’: Lib Dem warning as Lambeth faces £10m overspend Brixton Buzz
  E-bike vandalism at Shire golf course leads to closure of entry points to
  
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• TfL to run London bus routes again for first time since 2009

  25-09-2026 16:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Transport for London (TfL) will run bus routes again for the first time since 2009, starting with Route 6 between Willesden and Victoria in late 2027.You might be surprised to learn that TfL is running a bus service, as many people assume it already does. In fact, although London’s bus network is publicly planned and controlled, eight private companies provide the buses under contract. TfL’s new company, Buses for London (BfL), will give TfL a way to run a small number of those servi
  
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• Free exhibition inside the RNLI’s Thames lifeboat station

  25-09-2026 15:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  For a few days, there is a chance to go into the RNLI’s riverside base in central London and see a small but quite fascinating exhibition.The exhibition mainly features paintings from the RNLI’s archive, showing the range and variety of lifeboat stations along the UK’s coastline, along with archive drawings by their architects.
  As a collection, it’s both arty but also educational, as you get to learn about how early lifeboat buildings were designed with ecclesiastical des
  
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• Old masters meet surrealists in a free Marylebone exhibition

  25-09-2026 13:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  A wide-ranging collection of artworks, from old masters to modern, has been gathered in an exhibition that is, well, quite eclectic.The collection, which ranges from paintings by Hendrick Goltzius to Salvador Dalí, has been interspersed with modern works by the gallery owner, Glenn Brown.
  Glenn Brown’s work is very marmite and of a certain taste, but collecting a range of other artists and putting them on display around his work gives the visitor a chance to see usually private work
  
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• A once-in-a-lifetime bloom is coming to Kew Gardens

  25-09-2026 10:00 via ianvisits.co.uk
  
  Kew Gardens is advising people to stand by for a rare flowering of a giant Agave montana as it prepares its one bloom in its life.
  Anna Lim, Botanical Horticulturist with Agave montana – Photo Sebastian Kettley (c) RBG Kew
  The A. montana, which is native to the mountainous habitats of northeastern Mexico and sits in Kew’s Rock Garden next to Davies Alpine House, has produced an asparagus-like stalk (called a peduncle) growing at a rate of 10cm a day and is now measuring more than 2 m
  
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