 by JSA. I'm Barb Mitchell, EVP and Managing Director at JSA and I'm so excited to welcome you all here today to the first first day of Capacity Europe where we will be broadcasting live right here from the floor of the exhibition hall at the Intercontinental at the O2 in London. So great to be back with everyone so excited to see everyone yesterday. Today's day one yesterday was actually day zero and we could already feel the energy for the week ahead at the opening networking lounge sponsored by Colt's record numbers here this year at Capacity Europe and we know we can tell just looking around you know how busy this week is set to be and many of you will be very busy. I know meeting with important contacts and accessing content over the Capacity Europe swap card and and of course you know attending many of the important sessions that are coming up. So whatever you're doing during the hustle and bustle of Capacity Europe please feel free to take a step back and tune in because we have a full day today tomorrow and Thursday of content for you where we will be interviewing leaders from across the telecom data center and infrastructure space here to share some of their insights of what they're seeing what they're planning for the year ahead and we're really excited to share it with you. So in between these interviews of course we'll also be sharing content that's happening some sneak peeks into some of the the sessions that are happening some previews and some highlights and so please do tune in. Also exciting to note is the Global Carrier Awards which are set to happen tomorrow night here in London. A lot of amazing companies up for very important and distinguished awards at that event so we will be taking part in that and we hope to see you all there in person. And with Capacity Europe Extra we like I said will be streaming live all week so do tune in from time to time when you can and and take a break and enjoy some of this great content and when you when you have an opportunity of course look at the agenda and tune in to the Capacity Europe swap card app. We look forward to seeing you all live and in person and streaming live here from again the floor of the exhibition hall at the O2 intercontinental in London. We'll see you all out there. It's a big event for the community. It's a great networking framework for all of us and I extremely appreciate the opportunity to have this whole colleagues and partners and stakeholders in the community together and this year we have identified more than ever how important also in person meetings are after being locked down for almost two years. We are at the beginning of a new decade if it comes to the industry development and exciting times are ahead of us having the digital transformation everywhere for everyone and everybody this will change our industry as well. We're happy to be here at Capacity Europe to be again here and meet the industry and we are going every year because for us it's really big events meeting all of our partners across the carrier industry as well as other industry as well as technological partners meeting here and one venue which helps us very much to bring all the energy together to face all the challenges and to face all the business opportunities that the market is bringing to us. Creative ledger to be part of Capacity Europe 2021. A true partner of choice and looking forward for the future success. It's a fantastic place to meet customers, partners and essentially connect with the ecosystem. If we're not all successful no one is. I think we'll increase the way we co-create together. I think the importance of igniting end user be it consumer or enterprise experience has become more important and I think ultimately because we need to propel more growth so I'll see you at Capacity 2022. And see you at Capacity Europe 2022. We'll see you at Capacity Europe 2022. See you at Capacity Europe 2022. It's annual global carrier awards. I think there are an awful lot of events on the calendar it's a bit of a jamboree but I think the global carrier awards stand out, the capacity events stand out. I'm looking forward to network with a lot of people know what's going on around and the rest of the world from partners, from other operators, from our customers. Tonight this is the place to be in telecoms. We'll recognise the best global and regional carriers, projects, marketing and sales teams, campaigns, disruptors and innovations. You know really genuinely pretty product. New award category and I think it's brilliant for you and I'm really really happy for you. I'm very honoured and delighted to be part of this great group of companies and we want to mend some more. Congratulations to everyone. I hope you had a wonderful evening. Thank you. Welcome to Capacity Europe 2022 pre-event coverage. We are looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on the 18th to the 24th October at the Intercontinental London DO2 and also on the SWAT Carder app. I'm David Tran, conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called Five Minutes With, tapping into industry views but also bring out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event. Here in Five Minutes With I have Eric Seavis, president global wholesale of Verizon partner solutions. Eric first of all great to have you involved and great to have you speaking at this year's event. Ready for a quick five five minute with informal interview? Absolutely. Looking forward to it and glad to participate and support the Capacity Europe event. You know Verizon we like to show up each year and support the event so glad to do this for you. Great, great to have you in the room as well. We're looking forward to October. Alright let's start the clock. So Eric first of all tell me the cover and state of play situation in global telecoms. I believe that you know enterprises around the world are kind of looking for what we call global simple and secure solutions at the end of the day and we see this as an incredible opportunity for global telecom providers in the industry. If we look at our assets regardless of what's going on in kind of the economic and geopolitical vein this is just a great opportunity for us once again to deliver things into the business and to the industry so global simple secure that's the way the solutions need to go whether it's network, whether it's above the network, wireline and wireless services. It's staff and where would you say your organization is positioned at the moment. I mean we've seen these shifts obviously post-COVID take place but also digital transformation really kind of gathering momentum within the industry but also there's also a terrible and economic and inflationary climate as well. Where do you see your organization's position? If I look at my Verizon partner solutions global wholesale team we feel we're kind of very excited about the assets that we have. Once again if we look at what we've done we spent over 120 billion dollars getting our spectrum with c-band and millimeter wave and once again we got vast fiber deployments across the footprint right now so very strategic time for us whether it's wireline wireless what are we doing from ethernet to wave to internet services even what I'm doing above the network with blue jeans conferencing or security services or what I really love is the passion we have in the wireless area today with wireless backup or the internet of things or our own fixed wireless access services that we're doing on LTE business internet. So once again we think we're very well positioned in the industry we've made the investments and once again we want to help our customers that have big bandwidth requirements. Certainly and you're very much a familiar face within the industry circles for capacity events. How enjoyable is it working in this industry compared to when you first entered it? Okay I think you're calling out the fact that I've been doing this for 36 years. Yeah started back in 1986 and we were doing a lot of dial tone, dial tone, dial tone but I will tell you the industry has just transformed tremendously so from everything we're doing from our digital customer experience transformation where ease of business is kind of the forefront of what we do at APIs. Candly what we're doing across the board we look at new products and services in the industry you know the days of just dial tone when today you know as I said earlier I'm selling ethernet services I'm selling wave services we're selling internet services but above that we're adding things and partnerships with what we do in the cloud environment what we're doing with the internet of things how do we continue to leverage our wireless assets as we look at you know fixed wireless access and LTE business internet in the industry. Once again I think it's just a tremendous time not just selling one or two products and services but a lot of products and services that deal with our basic telecom needs so no longer just your basic telco but this is clearly a technology evolution and we're stepping up to it whether it's things we do organically or partnerships that we do in organically to make certain that we can meet the communication's need of the industry. Now we've got 90 seconds left so I'll have a quick fire kind of questions here you'd be addressing the talent gap in this year's events as well what is the state of play are we in good shape? Yeah we feel we're in good shape though our industry just like every industry I think during this period of time once again we're trying to show folks that it's attracted to be in the STEM environment with science and technology and engineering and mathematics and so once again even with the GLF the global leaders forum we're working on diversity inclusion and belonging and one of those initiatives is making sure we're bringing new talent forward and making sure that there are more opportunities with gender and balance ethnicity and making certain that we have a feeder pool that's ready to take on this telecom industry going forward so once again I feel good about the investments the training and the partnership we're doing with colleges and universities to bring even more talent into the fold. Now you lead your own organization Eric as well which I'm sure has its own pressures and strains I mean did you ever step back and wonder you know and help you optimize your own healthful and well-being? Absolutely step back I think it's important to sharpen the saw as we say take some time off reflect build back that strength and energy and come back even sharper than the day you left and so you know whether I'm taking vacations you know two time a year with my wife or I take the family on vacations or we attend events you know whether it's music events etc just taking that time reflect and enjoy and be thankful for all the blessings. Well I think that's time's up there but just one final kind of like quirky question for our viewers that probably have probably yet to see you in person for the very first time at pasty media related events but perhaps give our viewers one fun fact that they don't already know. Oh fun fact let's see I just went to the Elton John farewell tour concert at MetLife Stadium in New York that was pretty cool and I like cars and clothes so I don't know if that's three fun facts for you but hopefully that helps. That was a good lifestyle really I wasn't joining as well yeah well what a great artist as well so I'm quite envious that you got to got the chance to go and see him live as well thanks ever so much there Eric that was great now Eric will be speaking at capacity Europe it's October in London details of this session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now. Welcome to capacity Europe's 2022 pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly awaited blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London the O2 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in five minutes with I had Angela Capone Vice President Global Marketing at EdgeConnect. Angela how are you first of all and it's great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick five five minute Q&A yeah thank you for inviting me definitely for me okay well so certainly let's uh so let's start the clock right now so in our five minute Q&A here we go tell me the state of play in global telecoms yeah I mean global telecoms isn't just 5g and gigabot gigabit telecoms anymore it's the wider challenges of country regulations trust from our customers climate economic growth the worrying inflation news that we're seeing and where to build next so the balance is getting increasingly difficult with large cloud services requiring ever bigger capacity while also lowering overall emissions across their supply chains so closer collaboration among operators clients industry bodies government agencies will be needed to be the forefront of any future expansion and where do you see your organization position at the moment obviously it's in a post-COVID climate it's fundamentally changed yeah I mean when COVID hit EdgeConnect was well positioned actually to not miss a beat we were all remote workers for years and the data centers had the ability to remote operate through our EdgeOS software systems so when it hit we we kind of didn't really we felt the impact you know from a world perspective but we we didn't actually from an operational side we just continued on it's incredible so to continue with the drivers like digital transformation without the impact of COVID was a testament to our strategy to set way before it was struck and we were able to continue a pace for large enterprises as we were able to work with their IT providers to offer solutions in markets large and small and as the edge continues to develop globally we will continue to plan and supply land and power serving the largest global companies worldwide when they need it where they need it so it's the data center industry um in your point of view first of all are you enjoying it and second of all in terms of the people landscape is it suffering from a lack of diversity and it's uh in the workforce and if so why I mean yeah I mean when I talk to people about the data center industry you kind of get that that blank look on their face so it's not incredibly exciting but what I've seen over the last 10 years of working at EdgeConnex is the talent that is actually coming through difficult but it is coming through and the diversity of the talent is what I really enjoy and I'm loving seeing our employees you know join at a certain level and you know 10 years on their you know running teams and their head of security and and all of those different roles so um you know we are lacking in diversity for sure but it I believe it's not for not trying um as a company we work really hard on different projects to attract talent um from going out to universities um talking to the STEM type community that probably don't think about data center as an engineering type of place to go and work but when you talk to them about what we're doing and what we're developing and actually what our customers customers are doing I mean I'm very privileged to be in a position where I can see star trek type futures coming in um and when you talk to young people about um you know the the opportunity and how I mean this industry hasn't even slightly reached its dizzy heights um when you talk to young people about what they want to do from an engineering perspective and you say look have you thought about the data center industry we need you it's incredible it's growing you know absolutely at the speed of rate all the operators will say that so it's game on to to get that talent and nurture them and grow them into you know something fantastic in an industry that most people probably don't think about or understand certainly so um just some quick find some questions here then just about you and your enjoyment for for for Europe what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from the event we've got just over 30 seconds to go um yeah people finally we're back in a room together I mean capacity Europe's always had a fantastic agenda of content you know right broad way across of I'm talking about the industry so I'm really looking forward to listening to that meeting our customers again face to face um and yeah just being there in person yep and perhaps give our viewers one fun fact about you that they don't already know 10 seconds 10 seconds probably the bravest thing I've done in my life is uproot my entire family to the southwest where I knew absolutely no one so I have this really surreal world of um data centers and traffic jams cows time is up thank you ever so much there that's uh yeah that's a fantastic perspective there uh to find out a little bit more about you um and and obviously obviously the themes that you really care about and yeah so you're gonna be talking about um that's a little bit more in uh at our event in October yeah not like I'm really looking forward to it yeah so uh Angela yeah you'll be speaking in our data center um session on at the talent in telecoms track details of this session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now to capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on october the 18th to 20th at the end continental London do2 and on the swap card app I'm David Tran the conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll run a series of rather light hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this event here in this year's five minutes with I have sammy slim CEO of telehouse france sammy um how are you first of all and a great have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick fire five-minute Q&A absolutely thanks for having me so uh let's start the clock okay so sammy um tell me the state of play in the global telecoms market well we're seeing more blurring boundaries between the tempo of the OTT infrastructure something that is reaching the industry and we're looking forward to an exciting future right in um so where would you say then your organization is positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-covid digital transformation current in inflationary pressures well what is great about our industry is that all those prices are merely acceleration to the transformation to digital transformation however there are real risk uh especially related to energy price and energy shortage and the industry is looking forward to being affected by that kind of problems and and does the industry have a talent issue so how can it solve the problems well definitely yes as the industry is and and and I think the the problem should be solved in the future with what we are seeing now in terms of remote work and remote teams distributing teams around the globe because that actually brings the talent pool to a more global level and you'll be speaking in a subsea at data center related session about interconnectivity between those two landscapes it must be an exciting industry to be a part of incredibly diverse and things seem to be moving along at quite a relatively fast pace absolutely that's actually our main driver to the capacities here and we are very very excited to what kind of topic we share because the the telecom geography is changing thanks to the subsea and we are looking forward to see what are the future cities where the interconnection can happen and how can we shape it as well now I wanted to tap into a little bit you know about you yourself as a person so samy what's your preferred method to connect with your fellow industry peers given how platforms like teams and and zoom have transport reliability and convenience and connecting with fellow professionals in the past two years in person or virtual in terms of you know day-to-day engagements a nice drink with a great view I've got a lot of teams and I like that but to be honest it's good for introduction but which to human needs right so if you want to solve it in the future we need to do it in person and I'm looking forward to doing that well yeah definitely it's a great segue there to capacity Europe to be there in person in adding to continental do2 in London so what's the first thing um what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from being part of capacity Europe this year well I think that's the answer to those questions welcome to capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to 20th at the end continental London do2 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran the conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll run a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this event here in this year's five minutes with I have Sammy Slim CEO of Telehouse France Sammy um how are you first of all and a great tab you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick five minute Q&A absolutely thanks for having me so let's start the clock okay so Sammy tell me the state of play in the global telecoms market well we're seeing more of blurring boundaries between the 10-code OTT infrastructure something that is reaching the industry and we are looking forward to an exciting future right so where would you say then your organization is positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-covid digital transformation current inflationary pressures well what is great about our industry is that all those prices are merely acceleration to the transformation to digital transformation however there are real risk especially related to energy problems and the shortage and the industry is even thought to be tackling that kind of problems and and does the industry have a talent issue so how can it solve the problems well definitely yes as many industries and and and I think the program should be solved in the future with what we are seeing now in terms of really what to work welcome to capacity europe extra powered by jsa the newsroom for telecom and data center professionals i'm barb michael joining you today live from capacity europe and i have with me ruth vetter vp of strategic strategic alliances for cult technology services ruth thank you for joining us it's a pleasure to have you hello barb thanks for having me and it's a pleasure for me to be here such an exciting week right there's such a such an energy here a capacity of record numbers in attendance and and cult is playing an important role as sponsors of the event and i was able to attend the opening yesterday i'm calling it day zero because today's day one but yesterday you had your opening reception tell us what it feels like to be back and playing such an important role in this event yeah yeah really i'm absolutely glad to be here again and it's very exciting to be here again because we all know in these fast changing times and with about two years when we did not have the chance to meet for each other it's really so important to bring our industry back together and for us as cult it's really important and it's really something that we like to engage with capacity capacity is doing a great job and professional building a professional surrounding for all the industry to meet to meet in business meetings to meet in the panel sessions here at the expo but as well at the involved session tomorrow evening and really bring everybody together understand about what are the trends what are the challenges but what are the opportunities that we together can work on so glad to be here and glad to see the and feel the exciting atmosphere with having the people here inside again you sure you certainly can feel it and i'm looking forward to tomorrow night you mentioned the awards ceremony that's happening and i know that colt you're up for a couple of awards right one of them being the best global wholesale carrier that's a big one i you know fingers crossed for you there and also a best diversity and inclusion also a very important topic currently tell us you know what's led to this how how do you feel that you were able to secure these shortlisted nods at the awards yeah thank you very much so i really hope that we will win a lot of these awards because we are really very actively working on all these topics so i'm running the strategic alliances team globally within colt so that's what i'm always saying formally known as the wholesale organization so we are working together with all our peers across the industry the carriers the system integrators we're using our services to integrate into their backbones and build their own customer solutions upon it and for us it's always important to build something which is really ahead of the market ahead of the technology to really innovate and build flexible solutions that the ones that we are working with well can build their own services upon that can build it in the most efficient now automation is a big topic in a highly automated way as well so we are always trying to bring the best for our own enterprise customers but it's the same to bring the best for all of our wholesale customers and i think we all know the environment that we are in we are the very power intense industry and we are knowing that the data traffic is even increasing over the time so so many new data centers that are built new c-cables coming we need the connectivity so for me here capacity is a great forum to as well interact with our peers how do we do that in building a sustainable future so really sustainability esg is a big topic for us because we want to give a commitment to our people to our market partners as well to the planet that all that we are doing we are doing it in a sustainable and fair way so hopefully we will see some good results tomorrow in the award session yeah well fingers crossed for you best of luck and i know you're doing so much important work and so many of the things you just mentioned are such important pillars for so many of us here right and sustainability being a big one as well as the others we've already mentioned um what would you say sort of what are the the key things when we think about your sort of the pillars that you're holding on to as you look into you know we're almost at the end of 2022 so as you look ahead to 2023 what's your focus going to be on are there any you know things that you can give us a preview of that may be coming up for colt for next year yeah for sure beside esg which is something which is upon everything what we are doing there are two areas that's really building and investing into our own strong network and sometimes building strong partnerships so we as colt we are running an international network with 30 000 connected buildings i think more than up to now 1000 data centers that we are connecting we are constantly investing into our networks on the one hand really on the capacity the reach that we can provide to our partners same time and as we said with a huge increase of traffic that we are seeing across all the industries across the hyperscalers really to enable our network to be very much high bandwidth enabled so we have 100 g 400 g enabled network and this year we had the first industry first deployment even of 100 800 g so investing into high bandwidth solutions for our customers globally is a big area but same time as well building the right services upon our network and that is really something giving the highest flexibility via an sdn-based network with on-demand services with consumption-based services really the capabilities that all our partners need to consume either via our portals or via automation that's something that we are focusing very much so really building the right network for our customers voice is a big area that we are looking in because we know as well especially with video conferencing all these audio conferencing how important that is adding new countries to that so we will see additional new countries in Eastern Europe and Asia coming to our networks as well so these are three very very important focus areas how we want to support our partners or our customers and same time what i have to say is building a global environment and infrastructure we know we can't do everything on our own so focusing on strong partnerships is something where are the areas where we can bring the capabilities of our partners together with our own capabilities and co-build and co-create and with this expand capabilities so for sure investing in our network in order to bring the best to our customers but as we're cooperating and that's the reason why we are want to act not as a pure wholesale organization but a strategic alliance really building partnerships, mutual partnerships where we together enhance our capabilities that we can bring to our customers it's a big job you have in front of you and a big job to keep you know up with the demand of you know our environment now and as you said the partnerships are key to that and so you're doing a lot of really great work there and so i know that you're going to be very very busy this week and meeting with a lot of people but for those that want to of course we're streaming live today some people may hear what you're saying and want to immediately come and meet with you and so where can they find you here during this week and then and then after if they're not able to see you in person yeah we're really looking forward to connect to as much as as partners people all the contact across our industry so you can find a lot of us here at Capacity now in the second floor there are a couple of meeting rooms that you can find on the floor plan just come to us ask for a contact and yeah connect with us because we want to connect to our industry into the world thank you so much for joining us today it's been a real pleasure speaking with you Ruth thank you so much and thank you viewers for tuning in keep tuning in we have lots of great interviews ahead and join us and we look forward to sharing more content during the week here at Capacity Europe Welcome to Capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to 20th at the Intercontinental London DO2 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran the conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll run a serious or rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this event here in this year's five minutes with I have Sammy Slim CEO of Telehouse France Sammy how are you first of all and the great tab you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick five minute Q&A absolutely thanks for having me so let's start the clock okay so Sammy tell me the state of play in the global telecoms market well we're seeing more of blurring boundaries between the tempo the OTT green construction something that is reaching the industry and we are looking forward to an exciting future brilliant so where would you say then your organization is positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-covid digital transformation current in inflationary pressures well what is great about our industry is that all those prices are merely acceleration to the transformation to digital transformation however there are real risk especially related to energy price and the energy shortage and the industry is even thought to be tackling that kind of problems and does the industry have a talent issue so how can it solve the problems well definitely yes as the industry and I think the the problem should be solved in the future with what we are seeing now in terms of remote work and remote teams distributing teams around the globe because that actually brings the talent pool to a more global one and you'll be speaking in a subsea at data center related session about interconnectivity between those two landscapes it must be an exciting industry to be a part of incredibly diverse and things seem to be moving along at quite a relatively fast pace absolutely that's actually our main driver to the capacities here you are very very excited to what kind of topic we share because the telecom geography is changing thanks to the subsea and we are looking forward to see what are the future cities where the interconnection can happen and how can we have reshaping that as well. Now I wanted to tap into a little bit you know about you yourself as a person so Sammy what's your preferred method to connect with your fellow industry peers given how platforms like teams and zoom have transport reliability and convenience and connecting with fellow professionals in the past two years in person or virtual in terms of you know day-to-day engagements. A nice drink with a great view I've got a lot of teams and I like that but to be honest it's good for introduction which to human beings right so if you want to follow the teaching we need to be a person and I'm looking forward to that in London next October. Yeah definitely it's a great segue there to capacity Europe to be there in person in adding to continental DO2 in London so what's the first thing what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from being part of capacity Europe this year? Well I think that's the answer to those questions on how do we manage this blurring boundaries between different technical segments how do we manage the new Europe, how do we manage the new crisis and energy in Montana. Those are things that I am looking forward to discuss with my colleagues in the industry but again we have a chance to be able to see growing and that the world is immediately back especially with the current crisis so it will be a thing that will exactly mean. Definitely and it is a it's this huge event as well and taking place in the the UK capital of London so tell me about what you most love about London the location of the capacity Europe 2022. Definitely the view there in DO2 it's really great to meet people but I happen to we have an office in London so I actually love being able to do it so yeah one of my definitely my favorite cities in New York and I'm saying that I'm from Paris you know the competition between Paris and London there but two marvelous European cities and really modern as well we've got 45 seconds to go so basically we've got a few quick wild questions here for you give our viewers one fun fact about you that they don't already know. Most people so I mean no in the industry I see you in France but tell you how it's fun most people don't know that I'm actually not French I'm Tunisian and yeah when people discover that they are. Is there a person away from this industry that inspires you the most? Well I would love to meet a person someday if I have the chance I ended up on CEO of AcroSense. That's someone that has reshaped the entire community as big as Microsoft. And yeah that's the time's up so yeah that's that's our buzzer for that one as well so really great speaking to you Sammy there is a very quick fire interview you just realize how quickly five minutes goes up in the flash doesn't it but thanks so much that's been great. And then Sammy will be speaking at Capacity Europe this October in London details of the session will appear in the following closing messages. Bye for now. Welcome to Capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage. We're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London DO2 and on the SWAT card app. I'm David Tran, conference producer lead of this year's event and in a run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light hearted speaking interviews called Five Minutes With. Tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind us because that will be taking part in this year's event. Here in Five Minutes With I have Mateus Freeschrom, the vice president and chief evangelist of Aurelian. Mateus how are you first of all and great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event. Ready for a five minute quick five Q&A? I'm absolutely ready. Good to start Mateus. So let's start the clock. Mateus tell me the current state of play situation in global telecoms. I would say it's in a pretty good shape you know traffic is still growing post-pandemic which is a good sign. There are though some signs of costs going up because of some circumstances around the world but I would say the overall feeling in the industry is pretty good. And where would you say your organization is best positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-COVID taking place, digital transformation and also the current inflationary pressures that we are seeing. I think we are in a pretty good shape you know we're not a big organization we're very focused on high capacity transport services and IP services and I would say digital transformation moving traffic to the cloud using public internet much more those are good signs for us. So I would say we're in a very good position right now in a tough market. And how have the past couple years shaped the way you connect with your fellow industry peers from a personal perspective yourself Mateus? Yeah you know I think that's a good question and I was very skeptical to webinars in the beginning but I would say through the pandemic I've kind of enjoyed all the webinars that's been going on and that's been a fairly good way but I'm really eager to see people again now so you can get the feeling of the industry from a much better point of view. Well definitely you know we're looking forward to bringing capacity Europe in person in October 2018 to 20th in London. So how enjoyable is it working in this telecoms industry compared to when you first entered it? I would say it's really really enjoyable. I've enjoyed it all the way through but you know when I started 25 years ago I would say not very many people understood what we were doing you know internet was very new everything was more of a phone call situation in the telecoms world today everything relies on what we do you know internet is for everyone so it's much more seen these days and therefore quite a more funny industry with many more being part of it. What's the the interconnectivity between data centers and subsea is exciting as well as important to see these in sectors talking to one another. Mattes what do you think we are seeing this overlap between the two markets? Why is it becoming more profound? Yeah no I really think you know content needs to be as close as possible to end users and you know you can't really be closer to end users if you are at the submarine cable station and therefore I see this it's a very good sign when cable or content providers locate their content at the station itself because you know at the end of that sea cable there is an end user and that user wants to take advantage of that content as soon as possible and therefore we see these two industries merging as we speak. What's the one thing you're hoping to take away from being a part of capacity year 2022 this October? I think you know you want the overall feeling of the market you want to hear the bus on the floor you want to see what people talk about but then I really think you know the rumors that's what I'm there for you know speaking to people sort of on the side asking them you know how you're doing what's going on what's happening what's happening with this company and so on that's you know what you've been missing for the last couple of years. Yes definitely and I'm talking of the event itself and the location of the event. What do you most love about London? No London is a really nice city but it's also this international city you know you hear the bus from really everywhere which is what you've kind of missed the last couple of years seeing this feeling this international bus with people from everywhere coming to one place. I really love London. We've got a couple questions there but we realised we've still got 17 seconds on the on the clock here so if it wasn't for going to an event talking of London or you know other international cities around the world Mattes what would be the first thing you'll do if you're in a new city? I absolutely look at maps I love maps you know and when I come to a new city I want to see the maps so I know where everything is and I kind of enjoy just looking at maps following maps making sure I see as much as I can when I come to a new city that's really what I look for. And perhaps give our viewers one fun fact about you that they didn't already know. No I'm a really big sports fan many people know I'm a big sports fan but I'm really a big sports fan because I love all sports and I kind of have a secret habit of trying to learn all the rules of every sport there is and not too many people try to do that but I just enjoy pretty much every sport there is. I don't want you too much but I read a lot about it. Okay well we've got eight seconds so any any hobbies any other hobbies? Four seconds? No I like being in the forest as well. Oh brilliant good stuff well that's times up there. Thank you ever so much there Mateus that was that was great. Mateus will be speaking at capacity this October in London. Details of this session will appear in the following closing messages. Bye for now. That's just a flavour of what's coming what we're going to talk about today is what it's taken to get here what we're doing and the entire scope it's not just about mobile. There we go right so I'm Matthew Griffin I'm head of commercial telecoms at Transport for London and I have with me Andrew Conway and he's CTO or Director of Solutions and Innovations sorry for that's your old job title for BAI communications. We're here today because BAI were awarded a 20-year concession from TFL just in June 21st of June and we're going to explain what that concession is all about. It's in line with the Mayor's Transport Strategy the Mayor has asked TFL to make its assets available for telecommunications use and to put mobile coverage on the Tube and that's what we're doing. So TFL if you don't know TFL it's a very large organisation people think of it as London Underground it's a lot more than that it has if you move in London then we're responsible pretty much so it includes a major road network we manage all the traffic lights for example and just to give you a scale of TFL here's some sort of big numbers 31 million journeys every day we're slightly down on that at the moment but actually we found the road traffic is back to normal. Bus networks around 75% and the Tube is running during the week 50 to 60% and at weekends even higher than that so we are edging towards normality in terms of the number of journeys that we're looking after. So what we have here is a network that is very large for the Tube the underground part of the Tube we have 132 stations on the Tube that need covering with mobile coverage and we have hundreds of kilometres of tunnels likewise. Now I was tasked with getting mobile coverage on the Tube amongst other things my responsibility in TFL is to liaise with the telecoms industry we already provide access to our rooftops for cell sites we have the Wi-Fi network and we also have fibre running through the tunnels to a certain extent quite a small extent actually but what we decided is we needed to supercharge that and we needed investment to do that. Internal to TFL I was told I had no money so I was told we're not zero budget I could run a procurement but that was it so we needed a partner that to come in and invest in our network so what we did is we created a an offer that included all TFL assets previously a lot of times we'd we'd looked at mobile on the Tube and looked at just the Tube assets and just from a mobile perspective but what we did in this case is we looked at it from a much broader context and Andy's going to talk about the ambition that BAI have got for that and we have found a partner that matches our ambition to use all of our assets to deliver a step change in connectivity for London and the other thing we wanted we wanted a neutral host so we wanted a partner that would open up our network to the net to the industry as a whole and we believe it creates a whole load of opportunities way beyond those that we can think of at the moment. Now the other thing we've done on a technical basis we've been de-risking it by installing antennas through the tunnels and we've also been putting in fibre and connectivity within the station so lots and lots of infrastructure has been going in over a hundred million is going as already been invested. The other thing we're supporting as part of this is the the new emergency services network the new emergency services network in London is replacing Airway which is tetra-based technology it it will be sitting on a 4G network provided by EE and to support that in the tube environment we needed and the EE 4G signal everywhere including back office so areas where the public go but also everywhere else so we've been doing that that element of it and and aligning these two projects together has allowed us to save hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers money by creating a neutral host network that would be shared by the emergency services as well as the mobile operators so that was our compelling financial case. Also I'm hoping some of you traveled on the Jubilee line today if you did you will have noticed that we have a 4G network just on the eastern end of that and that that was a project that we delivered brilliantly this went live the day the UK went into lockdown so so we were going to do an enormous announcement we kind of got overtaken by events so it's been there quite some time now although for us because we've barely come into London or travelled on the tube it's kind of a new experience but it's been there over a year that network is very similar technology that's going to be rolled out everywhere and therefore we know that this service that can be produced by such technology is excellent and provides a really good customer experience. We do know now I was quite surprised at how busy the tube was today because I've travelled on it recently and it's not been so busy but you know you're still getting a decent throughput on that network and be able to use your your your data services in a way that's I think perfectly usable we'll still improve on that and continue to invest in that network so that service March 2020 that went live so we are confident that rolling that out of the entire tube network will you know provide the levels of service that we require and that the customers of BAI the mobile network operators will require. So as I say we've we've let a 20 year concession to BAI and I'm going to talk about let Andy talk about what they're planning to deliver from from that perspective. Thanks Matt so yes good morning it's nice to be here in person rather than at home on a on a zoom call yeah my name is Andy Conway I head up Solutions and Innovation at BAI Communications Broadcast Australia International as you can probably tell from my accent I'm not Australian I'm from Yorkshire but there you go. BAI who are they so we've been around about 100 years so we're headquartered in Sydney where we've been running the terrestrial broadcast network for nearly a hundred years. About 20 25 years ago we branched out into specialised telecommunications designing and building in areas where there is no signal so on transport networks we acquired a company in Hong Kong who specialised in that indeed in Hong Kong now I think they're on their fourth generation studied on 2G now they're rolling out 5G on the Hong Kong Metro and then about 10-12 years ago we moved into New York so our operation there Transit Wireless where we deploy cellular service and Wi-Fi service on the underground system. We've done the same now in Toronto and then we came to London five years ago to set up shop and ready ourselves for the the TFL opportunity. We've also recently acquired a company in the US called Mobility they also specialised in transportation systems and cellular systems at key venues. We like long-term deals that the partnership that we have with TFL is 20 years the reason being that we are majority owned by the Canadian Pension Plan and Investment Board so we really like these long-term infrastructure deals and partnerships with with authorities. So this is the kind of technology on a page just a single sort of like technical blueprint really of what we're designing and and building in London. So there you'll see at the top all of the red dots in the capital we call those edge data centres or base station hotels. I think the one thing that's different about the topology versus the solution that's currently present on the Jubilee Line pilot is that the mobile network operator equipment is off TFL premise and located in one of these edge data centres so this will be the base station equipment from the mobile network operators that are throughout London they're in those red dots and then connected up to the London Underground. As Matt said we have a vast array of low power radio network nodes that you'll see throughout the stations and they're connected up with a lot of wires. My colleague the CEO last week was saying it's incredible how much wiring you need to put underground to actually provide a wireless service. So last night as you all slept there were over 400 people down there in the tube manually pulling through cable coming down escalators you know and attaching the cable and connecting it up so it's a very manually intensive business in a very very harsh environment. It's hot cramped and very damp down there so we have to choose the electronics as well with extreme care and then you'll see that it's not really just about cellular of course there's the commercial mobile service and as Matt said you know if you travel today on the on the Jubilee line you know I had a great you know 100 megabit download with my mobile operator you can tell I'm in the comms industry I was probably the only one using speed test and getting excited about it but you know it offered that great cellular service but it's not only about cellular and emergency service network albeit they are very important. Our ambition is that we would take over the existing wi-fi concession there's been wi-fi on the underground for several years and we see that as a co-existing with the cellular offering and then really I think the exciting thing the ambition that we've got together with TFL our partner is that we will be investing and deploying a high capacity fiber count throughout the city underground following the TFL network and bringing that above ground to meet me points or points of presence at each of the stations on the underground system and I think that's really exciting to offer that kind of like alternative dark fiber connectivity within within the heart of London and then finally working with TFL TFL have also provided us access to the streetscape assets. So the holes and poles the CCTV columns you know lighting columns bus stops and so on there's a vast array over 80 000 of those assets which we want to bring into the mix as a neutral host. Just a little bit more detail it's that it's the only technical slide really in the deck that at the heart of the system then in terms of projecting and re-broadcasting the cellular signal on the underground is a thing that we are deploying called a DAS distributed antenna system which is connected to the the nine base station hotels and re-broadcast the cellular signal both throughout the stations and the connecting passageways but also of course through the tunnels where we are deploying the radiating cable or leaky feeder as it's called it's the only thing really that you can get down there with that very narrow gauging as you've probably seen the underground it being one of the oldest in the world over 150 years old there's not much space between the train and the tunnel wall so the way that we do it is to to roll out the radiating cable system down there in the underground. So I think when you take a step back of course the cellular system is important the streetscape is massively important people that are in the mobile industry particularly the MNO community know that it takes an awful long time to give birth to a macro site in in a in a global city like London it can take in excess of three years from putting a cross on the map to actually you know delivering a macro cellular site three years and yet you know data traffic is doubling every two so you know there's a problem there there's a crunch point coming so we are really really interested in leveraging that small small cell estate that streetscape really to provide a lot denser network much closer to the customer down at street level and really that's where we see a lot of the activity going over the period of the 20-year concession I think first on fibring up those assets and then offering them up to MNOs but it's not just about mobile network operators the streetscape assets can be used for a plethora of other use cases for example pollution monitoring there are a lot of people out there that offer some great technology with IOT sensors so we have air quality monitoring people and traffic counting and analytics and so on and all of those can utilize that streetscape that streetscape asset so really that's the sort of closing piece really that it's all about mobile coverage in the tunnels 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G ready it's that dark fibre network that alternative network underground which will be rolling out and then bringing to the surface taking over and improving that Wi-Fi experience and then really leveraging the small cell estate across the nine base station hotels plus we're also in two to three other major London data centres so there's 12 in total so really at that point that's the end of the presentation today thank you for your attention it's a big event for the community it's a great networking framework for all of us and I extremely appreciate the opportunity to have this whole colleagues and partners and stakeholders in the community together and this year we have identified more than ever how important also in-person meetings are after being locked down for almost two years we're at the beginning of a new decade if it comes to the industry development and exciting times are ahead of us having the digital transformation everywhere for everyone and everybody this will change our industry as well we're happy to be here in Capacity Europe to be again here and meet the industry and we are going every year because for us it's really big event meeting all of our partners across the carrier industry other industry as well technological partners meeting here in one venue which helps us very much to bring all the energy together to face all the challenges and to face all the business opportunities that the market is bringing to us creative ledger to be part of Capacity Europe 2021 a true partner of choice and looking forward for the future success it's a fantastic place to meet customers partners and essentially connect with the ecosystem if we're not all successful no one is I think we'll increase the way we co-create together I think the importance of igniting end user be it consumer or enterprise experience has become more important and I think ultimately because we need to propel more growth so I'll see you at Capacity 2022 and see you at Capacity Europe 2022 we'll see you at Capacity Europe 2022 see you at Capacity Europe 2022 it's annual global carrier awards I think there are an awful lot of events on the calendar it's a bit of a jamboree but I think the global carrier awards stand out the capacity events stand out I'm looking forward to network with a lot of people know what's going on around and the rest of the world from partners from other operators from our customers tonight this is the place to be in telecoms recognize the best global and regional carriers projects marketing and sales teams campaigns disruptors and innovations number one number one yes you know really genuinely pretty proud of this a new world category and I think it's brilliant for you and I'm really really happy for you very honored and delighted to be part of this this great group of companies and we want to win some more congratulations to everyone I hope you had a wonderful evening thank you welcome to capacity Europe's 2022 pre-event courage we are looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on the 18th to the 24th of October at the Intercontinental London DO2 and also on the SWAT Carder app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run up to the event we'll have a series of rather light hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into industry views but also bring out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in five minutes with I have Eric see this present global wholesale of Verizon partner solutions Eric first of all great to have you involved and great to have you speaking at this year's event ready for a quick five five minute with informal interview absolutely looking forward to it and glad to participate and support the capacity Europe event you know Verizon we like to show up each year and support the event so glad to do this for you great great to have you in the room as well we're looking forward to October all right let's start the clock so Eric first of all tell me the cover and state of play situation in global telecoms I believe that you know enterprises around the world are kind of looking for what we call global simple and secure solutions at the end of the day and we see this as an incredible opportunity for global telecom providers in the industry if we look at our assets regardless of what's going on and kind of the economic and geopolitical vein this is just a great opportunity for us once again to deliver things into the business into the industry so global simple secure that's the way the solutions need to go whether it's network whether it's above the network wireline and wireless services it's staff and where would you say your organization is positioned at the moment I mean we've seen these shifts obviously with post COVID take place but also digital transformation really kind of gathering momentum within the industry but also there's also a terrible and economic and inflationary climate as well where do you where do you see your organization's position if I look at my Verizon partner solutions global wholesale team we feel we're kind of very excited about the assets that we have once again if we look at what we've done we spent over 120 billion dollars getting our spectrum with c-band a millimeter wave and once again we got vast fiber deployments so very strategic time for us whether it's wireline wireless what are we doing from ethernet to wave to internet services even what I'm doing above the network with blue jeans conferencing or security services or what I really love is the passion we have in the wireless area today with wireless backup or the internet of things or our own fixed wireless access services that we're doing on LTE business internet so once again we think we're very well positioned in the industry we've made the investments and once again we want to help our customers that have big bandwidth requirements certainly and you're very much a familiar face within the industry circles for capacity events how enjoyable is it working in this industry compared to when you first entered it okay I think you're calling out the fact that I've been doing this for 36 years yeah started back in 1986 and we were doing a lot of dial tone dial tone dial tone but I will tell you the industry has just transformed tremendously so from everything we're doing from our digital customer experience transformation where ease of business is kind of the forefront of what we do at APIs candidly what we're doing across the board we look at new products and services in the industry you know the days of just dial tone when today you know as I said earlier I'm selling ethernet services I'm selling wave services we're selling internet services but above that we're adding things and partnerships or what we do in the cloud environment what we're doing with the internet of things how do we continue to leverage our wireless assets as we look at you know fixed wireless access and LTE business internet in the industry once again I think it's just a tremendous time not just selling one or two products and services but a lot of products and services that deal with our basic telecom needs so no longer just your basic telco but this is clearly a technology evolution and we're stepping up to it whether it's things we do organically or partnerships that we do in organically to make certain that we can meet the communications need of the industry now we've got 90 seconds left so I'll have a self quickfire kind of questions here you'll be dressing the talent gap in this year's events as well what is a state of play are we in good shape yeah we feel we're in good shape our industry just like every industry I think during this period of time once again we're trying to show folks that it's attracted to be in the STEM environment with science and technology and engineering and mathematics and so once again even with the GLF the global leaders forum we're working on diversity inclusion and belonging and one of those initiatives is making sure we're bringing new talent forward and making sure that there are more opportunities with gender and balance ethnicity and making certain that we have a feeder pool that's ready to take on this telecom industry going forward so once again I feel good about the investments the training and the partnership we're doing with colleges and universities to bring even more talent into the fold now you lead your own organization Eric as well which I'm sure has its own pressures and strains I mean did you ever step back and wonder you know and how you optimize your own helpful and well-being absolutely step back I think it's important to sharpen the saw as we say take some time off reflect build back that strength and energy and come back even sharper than the day you left and so you know whether I'm taking vacations you know two time a year with my wife or I take the family on vacations or we attend events you know whether it's music events et cetera just taking that time to reflect and enjoy and be thankful for all the blessings well I think that's time's up there but just one final kind of like quirky question for our viewers that probably have probably yet to see you in person for the very first time at capacity media related events but perhaps give our viewers one fun fact that they don't already know oh fun fact let's see I just went to the Elton John farewell tour concert at MetLife Medium in New York that was pretty cool and I like cars and clothes so I don't know that's three fun facts for you but hopefully that helps that was a good lifestyle really I was enjoying it as well yeah well what a great artist as well so I'm quite envious that you got to got the chance to go and see and live as well thanks ever so much there Eric that was great now Eric will be speaking at capacity Europe this October in London details of this session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now welcome to capacity Europe's 2022 pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly awaited blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London the 02 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in five minutes with I had Angela Capone Vice President Global Marketing at Edge Connects Angela how are you first of all and it's great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick five five-minute Q&A yeah thank you for inviting me definitely okay well so certainly let's let's start the clock right now so in our five-minute Q&A here we go tell me just state of play in global telecoms yeah I mean global telecoms isn't just 5G and gigabot gigabit telecoms anymore it's the wider challenges country regulations trust from our customers climate economic growth the worrying inflation news that we're seeing and where to build next so the balance is getting increasingly difficult with large cloud services requiring ever bigger capacity while also lowering overall missions across SI supply chains so closer collaboration among operators clients industry bodies government agencies will be needed to be at the forefront of any future expansion and where do you see your organization position at the moment obviously it's in a post-COVID climate it's fundamentally changed yeah I mean when COVID hit EdgeConnect was well positioned actually to not miss a beat we were all remote workers for years and the data centers had the ability to remote operate through our EdgeOS software systems so when it hit we kind of didn't really we felt the impact from a world perspective but we didn't actually from an operational side we just continued on it was incredible so to continue with the drivers like digital transformation without the impact of COVID was a testament to our strategy to set way before it was struck and we were able to continue a pace for large enterprises as we were able to work with their IT providers to offer solutions in markets large and small and as the Edge continues to develop globally we will continue to plan and supply land and power serving the largest global companies worldwide when they need it where they need it so it's the data center industry in your point of view first of all are you enjoying it and second of all in terms of the people landscape is it suffering from a lack of diversity and it's in the workforce and if so why I mean yeah I mean when I talk to people about the data center industry you kind of get that that blank look on their face so it's not incredibly exciting but what I've seen over the last 10 years of working at EdgeConnex is the talent that is actually coming through difficult but it is coming through and the diversity of the talent is what I really enjoy and I'm loving seeing our employees join at a certain level 10 years on their running teams and their head of security and all of those different roles so we are lacking in diversity for sure but I believe it's not for not trying as a company we work really hard on different projects to attract talent from going out to universities talking to the STEM type community that probably don't think about data center as an engineering type of place to go and work but when you talk to them about what we're doing and what we're developing and actually what our customers customers are doing I mean I'm very privileged to be in a position where I can see Star Trek type futures coming in and when you talk to young people about you know the opportunity and how I mean this industry hasn't even slightly reached its dizzy heights when you talk to young people about what they want to do from an engineering perspective and you say look have you thought about the data center industry we need you it's incredible it's growing absolutely at the speed of rate all the operators will say that so it's game on to to get that talent and nurture them and grow them into something fantastic in an industry that most people probably don't think about or understand certainly so just some quick find some questions here then just about you and your enjoyment for for Europe what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from the event we've got just over 30 seconds to go yeah people finally we're back in a room together I mean capacity Europe's always had a fantastic agenda of content you know right broad way across so I'm talking about the industry so I'm really looking forward to listening to that meeting our customers again face to face and yeah just being there in person yep and perhaps give our viewers one fun fact about you that they don't already know 10 seconds 10 seconds probably the bravest thing I've done in my life is uproot my entire family to the southwest where I knew absolutely no one so I have this really surreal world of data centers traffic jams cows time is up thank you ever so much there that's a fantastic perspective there to find out a little bit more about you and obviously obviously the themes that you really care about and yeah so you're going to talk about that a little bit more in at our event in October yeah not like I'm really looking forward to it yeah so Angela yeah you'll be speaking in our data center session on at the talent in telecoms track details of this session walk here in the following closing messages bye for now welcome to capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to 20th at the intercontinental London DO2 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran the conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run up to the event we'll run a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this event here in this year's five minutes with I have Sammy Slim CEO of Telehouse France Sammy how are you first of all and a great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick fire five minute Q&A absolutely thanks for having me so let's start the clock okay so Sammy tell me the state of play in the global telecoms market well we're seeing more of blurring boundaries between the 10 code or TTV infrastructure something that is reaching the industry and we are looking forward to an exciting future we're good so where would you say then your organization is positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-COVID digital transformation current inflationary pressures well what is great about our industry is that all those prices are merely acceleration to the transformation to digital transformation however there are real risk especially related to energy processing and energy products and the industry is even forced to be detected that kind of problems and does the industry have a talent issue so how can it solve the problems well definitely yes as the industry and I think the problem should be solved in the future with what we are seeing now in terms of remote work and remote teams distributed teams around the globe because that actually brings the talent pool to a more global one and you'll be speaking at data center related session about interconnectivity between those two landscapes it must be an exciting industry to be a part of incredibly diverse and things seem to be moving along quite a relatively fast pace absolutely that's actually our main driver to be in the capacities here and we are very very excited to what kind of topic we share because the telecom geography is changing thanks to the subsidy and we are looking forward to see what other future sit-ins where interconnection can happen and how can we help reshaping that as well now I wanted to tap into a little bit about you yourself as a person so Sammy what's your preferred method to connect with your fellow industry peers given how platforms like teams and Zoom have transport reliability and convenience and connecting with fellow professionals in the past two years in person or virtual in terms of day-to-day engagements a nice drink with a great view I've got a lot of Zooms and music I like that but to be honest it's good for introduction but we're still human beings right so if you want to solidly appreciate we need to be a person and I'm looking forward to that we're going to be next October well yeah definitely it's a great segue to capacity Europe to be there in person in adding to continental the O2 in London so what's the first thing what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from being part of capacity Europe this year well I think that's the answer to those questions on how do we manage this blurring boundaries between different technical segments how do we manage the New Europe how do we manage the new crisis of energy in Montana those are things that I am looking forward to discuss with my colleagues in the industry but again we have a chance to be able to see growing and that the world is needed in the back especially with the crisis so it will be a thing that looks at the meaning definitely and it is a it's this huge event as well and taking place in the UK capital of London so tell tell me about what you most love about London the location of capacity Europe 2022 definitely the view there in O2 it's really great to the people but I happen to we have an office in London so I actually love being in the city oh some kind of group do it so yeah one of my definitely my favorites is in New York and I'm saying that I'm from Paris you know the competition plenty of competition between Paris and London there but two marvellous so European cities and really modern as well we've got 45 seconds to go so basically we've got a few quick questions here for you give our viewers one fun fact about you that they don't already know most of people so I mean normally in the industry I see you in France but they have sponsor most people don't know that I'm actually not French I'm Tunisian and yeah when people yeah discover that is there a person away from this industry that inspires you the most well I would love to meet in person someday if I have the chance so I ended up on CEO of Microsoft that's that's someone that reshaping the entire community as big as Microsoft and yeah that's the time's up so yeah that's that's our buzzer for that one as well so really great speaking to you Sammy there is a very quick find to you you just realized how quickly five minutes goes up in the flash doesn't it but thanks so much that's been great it's a pleasure and Sammy will be speaking at Capacity Europe this October in London details of the session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now welcome to Capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London DO2 and on the SWAT Card app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in a run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called Five Minutes With tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in Five Minutes With I have Mateus Freeschrum the vice president and chief evangelist of Aurelian Mateus how are you first of all and great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a five minute quickfire Q&A I'm absolutely ready good to start Mateus so let's start the clock Mateus tell me the current state-of-play situation in global telecoms I would say it's in a pretty good shape you know traffic is still growing post pandemic which is a good sign there are though some signs of costs going up because of some circumstances around the world but I would say the overall feeling in the industry is pretty good and where would you say your organization is best positioned at the moment as the industry seeing these shifts like post-COVID taking place digital transformation and also the current inflationary pressures that we are seeing I think we are in a pretty good shape you know we're not a big organization we're very focused on high capacity transport services and IP services and I would say digital transformation moving traffic to the cloud using public internet much more those are good signs for us so I would say we are in a very good position right now in a tough market and how have the past couple years to shape the way you connect with your fellow industry peers from a personal perspective yourself Matias yeah you know I think that's a good question and I was very skeptical to webinars in the beginning but I would say through the pandemic I've kind of enjoyed all the webinars that's been going on and that's been a fairly good way but I'm really eager to see people again now so you can get the feeling of the industry from a much better point of view well definitely you know we're looking forward to bringing capacity Europe in person in October the 18th to the 20th in London so how enjoyable is it working in this telecoms industry compared to when you first entered it I would say it's really really enjoyable I've enjoyed it all the way through but you know when I started 25 years ago I would say not very many people understood what we were doing you know internet was very new everything was more of a phone call situation in the telecoms world today everything relies on what we do you know internet is for everyone so it's much more seen these days and therefore quite a more funny industry with many more being part of it what's the interconnectivity between data centers and subsea is exciting as well as important to see these in sectors talking to one another Matisse what do you think we are seeing this overlap between the two markets why is it becoming more profound yeah no I really think you know content needs to be as close as possible to end users and you know you can't really be closer to end users if you're at the submarine cable station and therefore I see this it's a very good sign when cable or content providers locate their content at the station itself because you know at the end of that C cable there is an end user and that user wants to take advantage of that content as soon as possible and therefore we see these two industries merging as we speak and what's the one thing you're hoping to take away from being a part of capacity year 2022 this October I think you know you want the overall feeling of the market you want to hear the bus on the floor you want to see what people talk about but then I really think you know the rumors that's what I'm there for you know speaking to people sort of on the side asking them you know how are you doing what's going on what's happening what's happening with this company and so on that's you know what you've been missing for the last couple of years yes definitely and talking of the event itself and the location of the event what do you most love about London now London is a really nice city but it's also this international city you know you hear the bus from really everywhere which is what you've kind of missed the last couple of years seeing this feeling this international bus with people from everywhere kind of in one place I really love London and we've got a couple of questions there but we realized we've still got 70 seconds on the on the clock here so if it wasn't for going to an event talking of London what or you know other international cities around the world Matisse what would be the first thing you'll do if you're in a new city I absolutely look at maps I love maps you know and when I come to a new city I want to see the map so I know where everything is and I I kind of enjoy just looking at maps following maps making sure I see as much as I can when I come to a new city that's really what I look for and perhaps give our viewers one fun fact about you that they didn't already know no I'm a really big sports fan many people know I'm a big sports fan but I'm really a big sports fan because I love all sports and I kind of have a secret habit of trying to learn all the rules of every sport there is and I'm not too many people try to do that but I just enjoy pretty much every sport there is I don't watch it too much but I read a lot about it okay well we've got eight seconds so any any hobbies any other hobbies four seconds no I I like I like being in the forest as well oh brilliant good stuff well that's times up there thank you ever so much there Mateus that was that was great Mateus will be speaking at capacity this October in London details of this session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now great so that's just that's just a flavour of what's coming what what we're going to talk about today is what it's taken to get here what we're doing and the entire scope it's not just around mobile there we go right so I'm Matthew Griffin I'm head of commercial telecoms at Transport for London and I have with me Andrew Conway and he's CTO or Director of Solutions and Innovations sorry for that's your old job title for BAI communications we're here today because BAI were awarded a 20-year concession from TFL just in June 21st of June and we're going to explain what what what that concession is all about it's in line with the mayor's transport strategy the mayor has asked TFL to make its assets available for telecommunications use and to put mobile coverage on the tube and that's what we're doing so TFL if you don't know TFL it's a very large organisation people think of it as London Underground it it's a lot more than that it has if you move in London then we're responsible pretty much so it includes a major road network it we manage all the traffic lights for example and just to give you a scale of TFL here's some sort of big numbers 31,000, 31 million journeys every day we're slightly down on that at the moment but actually we found the road traffic is back to normal bus networks around 75% and the tube is running during the week 50 to 60% and at weekends even higher than that so we are edging towards normality in terms of the number of journeys that we're looking after so what we have here is a network that is very large for the the tube the underground part of the tube we have 132 stations on the tube that need covering with mobile coverage and we have hundreds of kilometres of tunnels likewise now I was tasked with getting mobile coverage on the tube amongst other things my responsibility in TFL is to liaise with the telecoms industry we already provide access to our rooftops for cell sites we have the Wi-Fi network and we also have fiber running through the tunnels to a certain extent quite a small extent actually but what we decided is we needed to supercharge that and we needed investment to do that internal to TFL I was told I had no money so I was told we're not zero budget I could run a procurement but that was it so we needed a partner to come in and invest in our network so what we did is we created an offer that included all TFL assets previously a lot of times we'd looked at mobile on the tube and looked at just the tube assets and just from a mobile perspective but what we did in this case is we looked at it from a much broader context and Andy's going to talk about the ambition that BAI have got for that and we have found a partner that matches our ambition to use all of our assets to deliver a step change in connectivity for London and the other thing we wanted we wanted a neutral host so we wanted a partner that would open up our network to the net to the industry as a whole and we believe it creates a whole load of opportunities way beyond those that we can think of at the moment now the other thing we've done on a technical basis we've been de-risking it by installing antennas through the tunnels and we've also been putting in fibre and connectivity within the station so lots and lots of infrastructure has been going in over 100 million is already been invested the other thing we're supporting as part of this is the new emergency services network the new emergency services network in London is replacing Airway which is tetra-based technology it will be sitting on a 4G network provided by EE and to support that in the tube environment we needed the EE 4G signal everywhere including back office so areas where the public go but also everywhere else so we've been doing that that element of it and aligning these two projects together has allowed us to save hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers money by creating a neutral host network that will be shared by the emergency services as well as the mobile operators so that was our compelling financial case also I'm hoping some of you travelled on the Jubilee line today if you did you will have noticed that we have a 4G network just on the eastern end of that and that that was a project that we delivered brilliantly this went live the day the UK went into lockdown so we were going to do an enormous announcement we kind of got overtaken by events so it's been there for quite some time now although for us because we've barely come into London or travelled on the tube it's kind of a new experience but it's been there over a year that network is very similar technology that's going to be rolled out everywhere and therefore we know that this service that can be produced by such technology is excellent and provides a really good customer experience we do know now I was quite surprised at how busy the tube was today because I've travelled on it recently and it's not been so busy but you know you're still getting a decent throughput on that network and be able to use your data services in a way that's I think perfectly usable we'll still improve on that and continue to invest in that network so that service March 2020 that went live so we are confident that rolling that out over the entire tube network will provide the levels of service that we require and that the customers of BAI the mobile network operators will require so as I say we've let a 20-year concession to BAI and I'm going to talk about Andy talk about what they're planning to deliver from that perspective thanks Matt so yes good morning it's nice to be here in person rather than at home on a on a Zoom call yeah my name is Andy Andy Conway I head up Solutions and Innovation at BAI Communications Broadcast Australia International as you can probably tell from my accent I'm not Australian I'm from Yorkshire but there you go BAI who are they so we've been around about 100 years so we're headquartered in Sydney where we've been running the terrestrial broadcast network for nearly 100 years about 20-25 years ago we branched out into specialised telecommunications designing and building in areas where there is no signal so on transport networks we acquired a company in Hong Kong who specialised in that indeed in Hong Kong now I think they're on their fourth generation started on 2G now they're rolling out 5G on the Hong Kong Metro and then about 10-12 years ago we moved into New York so our operation there Transit Wireless where we deploy cellular service and Wi-Fi service on the underground system welcome to capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA the live streaming newsroom for telecom and data centre professionals today we're in London at capacity Europe streaming live from the intercontinental at the O2 in London I'm Barb Mitchell and joining me today is Angela Capon from EdgeConnex VP of Global Marketing at EdgeConnex Angela thank you so much for joining us it's really a pleasure to have you here thank you very much for asking me yeah it's great it's so exciting to be back in in person I know you know for those of us traveling from overseas you know we're back in London and I know for you what's it like to have everyone here back in the UK back in where you are based you know what's it like to have everyone back with you at this event it's the biggest one they've had to date so far yeah I mean I heard that it was going to be the biggest one I'm not surprised with us being shut down for the last three years and it's all very well having teams meetings or virtual events but nothing beats people and interaction we're humans we like to talk to humans in the same room so this has been the biggest thing I've looked forward to is finally meeting people that I've had conversations on teams for two years and being in the same room and what a bonus it's their biggest event to date so yeah fantastic so great and it's such a busy week we're still only on day one I keep calling yesterday was day zero but it also was full wasn't it and and now we're starting and this afternoon you're speaking on a panel about I think about talent in telecom and diversifying the the talent base can you talk and what do you give us some highlights of what you're going to cover yeah I mean I'm hoping that we're going to be able to get across that there is a gap a skills gap and a diversity gap in the data center industry in particular and we're going to try and get across sort of best practices or practical things that you can do as an organization or an individual to take back to your company and implement so for example I'll be talking about women connects which is the group we started in the pandemic to support women in our organization through personal challenges to getting used to remote working to where does your career look like and where it's going and hopefully exciting the women in the industry to go out and talk to other women to get into the industry so it's hopefully it'll come across as a practical session that people can take actual things away with them to implement back at their company and I mean that's that's one of many things you've been working on lots of initiatives for the company also you know campaigns that you've been working on I kind of wanted to mention tomorrow night is the global carrier awards you're up for three awards tomorrow all in in sort of the marketing themed area and of course your global marketing and I know these are with Adani connects but can you tell us a little bit about all of that work that's been done yeah I mean it's amazing right because we've been in a partnership with Adani for 18 months and already the Adani connects are up for three marketing awards which is like incredible really because they've done as a as two companies coming together I mean the Adani name is not difficult to talk about they're huge in India and we're very very much proud to be part of their team building out the data centers for them across India and some of the campaigns that they're being awarded for isn't necessarily about data centers per se it's like the human side of it their culture is something that actually everybody should learn from and how they look after their people and what they do from a cultural perspective certainly edge connects are taking some of their activities and going to be implementing them within our company that's fantastic and and the the Adani connects has been a big initiative that that partnership and that the work that you've been doing with Adani but you've been doing so much more globally I mean how do you keep up with it there's so much you know can you give us some highlights from this past year of what are the be sort of the big wins the big exciting projects that you've taken on this last year yeah I mean 2020 is is set to be one of our best years since the company was created and it's it's pretty special considering we are you know we've gone from when I started 40 to 50 people to over 200 people now so we've grown really quickly and we are basically doing what we said we would always do deliver for our customers where they need to be on time on budget and we're agile enough to be able to do that in comparison to other operators so our customers like us because we can do things quickly we're responding to the requirements particularly in the pandemic when all of a sudden I think all us operators thought as if it couldn't get any busier buckle up it's going to get even busier with with the demand so yeah this year has been a great success. The highlights has got to be a Dhani Konex partnering with the Dhani across India where you know it's it's a human element of it as well is that we're building the digital infrastructure for India to get more people online effectively and giving that opportunity to young people to be able to educate themselves we know it's just such a great success story a Dhani Konex and I love working with that team because the people are amazing as well we learn so much from each other we talk daily you know it's amazing and then right the way across Asia-Pac in general it's like growing so fast with the different joint benches that we're doing across Asia-Pac the the sites that we're acquiring and building right through to Europe has almost had a renaissance and all of a sudden Europe is massively in demand as well because you know there's you know the demand from post pandemic and you know building out in the territories so yeah it's yeah it's busy it's busy Bob but it's incredibly exciting you know that the company in its own right they you know they the founders should be really proud of themselves because they've created a culture that everybody wants everybody to do well and that's why we are successful because of the people we have this sort of three column thing of customers people planets so we look after the planet in the most sustainable way because data centers get a a hard time through that so we're doing everything we can to build with goodness we're looking trying to look after all our people with all the different initiatives and then that naturally means that they look after our customers and therefore you've got this beautiful triangle of success hopefully so amazing it's it's so exciting to watch and and we you know we know your team obviously really well and it's I would you know echo everything you're saying and there's just such a great you know team effort that's going on and the momentum is amazing and it's infectious and and so you know congratulations on everything that's happened so far but you're you know clearly not slowing down so anything you can sort of predict or or share with us you know of what may be happening as we look forward you know into 2023 and beyond yeah I think all of the operators are probably saying the same thing is the expansion plans of of the of our customers is just some of the figures I'm seeing and numbers are just like this this looks impossible but we are a we we call ourselves the edge of tomorrow so yeah we yeah the the expansion plans of customers is yeah it's it's daunting but doable that's our method daunting but doable I like it I like it that's a good slogan and so for you're here for the rest of the week I know that you have meeting space here I believe I'm sure you're so busy but you know we're streaming live and and so people may be tuning in to this and want to connect with you so how can they find you and if not today you know after this week well yeah we're in meeting suite 641 so just come and knock on our door I think we've got some fresh muffins just arrived if that's what takes your fancy look us up on LinkedIn I'm Angela Kaepern I can point you I know everybody in edge connects now so I'm sure I can direct you to the right person if you need any help or support in talking to one of our you know people within edge connects thank you so much Angela it's been really a pleasure speaking with you we look forward to seeing you all week as we're here and working with you down the road and and thank you viewers for tuning in to capacity extra powered by JSA TV and we'll be here like I said continuing to stream live throughout the week see you soon big event for the community it's a great networking framework for all of us and I extremely appreciate the opportunity to have this whole colleagues and partners and stakeholders in the community together and this year we have identified more than ever how important also in person meetings are after being locked down for almost two years we are at the beginning of a new decade if it comes to the industry development and exciting times are ahead of us having the digital transformation everywhere for everyone and everybody this will change our industry as well we're happy to be here in capacity Europe to be again here and meet the industry and we are going every year because for us it's really big event meeting all of our partners across the carrier industry for us other industry as well technological partners meeting here in one venue which helps us very much to bring all the energy together to face all the challenges and to face all the business opportunities that the market is bringing to us creative leader to be about to visit Europe 2021 a true partner of choice and looking forward for a future success it's a fantastic place to meet customers, partners and essentially connect with the ecosystem if we're not all successful no one is I think we'll increase the way we co-create together I think the importance of igniting end user be it consumer or enterprise experience has become more important and I think ultimately because we need to propel more growth so I'll see you at capacity 2022 and see you at the capacity Europe 2022 we'll see you at capacity Europe 2022 see you at capacity Europe 2022 it's annual global carrier awards I think there are an awful lot of events on the calendar it's a bit of a jamboree but I think the global carry awards stand out the capacity events stand out I'm looking forward to network because a lot of people know what's going on around them and the rest of the world from partners from other operators from our customers tonight this is the place to be in telecoms to recognise the best global and regional carriers projects marketing and sales teams campaigns disruptors and innovations number one you know really genuinely pretty products a new world category and I think it's brilliant for you and I'm really, really happy for you very honoured and delighted to be part of this this great group of companies and we want to meet some more so congratulations to everyone I hope you had a wonderful evening thank you to capacity Europe 2022 pre-event coverage we are looking forward to delivering this year's equally anticipated blended event on the 18th to the 24th of October at the Intercontinental London DO2 and also on the Spotcard app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called Five Minutes with tapping into industry views but also bring out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in Five Minutes with I have Eric Seavis president global wholesale of Verizon Partner Solutions Eric first of all great to have you involved and great to have you speaking at this year's event ready for a quick five five minute with informal interview absolutely looking forward to it and glad to participate and support the capacity Europe event you know Verizon we like to show up each year and support the event so glad to do this for you great great to have you in the room as well we're looking forward to October all right let's start the clock so Eric first of all tell me the cover and state of play situation in global telecoms I believe that you know enterprises around the world are kind of looking for what we call global simple and secure solutions at the end of the day and we see this as an incredible opportunity for global telecom providers in the industry if we look at our assets regardless of what's going on and kind of the economic and geopolitical vein this is just a great opportunity for us once again to deliver things into the business into the industry so global simple secure that's the way the solutions need to go whether it's network whether it's above the network wireline and wireless services it's staff and where would you say your organization is positioned at the moment I mean we've seen these shifts obviously with post-COVID take place but also digital transformation really kind of gathering momentum within your industry but also there's also a terrible and economic and inflationary climate as well where do you where do you see your organization's position if I look at my Verizon partner solutions global wholesale team we feel we're kind of very excited about the assets that we have once again if we look at what we've done we spent over 120 billion dollars getting our spectrum with c-band and millimeter wave and once again we got vast fiber deployments across the footprint right now so very strategic time for us whether it's wireline wireless what are we doing from ethernet to wave to internet services even what I'm doing above the network with blue jeans conferencing or security services or what I really love is the passion we have in the wireless area the day with wireless backup or the internet of things or our own fixed wireless access services that we're doing on LTE business internet so once again we think we're very well positioned in the industry we've made the investments and once again we want to help our customers that have big bandwidth requirements certainly and you're very much a familiar face within the industry circles for capacity events how enjoyable is it working in this industry competitive when you first entered it okay I think you're calling out the fact that I've been doing this for 36 years yeah started back in 1986 and we were doing a lot of dial tone dial tone dial tone but I will tell you the industry has just transformed tremendously so from everything we're doing from our digital customer experience transformation where ease of business is kind of the forefront of what we do at APIs candidly what we're doing across the board when you look at new products and services in the industry you know the days of just dial tone when today you know as I said earlier I'm selling ethernet services I'm selling wave services we're selling internet services but above that we're adding things and partnerships to what we do in the cloud environment what we're doing with the internet of things how do we continue to leverage our wireless assets as we look at you know fixed wireless access and LTE business internet in the industry once again I think it's it's welcome to capacity europe extra powered by jsa the live streaming newsroom for telecom and data center professionals we're coming to you today live from the exhibit hall at capacity europe at the intercontinental at the o2 in london we're here together and i'm barb mitchell from jsa and joining me is mike jonis president of global customer operations at light river like it's great to be back here isn't it at capacity is this your first time in a few years I would imagine being back live at capacity europe cheers yes from london it's my first trip back in a couple of years that there was something in the news about travel restrictions so I didn't make it last year but you know thrilled to be here again yeah I mean it's it was obviously a long time coming for a lot of us to be back here I've heard that it's you know record numbers this year what are you most excited about being being back at the event with you know the entire community that's that's come together at this at this event there's no alternative for us at least for face to face meetings this is a vital part of the business we have it's a complex world this complex networking challenges today and you can't solve them all on zoom you just can't we have to be together we have to make things happen and we we have to really understand what the problems are in order to come up with the solution so what's the what's the biggest focus I mean for light river what are you what are you most thinking about what are you most focused on right now at this point in time well my trip to England is is almost a hundred percent around our Netflix automation platform so the the challenges that European operators have with diverse networks with with disaggregation with open networks are just the same as we have in the States and in Canada so you know the the work here is what can be done about practical automation how can you make a network more intelligent how can you make a more responsive how can you provide a better service product to the carriers and customer without them having to try quite so hard the problems here are the same as the problems we have in North America so my trip here is is to further that we have a number of great European customers and getting more but to properly service them light river is is further expanding its own partner program here in both the UK and the EU to make sure that there's a local presence for those software customers that that are here locally the right products the right services and solutions but the right community the right network the right alliance to bring that together and put it in in motion right absolutely we have to protect the brand we have a great reputation for for delivering a great reputation for technological excellence and for caring about our customer's success and I can't do that from 4,000 miles away so we will have support here locally for for those customers here that deserve it I mean our industry has has enabled all of us to be able to work remotely globally but nothing really replaces does it as you're saying you know being together and and having those those conversations in person no all the technology we have all the fantastic engineers on the team the great software products our most valuable tool is a whiteboard by far and you know what it helps connect you more closely to your customer when you're working on a problem together and there there is great opportunity right now in the world in our world of networking as well and so we're not going to wait on the sideline for something to happen we'll make it happen so on that note are there any things coming that you might want to share with us or give us a little peek behind the curtain of what's next well what's next here in Namia might be a little different than what's next in North America but so we have a number of European customers we're going to have several more we are building out that partner program here on this side of the pond and you'll see more of that and Light River will be active on multiple continents in 2023 in a much bigger way and you know we're going to do it though from the ground up and we're going to make short sticks okay so for anyone that's seeing you live streaming of course we're streaming across the capacity platforms as well as JSA TV and for anyone that's here and wants to connect with you what's the best way of doing that oh I would bet our website lightriver.com is a is a good way to learn more about Light River and to find out how to contact your your local support Light River has been designing, deploying and automating networks for 25 years we have what we think are some of the best customers and some of the best teammates in the world and we want you to learn about us fantastic Mike thank you so much for joining us it's always a pleasure to to chat with you we've chatted with you many times but there's always something new that you have to share and we appreciate that we appreciate your time here I know it's a busy week and to you viewers thank you again for tuning in to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA stay tuned we'll be back shortly with the next live streamed interview big event for the community it's a great networking framework for all of us and I extremely appreciate the opportunity to have this whole colleagues and partners and stakeholders in the community together and this year we have identified more than ever how important also in-person meetings are after being locked down for almost two years we're at the beginning of a new decade if it comes to the industry development and exciting times are ahead of us having the digital transformation everywhere for everyone and everybody this will change our industry as well we're happy to be here at Capacity Europe to be again here and meet the industry and we are going every year because for us it's really big events meeting all of our partners across the carrier industry across other industry as well technological partners meeting here in one venue which helps us very much to bring all the energy together to face all the challenges and to face all the business opportunities that the market is bringing to us creative ledger to be part of Capacity Europe 2021 a true partner of choice and looking forward for the future success it's a fantastic place to meet customers, partners and essentially connect with the ecosystem if we're not all successful no one is I think we'll increase the way we co-create together I think the importance of igniting end user be it consumer or enterprise experience has become more important and I think ultimately because we need to propel more growth so I'll see you at Capacity 2022 and see you at Capacity Europe 2022 we'll see you at Capacity Europe 2022 see you at Capacity Europe 2022 it's annual global carrier awards I think there are an awful lot of events on the calendar it's a bit of a jamboree but I think the global carrier awards stand out the capacity events stand out I'm looking forward to network because a lot of people know what's going on around and the rest of the world from partners from other operators from our customers tonight this is the place to be in telecoms we'll recognize the best global and regional carriers projects marketing and sales teams campaigns disruptors and innovations you know really genuinely pretty products a new award category and I think it's brilliant for you and I'm really really happy for you really honored and delighted to be part of this this great group of companies and we want to mend some more so congratulations to everyone I hope you had a wonderful evening thank you Welcome to Capacity Europe's 2022 pre-event coverage we are looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on the 18th to the 24th of October at the Intercontinental London DO2 and also on the SWAT Carder app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tackling today industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part this year's event here in five minutes with I have Eric Sieves president global wholesale of Verizon Partner Solutions Eric first of all great to have you involved and great to have you speaking at this year's event ready for a quick five five-minute with informal interview absolutely looking forward to it and glad to participate and support the Capacity Europe event you know Verizon we like to show up each year and support the event so glad to do this for you great great to have you in the room as well we're looking forward to October all right let's start the clock so Eric first of all tell me the cover and state of play situation in global telecoms I believe that you know enterprises around the world are kind of looking for what we call global simple and secure solutions at the end of the day and we see this as an incredible opportunity for global telecom providers in the industry if we look at our assets regardless of what's going on and kind of the economic and geopolitical vein this is just a great opportunity for us once again to deliver things into the business into the industry so global simple secure that's the way the solutions need to go whether it's network whether it's above the network wireline and wireless services it's staff and where would you say your organization is positioned at the moment I mean we've seen these shifts obviously with post-COVID take place but also digital transformation really kind of gathering momentum within your industry but also it's also terrible and economic and inflationary climate as well where do you where do you see your organization position if I look at my Verizon partner solutions global wholesale team we feel we're kind of very excited about the assets that we have once again if we look at what we've done we spent over 120 billion dollars getting our spectrum with c-band and millimeter wave and once again we got vast fiber deployments across the footprint right now so very strategic time for us whether it's wireline wireless what are we doing from ethernet to wave to internet services even what I'm doing above the network with blue jeans conferencing or security services or what I really love is the passion we have in the wireless area today with wireless backup or the internet of things or our own fixed wireless access services that we're doing on LTE business internet so once again we think we're very well positioned in the industry we've made the investments and once again we want to help our customers that have big bandwidth requirements certainly and you're very much a familiar face within the industry circles for capacity events how enjoyable is it working in this industry compared to when you first entered it okay I think you're calling out the fact that I've been doing this for 36 years yeah started back in 1986 and we were doing a lot of dial tone dial tone dial tone but I will tell you the industry has just transformed tremendously so from everything we're doing from our digital customer experience transformation where ease of business is kind of the forefront of what we do at APIs candidly what we're doing across the board we look at new products and services in the industry you know the days of just dial tone when today you know as I said earlier I'm selling ethernet services I'm selling wave services we're selling internet services but above that we're adding things and partnerships with what we do in the cloud environment what we're doing with the internet of things how do we continue to leverage our wireless assets as we look at you know fixed wireless access and LTE business internet in the industry once again I think it's just a tremendous time not just selling one or two products and services but a lot of products and services that deal with our basic telecom needs so no longer just your basic telco but this is clearly a technology evolution and we're stepping up to it whether it's things we do organically or partnerships that we do in organically to make certain that we can meet the communications need of the industry now we've got 90 seconds left so I'll have a some quick fire um kind of questions here you'll be dressing the talent gap in this year's events as well what is a state of play are we in good shape yeah we feel we're in good shape though our industry just like every industry I think during this period of time once again we're trying to show folks that it's attracted to be in the STEM environment with science and technology and engineering and mathematics and so once again even with the GLF the global leaders forum we're working on diversity inclusion and belonging and one of those initiatives is making sure we're bringing new talent forward and making sure that there are more opportunities with gender and balance ethnicity and making welcome to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA the streaming live streaming newsroom for telecom and data center professionals today we're here in London at the intercontinental at the O2 for Capacity Europe and I mean it's such an amazing crowd that's come together for this I'm I'm Barb Mitchell from JSA and and joining me is Patrick Sullivan area vice president for APAC, AMIA and LATAM for Verizon Partner Solutions thank you so much Patrick for joining us thank you so much it's a pleasure to be invited here as well it is so nice to be back at Capacity Europe unfortunately I wasn't able to attend this session last year and for the previous couple of years beforehand obviously not here so being back again it's really really exciting so exciting and you can just you can see it and you can feel it and I know everyone seems so busy and you're no exception I think we were saying you know it's day one it feels like we've already been here a week we've packed a week into a half a day here and what does what does the event really hold in store for you what are you most looking forward to? I think honestly most looking forward to connecting with customers again you know the opportunity to be face to face of our customers having that human contact it is just so important when you think of the pandemic and how we manage through that and through virtual communications etc we have our own our own platform for virtual communication so we have the BlueJeans platform that's really good but there's no real substitute unfortunately for that face to face discussion so you know being here reconnecting with customers candidly understanding where they are and their agendas how we can support them you know that's really really interesting for us I keep hearing that over and over really I mean there's just no replacement for for sitting here and talking to someone and seeing them and having good quality conversations and talking about some of the things for our industry that that people share in common in terms of priorities and what they're seeing in terms of trends and pressures and what needs to be done you know as an industry going forward what are some of the things that that you're seeing and how are they aligning with the work that you're doing? Well I think always a common trend in this industry is around interoperability and these of doing business you know there's always a discussion on that front there's a lot of things that Verizon are doing in terms of interoperability with the MEPH forum and certainly in terms of ease of doing business that digital transformation working with our partners making it easy for them to on board of us etc you know there's some of the key themes but also from a product perspective as well there's some of the challenges we're all facing in terms of fixed network is trying to find out what we can do above and beyond that whether it's above the network solutions whether it's mobility fixed wireless access solutions or indeed whether it's you know going into the areas of professional service or security I think all of our partners are wanting to have that discussion so we can broaden the relationships that we have and broaden the opportunities that we're discussing as well I mean the task ahead for the entire industry is a big one and it's important to really put that together and bring the right partners together to reach those goals and so in terms of goals as my segue for you what does what are you looking ahead to so what can we expect to see in 2023 and beyond I think one of the words you mentioned there which is key to us and to many of us as well is around partnership as well so one of the goals we always have is coming here understanding from our partner and what our partners what their agenda is how we can make sure we're best able to address their requirements as well a key goal from my perspective is as I mentioned in terms of moving above the network working with our partners to understand in areas such as security such as fixed wireless access such as IoT also conferencing such as blue jeans and the platform we bring what we can do to differentiate the solutions that we bring to market but also the solutions that our partners can avail of and take to market as well a big goal of mine is really hearing from our customers those requirements and making sure we tailor our solutions to address those requirements as well and so you're busy obviously this week here in London there's a lot going on just at this event alone but you cover a large geography I mean how do you do all that how do you sort of split your priorities between those and and you know I'm sure they're in different stages of of evolution can you can you talk about that yeah of course I mean it's Verizon is a global organization I have the privilege of looking after the international part of that so effectively everything outside of US and Canada you know we have a global organization in global presence and global capabilities so the one good thing is we can always leverage people in region making sure that we can engage of our customers on a face-to-face basis at events like this or in their own offices if you will you know there's a lot of travel required to make sure that we're constantly in front of our customers but also what we try to do is bring our customers to us as well we just recently had a partner summit which we sponsored over in Miami an amazing event was an opportunity to hear from our customers again about what's key for them for their agendas going forward but also for us to showcase some of our products some of our roadmap what we're trying to do going forward from a technology perspective as well so bringing our customers together on a global basis at events like that has been really helpful as well so important and speaking of bringing people together I mean you are still here and for people that are you know maybe tuning into this live broadcast or seeing you and wanting to connect with Verizon how can they find you this week and after this week what's the best way to connect well first and foremost we've got a good presence here probably about 25-30 people from Verizon probably the next couple of days we're on the second floor the Riverside sweet 7 I believe it is so by all means come up and see us we'll certainly make sure we've got time to speak to some of our customers there and also new prospects as well the other thing just reach out to me everyone can get hold of me Patrick Sullivan you'll find me on LinkedIn and various other media as well you know I would be very happy to speak to the customers or we can find somebody else that can help them on that agenda as well Fantastic thank you so much for joining joining us here today it's a pleasure speaking with you and thank you all for tuning in to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA stay tuned because we'll be live again shortly with our with our next interviewer here from the exhibit hall at Capacity Europe stay tuned and welcome to Capacity Europe's 2022 pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly awaited blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London the 02 and on the Swapcard app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called Five Minutes With tapping into their industry reviews also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in Five Minutes With I had Angela Capone Vice President Global Marketing at Edge Connects Angela how are you first of all and it's great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick five five-minute Q&A yeah thank you for inviting me definitely for me okay well so certainly let's let's start the clock right now so in our five-minute Q&A here we go tell me just state of the play in global telecoms yeah I mean global telecoms isn't just 5G and gigabot gigabit telecoms anymore it's the wider challenges of country regulation trust from our customers climate economic growth the worrying inflation news that we're seeing and where to build next so the balance is getting increasingly difficult with large cloud services requiring ever bigger capacity while also lowering overall emissions across supply chains so closer collaboration among operators clients industry bodies government agencies will be needed to be the forefront of any future expansion and where do you see your organization position at the moment obviously it's in a post-COVID climate it's fundamentally changed yeah I mean when COVID hit EdgeConnect was well positioned actually to not miss a beat we were all remote workers for years and the data centers had the ability to remote operate through our EdgeOS software systems so when it hit we kind of didn't really we felt the impact from a world perspective but we didn't actually from an operational side we just continued on it was incredible so to continue with the drivers like digital transformation without the impact of COVID was a testament to our strategy to set way before it was struck and we were able to continue a pace for large enterprises as we were able to work with their IT providers to offer solutions in markets large and small and as the Edge continues to develop globally we will continue to plan and supply land and power serving the largest global companies worldwide when they need it where they need it so it's the data center industry in your point of view first of all are you enjoying it and second of all in terms of the people landscape is it suffering from a lack of diversity and it's in the workforce and if so why I mean yeah I mean when I talk to people about the data center industry you kind of get that that blank look on their face so it's not incredibly exciting but what I've seen over the last 10 years of working at Edge Connects is the talent that is actually coming through difficult but it is coming through and the diversity of the talent is what I really enjoy and I'm loving seeing our employees join at a certain level and 10 years on there running teams and their head of security and all of those different roles so you know we are lacking in diversity for sure but I believe it's not for not trying as a company we work really hard on different projects to attract talent from going out to universities talking to the STEM type community that probably don't think about data center as an engineering type of place to go and work but when you talk to them about what we're doing and what we're developing and actually what our customers customers are doing I mean I'm very privileged to be in a position where I can see Star Trek type futures coming in and when you talk to young people about you know the opportunity and how I mean this industry hasn't even slightly reached its dizzy heights and when you talk to young people about what they want to do from an engineering perspective and you say look have you thought about the data center industry we need you it's incredible it's growing absolutely at the speed of rate all the operators will say that so it's game on to get that talent and nurture them and grow them into you know something fantastic in an industry that most people probably don't think about or understand certainly so just some quick find some questions here then just about you and your enjoyment for for for Europe what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from the event we've got just over 30 seconds to go yeah people finally we're back in a room together I mean capacity Europe's always had a fantastic agenda of content you know right Broadway across of talking about the industry so I'm really looking forward to listening to that meeting our customers again face to face and yeah just being there in person yep and perhaps give our viewers one fun fact about you that they don't already know 10 seconds 10 seconds probably the bravest thing I've done in my life is uproot my entire family to the southwest where I knew absolutely no one so I have this really surreal world of data centers and traffic jams cows time is up thank you ever so much there that's yeah that's a fantastic perspective there to find out a little bit more about you and obviously obviously the themes that you read we care about and yeah so you're going to talk about that a little bit more in at our event in October yeah not like I'm really looking forward to it yeah so Angela yeah you'll be speaking in our data center session on at the talent in telecoms track details of this session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now to capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the intercontinental London DO2 and on the swap card app I'm David Shran the conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run up to the event we'll run a series of rather light hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this event here in this year's five minutes with I have Sammy Slim CEO of telehouse France Sammy how are you first of all and great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick fire five minute Q&A absolutely thanks for having me so let's start the clock okay so Sammy tell me the state of play in the global telecoms market well we're seeing more blurring boundaries between the tempo the OTT infrastructure something that is reaching the industry and we are looking forward to an exciting future great so where would you say then your organisation is positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-covid digital transformation current inflationary pressures well what is great about our industry is that all those prices are merely acceleration to the transformation to digital transformation however there are real risk especially related to energy price and the energy shortage and the industry is even forced to be detected that kind of problems and does the industry have a talent issue if so how can it solve the problems well definitely yes as many and I think the problem should be solved in the future with what we are seeing now in terms of remote work and remote teams distributed teams around the globe because that actually brings the talent pool to a more global level and you'll be speaking in a subsea a data centre related session about interconnectivity between those two landscapes it must be an exciting industry to be a part of incredibly diverse and things seem to be moving along quite a relatively fast pace absolutely that's actually our main driver to be in the capacities here we are very very excited to what kind of topic we share because the telecom geography is changing thanks to the subsea and we are looking forward to see what are the future cities where the interconnection can happen and how can we have to reshape it as well now I wanted to tap into a little bit you know about you yourself as a person so Sammy what's your preferred method to connect with your fellow industry peers given how platforms like teams and zoom have transport reliability and convenience and connecting with fellow professionals in the past two years in person or virtual in terms of you know day-to-day engagements nice drink with a great view I've got a lot of teams and views I like that but to be honest it's good for introduction we're still human beings right so if you want to solidly appreciate we need to be a person and I'm looking forward to that in London next October well yeah definitely it's a great segue there to capacity Europe to be there in person in adding to continental the O2 in London so what's the first thing what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from being part of capacity Europe this year well I think that's the answer to those questions on how do we manage this blurring boundaries between different technical segments how do we manage the new Europe think how do we manage the new crisis and energy in Montana those are things that I am looking forward to discuss with my colleagues in the ministry but again we have a chance to be in the industry to see growing and that the world is needing it back especially with the current crisis so it will be a thing that will exactly mean definitely and it is this huge event as well and taking place in the UK capital of London so tell me tell me about what you most love about London the location of the capacity Europe 2022 definitely the view there in O2 it's really great to meet the people but I happen to we have an office in London so I actually love being in O2 to see some kind of career do it so yeah one of my definitely my favorites is in New York and I'm saying that I'm from Paris you know the competition between me plenty of competition between Paris and London there but two marvelous so European cities and really modern as well we've got 45 seconds to go so basically we've got a few quick five questions here for you give our viewers one fun fact about you that they don't already know ha most people so I mean normally in the industry I see you in France but tell you how it's France most people don't know that I'm actually not French I'm Tunisian and yeah well when people yeah discover that is there a person away from this industry that inspires you the most well I would love to meet the person someday if I have the chance I and Adela from a CEO of that's someone that reshaped the entire career as we use Microsoft and yeah that's the time's up so yeah that's that's our buzzer for that one as well so really great speaking to you Sammy there is a very quick buy into you you just realise how quickly five minutes goes up in the flash doesn't it but thanks so much that's been great and then Sammy will be speaking at Capacity Europe it's October in London details of the session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now welcome to Capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London DO2 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran conference producer leads of this year's event and in a run up to the event we'll have a series of rather light hearted speak interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in five minutes with I have Matthias Friedschirm the vice president and chief evangelist of Aurelian Matthias, how are you first of all and great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a five minute quick fire Q&A I'm absolutely ready get to staff Matthias so let's start the clock Matthias, tell me the current state of play situation in global telecoms I would say it's in a pretty good shape you know traffic is still growing post pandemic which is a good sign there are though some signs of costs going up because of some circumstances around the world but I would say the overall feeling in the industry is pretty good and where would you say your organization is best positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-COVID taking place digital transformation and also the current inflationary pressures that we are seeing I think we are in a pretty good shape you know we're not a big organization we're very focused on high capacity transport services and IP services and I would say digital transformation moving traffic to the cloud using public internet much more those are good signs for us so I would say we're in a very good position right now in a tough market and how have the past couple years shaped the way you connect with your fellow industry peers from a personal perspective yourself Matthias yeah you know I think that's a good question and I was very skeptical to webinars in the beginning but I would say through the pandemic I've kind of enjoyed all the webinars that's been going on and that's been a fairly good way but I'm really eager to see people again now so you can get the feeling of the industry from a much better point of view well definitely you know we're looking forward to bringing capacity Europe in person in October the 18th to the 20th in London so how enjoyable is it working in this telecoms industry compared to when you first entered them I would say it's really really enjoyable I've enjoyed it all the way through but you know when I started 25 years ago I would say not very many people understood what we were doing you know internet was very new everything was more of a phone call situation in the telecoms world today everything relies on what we do you know internet is for everyone so it's much more seen these days and therefore quite a more funny industry with many more being part of it what's the the interconnectivity between data centres and subsea is exciting as well as important to see these in sectors talking to one another Mattes what do you think we are seeing this overlap between the two markets why is it becoming more profound yeah no I really think you know content needs to be as close as possible to end users and you know you can't really be closer to end users if you are at the submarine cable station and therefore I see this it's a very good sign when cable or content providers locate their content at the station itself because you know at the end of that sea cable there is an end user and that user wants to take advantage of that content as soon as possible and therefore we see these two industries merging as we speak and what's the one thing you're hoping to take away from being a part of capacity year 2022 this October I think you know you want the overall feeling of the market you want to hear the bus on the floor you want to see what people talk about but then I really think you know the rumors that's what I'm there for you know speaking to people sort of on the side asking them you know how are you doing what's going on what's happening what's happening with this company and so on that's you know what you've been missing for the last couple of years yes definitely and talking of the event itself and the location of the event what you most love about London now London is a really nice city but it's also this international city you know you hear the bus from really everywhere which is what you've kind of missed the last couple of years seeing this feeling this international bus with people from everywhere kind of in one place I really love London we've got a couple of questions there but we realise we still got 17 seconds on the on the clock here so if it wasn't for going to an event talking of London what or you know other international cities around the world Mattes what would be the first thing you'll do if you're in a new city I absolutely look at maps I love maps you know and when I come to a new city I want to see the map so I know where everything is and I kind of enjoy just looking at maps following maps making sure I see as much as I can when I come to a new city that's really what I look for and perhaps give our viewers one fun fact about you that they didn't already know now I'm a really big sports fan many people know I'm a big sports fan but I'm really a big sports fan because I love all sports and I kind of have a secret habit of trying to learn all the rules of every sport there is and I'm not too many people try to do that but I just enjoy pretty much every sport there is I don't watch it too much but I read a lot about it okay well we've got eight seconds so any any hobbies any other hobbies four seconds no I I like being in the forest as well oh brilliant good stuff well that's times up there thank you ever so much there Mateus that was that was great Mateus will be speaking at capacity this October in London details of this session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now right so that's just that's just a flavor of what's coming what what we're going to talk about today is what it's taken to get here what we're doing and the entire scope it's not just about mobile there we go right so I'm Matthew Griffin I'm head of commercial telecoms at Transport for London and I have with me Andrew Conway and he's CTO or Director of Solutions and Innovations sorry for for that's your old job title for BAI Communications we're here today because BAI were awarded a 20-year concession from TFL just in June 21st of June and we're going to explain what what what that concession is all about it's in line with the Mayor's Transport Strategy the Mayor has asked TFL to make its assets available for telecommunications use and to put mobile coverage on the Tube and that's what we're doing so TFL if you don't know TFL it's a very large organisation people think of it as London Underground it's a lot more than that it has if you move in London then we're responsible pretty much so it includes a major road network it we manage all the traffic lights for example and just to give you a scale of TFL here's some sort of big numbers 31,000 31 million journeys every day we're slightly down on that at the moment but actually we found the road traffic is back to normal bus networks around 75% and the Tube is running during the week 50 to 60% and at weekends even higher than that so so we are we are edging towards normality in terms of the number of journeys that that we're looking after so so what we have here is a network that is very large for the Tube the underground part of the Tube we have 132 stations on the Tube that need covering with mobile coverage and we have hundreds of kilometres of tunnels likewise now I was tasked with getting mobile coverage on the Tube amongst other things my responsibility in TFL is to liaise with the telecoms industry we already provide access to our rooftops for cell sites we have the Wi-Fi network and we also have fibre running through the tunnels to a certain extent quite a small extent actually but what we what we decided is we needed to supercharge that and we needed investment to do that internal to TFL I was told I had no money so so I was told zero we're not zero budget I could run a procurement but that was it so we needed a partner that to come in and invest in our network so what we did is we created a an offer that included all TFL assets previously a lot of times we'd looked at mobile on the Tube and looked at just the Tube assets and just from a mobile perspective but what we did in this case is we looked at it from a much broader context and Andy's going to talk about the ambition that BAI have got for that and we have found a partner that matches our ambition to use all of our assets to deliver a step change in connectivity for London and the other thing we wanted we wanted a neutral host so we wanted a partner that would open up our network to the industry as a whole and we believe it creates a whole load of opportunities way beyond those that we can think of at the moment now the other thing we've done on a technical basis we've been de-risking it by installing antennas through the tunnels and we've also been putting in fibre and connectivity within the station so lots and lots of infrastructure has been going in over a hundred million is already been invested the other thing we're supporting as part of this is the new emergency services network the new emergency services network in London is replacing airway which is tetra-based technology it will be sitting on a 4G network provided by EE and to support that in the tube environment we needed and the EE 4G signal everywhere including back office so areas where the public go but also everywhere else so we've been doing that element of it and aligning these two projects together has allowed us to save hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers money by creating a neutral host network that will be shared by the emergency services as well as the mobile operators so that was our compelling financial case also I'm hoping some of you travelled on the Jubilee line today if you did you will have noticed that we have a 4G network just on the eastern end of that and that was a project that we delivered brilliantly this went live the day the UK went into lockdown so we were going to do an enormous announcement we kind of got overtaken by events so it's been there quite some time now although for us because we've barely come into London or travelled on the tube it's kind of a new experience but it's been there over a year that network is very similar technology that's going to be rolled out everywhere and therefore we know that this service that can be produced by such technology is excellent and provides a really good customer experience we do know now I was quite surprised at how busy the tube was today because I've travelled on it recently and it's not been so busy but you know you're still getting a decent throughput on that network and be able to use your your data services in a way that's I think perfectly usable we'll still improve on that and continue to invest in that network so that service March 2020 that went live so we are confident that rolling that out of the entire tube network will provide the levels of service that we require and that the customers of BAI the mobile network operators will require so as I say we've let a 20-year concession to BAI and I'm going to talk about Andy talk about what they're planning to deliver from from that perspective thanks Matt so yes good morning it's nice to be here in person rather than at home on a on a zoom call yeah my name is Ann B Andy Conway I head up Solutions and Innovation at BAI Communications Broadcast Australia International as you can probably tell from my accent I'm not Australian I'm from Yorkshire but there you go BAI who are they so we've been around about 100 years so we're headquartered in Sydney where we've been running the terrestrial broadcast network for nearly 100 years about 20-25 years ago we branched out into specialised telecommunications designing and building in areas where there is no signal so on transport networks we acquired a company in Hong Kong who specialised in that indeed in Hong Kong now I think they're on their fourth generation studied on 2G now they're rolling out 5G on the on the Hong Kong Metro and then about 10-12 years ago we moved into New York so our operation there Transit Wireless where we deploy cellular service and Wi-Fi service on the underground system we've done the same now in Toronto and then we came to London five years ago to set up shop and ready ourselves for the TFL opportunity we've also recently acquired a company in the US called Mobility they also specialised in transportation systems and cellular systems at key venues we like long-term deals the partnership that we have with TFL is 20 years the reason being that we are majority owned by the Canadian Pension Plan and Investment Board so we really like these long-term infrastructure deals and partnerships with authorities so this is the kind of technology on a page just a single sort of like technical blueprint really of what we're designing and building in London so there you'll see at the top all of the red dots in the capital we call those edge data centres or base station hotels I think the one thing that's different about the topology versus the solution that's currently present on the Jubilee line pilot is that the mobile network operator equipment is off TFL premise and located in one of these edge data centres so this will be the base station equipment from the mobile network operators that are throughout London they're in those red dots and then connected up to the London underground as Matt said we have a vast array of low power radio network nodes that you'll see throughout the stations and they're connected up with a lot of wires my colleague the CEO last week was saying it's incredible how much wiring you need to put underground to actually provide a wireless service so last night as you all slept there were over 400 people down there in the tube manually pulling through cable coming down escalators you know and attaching the cable and connecting it up so it's a very manually intensive business in a very very harsh very very harsh environment it's hot cramped and very damp down there so we have to choose the electronics as well with extreme care and then you'll see that it's not really just about cellular of course there's the commercial mobile service and as Matt said you know if you travel today on the on the Jubilee line you know I had a great you know 100 megabit download with my mobile operator you can tell I'm in the comms industry I was probably the only one using speed test and getting excited about it but you know it offered that great cellular service but it's not only about cellular and emergency service network albeit they are very important our ambition is that we would take over the existing Wi-Fi concession there's been Wi-Fi on the underground for several years and we see that as a coexisting with the cellular offering and then really I think the exciting thing the ambition that we've got together with TFL our partner is that we will be investing and deploying a high capacity fiber count throughout the city underground following the TFL network and bringing that above ground to meet me points or points of presence at each of the stations on the underground system and I think that's really exciting to offer that kind of alternative dark fiber connectivity within the heart of London and then finally working with TFL TFL have also provided as access to the streetscape assets so the holes and poles the CCTV columns lighting columns bus stops and so on there's a vast array over 80,000 of those assets which we want to bring into the mix as a neutral host just a little bit more detail it's the only technical slide really in the deck that at the heart of the system then in terms of projecting and rebroadcasting the cellular signal on the underground is a thing that we are deploying called a DAS distributed antenna system which is connected to the nine base station hotels and rebroadcast the cellular signal both throughout the stations and the connecting passageways but also of course through the tunnels where we are deploying the radiating cable or leaky feeder as it's called it's the only thing really that you can get down there with that very narrow gauging as you've probably seen the underground it being one of the oldest in the world over 150 years old there's not much space between the train and the tunnel wall so the way that we do it is to roll out the radiating cable system down there in the underground so I think when you take a step back of course the cellular system is important the streetscape is massively important people that are in the mobile industry particularly the MNO community know that it takes an awful long time to give birth to a macro site in a global city like London it can take in excess of three years from putting a cross on the map to actually delivering a macro cellular site three years and yet data traffic is doubling every two so there's a problem there there's a crunch point coming so we are really really interested in leveraging that small cell estate that streetscape really to provide a lot denser network much closer to the customer down at street level and really that's where we see a lot of the activity going over the period of the 20-year concession I think first on fibring up those assets and then offering them up to MNOs but it's not just about mobile network operators the streetscape assets can be used for a plethora of other use cases for example pollution monitoring there are a lot of people out there that offer some great technology with IoT sensors so we have air quality monitoring people and traffic counting and analytics and so on and all of those can utilize that streetscape that streetscape asset so really that's the sort of closing piece really that it's all about mobile coverage in the tunnels 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G ready it's that dark fiber network that alternative network underground which will be rolling out and then bringing to the surface taking over and improving that Wi-Fi experience and then really leveraging the small cell estate across the nine base station hotels plus we're also in two to three other major London data centers so there's 12 in total so really at that point that's the end of the presentation today thank you for your attention Big event for the community it's a great networking framework for all of us and I extremely appreciate the opportunity to have this whole colleagues and partners and stakeholders in the community together and this year we have identified more than ever how important also in-person meetings are after being locked down for almost two years we're at the beginning of a new decade if it comes to the industry development and exciting times ahead of us having the digital transformation everywhere for everyone and everybody this will change our industry as well we're happy to be here in Capacity Europe to be again here and meet the industry and we are going every year because for us it's really big event meeting all of our partners across the carrier industry for us another industry as well technological partners meeting here and one when you which helps us very much to bring all the energy together to face all the challenges and to face all the business opportunities that the market is bringing to us creative leader to be part of Capacity Europe 2021 a true partner of choice and looking forward for the future success fantastic place to meet customers, partners and essentially connect with the ecosystem if we're not all successful, no one is I think we'll increase the way we co-create together I think the importance of igniting end-user be it consumer or enterprise experiences become more important and I think ultimately because we need to propel more growth so I'll see you at Capacity 2022 and see you at Capacity Europe 2022 we'll see you at Capacity Europe 2022 see you at Capacity Europe 2022 it's annual global carrier awards I think there are an awful lot of events on the calendar it's a bit of a jamboree but I think the global carrier awards stand out the capacity events stand out I'm looking forward to this because a lot of people know what's going on around and the rest of the world from partners from other operators from our customers tonight this is the place to be in telecoms we'll recognize the best global and regional carriers projects marketing and sales teams campaigns disruptors and innovations welcome to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA the live streaming newsroom for telecom and data center professionals I'm Barb Mitchell here today live in the exhibition hall of Capacity Europe at the Intercontinental at the O2 in London and I'm excited to be joined by John Coleman VP of sales at NetNumber Global Data Services John thanks for joining us thank you Barb tell us what's in store for you this week it's exciting to be here in London live in person with with the industry tell us what what you're most looking forward to well most looking forward to reconnecting with people it's been a long time since people have the opportunity to reach out and talk with others and explore other solutions that they're looking for in times of COVID and the pandemic and we appreciate the opportunity to reconnect with them it is it is so great I'm hearing that over and over from people that it's just nothing really replaces being in person and face to face with with our customers our partners our network yeah so it's great to be here now you guys have had an exciting year so far and the year's not over it's winding down slowly but it's not over yet but with your the recent acquisition of NetNumber by by Abri Carterson so can you tell us a little bit about that the new brand the new logo the big launch event that you had in the summer all sorts of exciting things yeah sure I appreciate it so yeah NetNumber has been around for 24 years a lot of folks know us as the company that can provide reliable accurate secure telephone number intelligent data and this past July we were acquired by Abri partners on the data services side of NetNumber and they're very familiar with communications service space it's great to have an investor understand our business and for our brand launch with the new logo and other information we were able to entertain key customers over the dual race event in the Annapolis and share some of the things we're going to do with existing services and looking for new solutions as they look to optimize things for their network and their customers and so when you think about the the industry and the the people that are here that capacity or what are what are you most excited for them to know about NetNumber and your solutions the solutions that you provide well great question so a lot of people may know us primarily as the largest distributor of number intelligence data for the United States we run registries in the United States for messaging but the other thing is in Europe we have many customers actually throughout the globe we've got endpoints to deliver number intelligence to or number portability other registry data we've got many clients here throughout the world and in Europe particularly we've got teams here and customers that we want to meet with and again reconnect with them share some of the solutions we have already for delivering number intelligence and then also looking for other ways we can help them as your things get more complicated for messaging and voice and other data solutions well and speaking of complications I know one of the growing concerns for data services is of course security and fraud prevention can you talk about what you're doing to to help counter that well yeah it's a great question because one of the things we have is the largest number inventory we've got 2.4 billion numbers identified throughout the world then number 24 years ago when we started mapped out all the regulated service providers close to 10,000 of them throughout the world and then there are other non-regulated providers and either over the top service providers for messaging and voice such as Google and others so we have the information that they need to use those unique attributes to better route voice messaging and identify other attributes of information around those numbers so some of those applications now are shaken so you can cut down a robocalls there is a move by many of the mobile network operators to identify spam messaging coming onto the network so they can make sure they've got enough network resource for their clients and maintain the quality of service so for those two things we have attributes that can help for instance we have a stir shaking solution we're a certified provider in the United States and in Canada deliver more quality phone calls and also in messaging space we have A to P attributes that we link to telephone numbers so mobile network operators can better understand which messaging they want to come into their network which ones they want to knock out for spam so they can give their customers a better service experience a lot a lot that you have to offer in terms of this in really important issue that a lot of people are facing and trying to prevent issues with so thanks for the update on that but I also want to ask you you know we sort of talked about the exciting things that have happened so far in 2022 but as you look ahead you know as we wind down this year 2022 and look to 2023 and beyond what are some of the things that you're you're most excited about well I think what we're most excited about is the opportunity to work with more people expand our existing services in the mobile fixed line messaging space for service providers but also looking at the new solutions so we just talked about security how we could do better for voice calls messaging but there are other unique service attributes we have that can help prevent fraud fintech solutions that can power a difficult insights to help reduce fraud from banking and other things and then also looking and understanding new solutions that customers are looking to optimize their businesses you know there's a telecom information is bolted on to a lot of things throughout the world it's a great index that can be used to provide other information by in some countries the telephone number is basically used as their social security number so there are a lot of things that we can help expand not only the message routing and other things done in the past but to improve security and give better experiences and optimize businesses and and their customers experience so there's a lot for people I think to talk to you about I think a lot that you can offer to the industry and all of the the companies that are here you know people that may be tuning in live to this event or watching it after and and wanting to connect with you how can they find you sure uh they can reach out to netnumber.com net and umbeor.com reach out to us and one of our sales folks or account management team will reach back and John thank you so much for joining us today it's been a pleasure chatting with you we'll see you around the week this week I'm sure a lot it's going to be a busy week but you know thank you again and thank you for tuning in to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA TV and we look forward to being back online in just a few minutes with our next live streaming guest until then happy networking big event for the community it's a great networking framework for all of us and I extremely appreciate the opportunity to have this whole colleagues and partners and stakeholders in the community together and this year we have identified more than ever how important also in-person meetings are after being locked down for almost two years we're at the beginning of a new decade if it comes to the industry development and exciting times are ahead of us having the digital transformation everywhere for everyone and everybody this will change our industry as well we're happy to be here at Capacity Europe to be again here and meet the industry and we are going every year because for us it's really big events meeting all of our partners across the carrier industry across other industry as well technological partners meeting here and one when you which helps us very much to bring all the energy together to face all the challenges and to face all the business opportunities that the market is bringing to us Creative Leader to be part of Capacity Europe 2021 a true partner of choice and looking forward for the future success it's to me customers, partners and essentially connect with the ecosystem if we're not all successful no one is I think we'll increase the way we co-create together I think the importance of igniting end-user be it consumer or enterprise experience has become more important and I think ultimately because we need to propel more growth so I'll see you at Capacity 2022 and see you at Capacity Europe 2022 we'll see you at Capacity Europe 2022 see you at Capacity Europe 2022 I think there are an awful lot of events on the calendar it's a bit of a jamboree but I think the global carrier awards stand out the capacity events stand out I'm looking forward to network because a lot of people know what's going on around now and then the rest of the world from partners from other operators from our customers tonight this is the place to be in telecoms this evening we'll recognize the best global and regional carriers projects marketing and sales teams campaigns disruptors and innovations you know really genuinely pretty product this one a new award category and I think it's brilliant for you and I'm really really happy for you very honored and delighted to be part of this this great group of companies and we want to win some more so congratulations to everyone I hope you had a wonderful evening thank you Welcome to Capacity Europe's 2022 pre-event coverage we are looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on the 18th to the 24th of October at the Intercontinental London DO2 and also on the SWAT Carder app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into industry views but also bring out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part this year's event here in five minutes with I have Eric Seavis president global wholesale of Verizon Partner Solutions Eric first of all great to have you involved and great to have you speaking at this year's event ready for a quick five five minute with informal interview absolutely looking forward to it and glad to participate and support the Capacity Europe event you know Verizon we like to show up each year and support the event so glad to do this for you great great to have you in the room as well we're looking forward to October all right let's start the clock so Eric first of all tell me the cover and state of play situation in global telecoms I believe that you know enterprises around the world are kind of looking for what we call global simple and secure solutions at the end of the day and we see this as an incredible opportunity for global telecom providers in the industry if we look at our assets regardless of what's going on in kind of the economic and geopolitical vein this is just a great opportunity for us once again to deliver things into the business into the industry so global simple secure that's the way the solutions need to go whether it's network whether it's above the network wire line and wireless services it's staff and where would you say your organization is positioned at the moment I mean we're seeing these shifts obviously with post COVID take place but also digital transformation really kind of gathering momentum within the industry but also there's also a terrible and economic and inflationary climate as well where do you where do you see your organization's position you know if I look at my Verizon partner solutions global wholesale team we feel we're kind of very excited about the assets that we have once again if we look at what we've done we spent over 120 billion dollars getting our spectrum with c-band a millimeter wave and once again we got vast fiber deployments across the footprint right now so very strategic time for us whether it's wire line wireless what are we doing from ethernet to wave to internet services even what I'm doing above the network with blue jeans conferencing or security services or what I really love is the passion we have in the wireless area today with wireless backup or the internet of things or our own fixed wireless access services that we're doing on LTE business internet so once again we think we're very well positioned in the industry we've made the investments and once again we want to help our customers that have big band with requirements certainly and you're very much a familiar face within the industry circles for capacity events how enjoyable is it working in this industry competitive when you first entered it okay I think you're calling out the fact that I've been doing this for 36 years yeah started back in 1986 and we were doing a lot of dial tone dial tone dial tone but I will tell you the industry has just transformed tremendously so from everything we're doing from our digital customer experience transformation where ease of business is kind of the forefront of what we do at APIs candidly what we're doing across the board when we look at new products and services in the industry you know the days of just dial tone when today you know as I said earlier I'm selling ethernet services I'm selling wave services we're selling internet services but above that we're adding things and partnerships or what we do in the cloud environment what we're doing with the internet of things how do we continue to leverage our wireless assets as we look at you know fixed wireless access and LTE business internet in the industry once again I think it's just a tremendous time not just selling one or two products of services but a lot of products and services that deal with our basic telecom needs so no longer just your basic telco but this is clearly a technology evolution and we're stepping up to it whether it's things we do organically or partnerships that we do in organically to make certain that we can meet the communications need of the industry now we've got 90 seconds left so I'll have a some quickfire kind of questions here you'll be dressing the talent gap in this year's events as well what is the state of play are we in good shape yeah we feel we're in good shape though our industry just like every industry I think during this period of time once again we're trying to show folks that it's attracted to be in the STEM environment with science and technology and engineering and mathematics and so once again even with the GLF the global leaders forum we're working on diversity inclusion and belonging and one of those initiatives is making sure we're bringing new talent forward and making sure that there are more opportunities with gender and balance ethnicity and making certain that we have a feeder pool that's ready to take on this telecom industry going forward so once again I feel good about the investments the training and the partnership we're doing with colleges and universities to bring even more talent into the fold now you lead your own organization Eric as well which I'm sure has its own pressures and strains I mean did you ever step back and wonder you know and how you optimize your own health and wellbeing absolutely step back I think it's important to sharpen the saw as we say take some time off reflect build back that strength and energy and come back even sharper than the day you left and so you know whether I'm taking vacations you know two-time year with my wife or I take the family on vacations or we attend events you know whether it's music events etc just taking that time to reflect and enjoy and be thankful for all the blessings well I think that's time's up there but just one final kind of like quirky question for our viewers that probably have probably yet to see you in person for the very first time at capacity media related events but perhaps give our viewers one fun fact that they don't already know oh fun fact let's see I just went to the Elton John farewell tour concert at MetLife Stadium in New York that was pretty cool and I like cars and clothes so I don't hold that three fun facts for you but hopefully that helps that was a good lifestyle really I was enjoying it as well yeah well what a great artist as well so I'm quite envious that you've got to got the chance to go and see him live as well thanks ever so much there Eric that was great now Eric will be speaking at capacity Europe it's October in London details of this session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now welcome to capacity Europe's 2022 pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly awaited blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London the 02 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry reviews also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this year's event here in five minutes with I had Angela Capone Vice President Global Marketing at Edge Connects Angela how are you first of all and it's great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick five minute Q&A yeah thank you for inviting me definitely okay well so certainly let's so let's start the clock right now so in our five minute Q&A here we go tell me the state of play in global telecoms yeah I mean global telecoms isn't just 5G and gigabot gigabit telecoms anymore it's the wider challenges of country regulations trust from our customers climate economic growth the worrying inflation news that we're seeing and where to build next so the balance is getting increasingly difficult with large cloud services requiring ever bigger capacity while also lowering overall emissions across SI supply chains so closer collaboration among operators clients industry bodies government agencies will be needed to be at the forefront of any future expansion and where do you see your organization position at the moment obviously it's in a post-COVID climate it's fundamentally changed yeah I mean when COVID hit EdgeConnex was well positioned actually to not miss a beat we were all remote workers for years and the data centers had the ability to remote operate through our EdgeOS software systems so when it hit we kind of didn't really we felt the impact from a world perspective but we didn't actually from an operational side we just continued on it was incredible so to continue with the drivers like digital transformation without the impact of COVID was a testament to our strategy to set way before it was struck and we were able to continue a pace for large enterprises as we were able to work with their IT providers to offer solutions in markets large and small and as the Edge continues to develop globally we will continue to plan and supply land and power serving the largest global companies worldwide when they need it where they need it so it's the data center industry in your point of view first of all are you enjoying it and second of all in terms of the people landscape is it suffering from a lack of diversity and it's in the workforce and if so why I mean yeah I mean when I talk to people about the data center industry you kind of get that blank look on their face so it's not incredibly exciting but what I've seen over the last 10 years of working at EdgeConnex is the talent that is actually coming through difficult but it is coming through and the diversity of the talent is what I really enjoy and I'm loving seeing our employees join at a certain level 10 years on their running teams and their head of security and all of those different roles so we are lacking in diversity for sure but I believe it's not for not trying as a company we work really hard on different projects to attract talent from going out to universities talking to the STEM type community that probably don't think about data center as an engineering type of place to go and work but when you talk to them about what we're doing and what we're developing and actually what our customers customers are doing I mean I'm very privileged to be in a position where I can see Star Trek type futures coming in and when you talk to young people about you know the opportunity and how I mean this industry hasn't even slightly reached its dizzy heights when you talk to young people about what they want to do from an engineering perspective and you say look have you thought about the data center industry we need you it's incredible it's growing absolutely at the speed of rate all the operators will say that so it's game on to get that talent and nurture them and grow them into something fantastic in an industry that most people probably don't think about or understand certainly so just some quick find some questions here then just about you and your enjoyment for Europe what's the one thing that you're hoping to take away from the event we've got just over 30 seconds to go yeah people finally we're back in a room together I mean capacity Europe's always had a fantastic agenda of content you know right broad way across of I'm talking about the industry so I'm really looking forward to listening to that meeting our customers again face to face and yeah just being there in person yep and perhaps give our viewers one fun fact about you that they don't already know 10 seconds 10 seconds probably the bravest thing I've done in my life is uproot my entire family to the southwest where I knew absolutely no one so I have this really surreal world of data centers and traffic jams cows time is up thank you ever so much there that's yeah that's a fantastic perspective there to find out a little bit more about you and obviously obviously the themes that you really care about and yeah so you're going to talk about that a little bit more in at our event in October yeah not like I'm really looking forward to it yes so Angela yeah you'll be speaking in our data center session on at the talent in telecoms track details of this session walk here in the following closing messages right for now to capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to 20th at the intercontinental London DO2 and on the swap card app I'm David Tran the conference producer lead of this year's event and in the run up to the event we'll run a series of rather light hearted speaking interviews called five minutes with tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind the speakers that will be taking part in this event here in this year's five minutes with I have Sammy Slim CEO of telehealth France Sammy how are you first of all and great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a quick five minute Q&A absolutely thanks for having me so let's start the clock okay so Sammy tell me the state of play in the global telecoms market well we're seeing more of blurring boundaries between the tempo of the OTT infrastructure something that is reaching the industry and we are looking forward to a future right in so where would you say then your organisation is positioned at the moment as the industry is seeing these shifts like post-covid digital transformation current inflationary pressures well what is great about our industry is that all those prices are merely acceleration to the transformation to digital transformation however there are real risk especially related to energy problems in the energy shortage and the industry is looking forward to be protected that kind of problems and does the industry have a talent issue so how can it solve the problems well definitely yes as many industries and I think the problem should be solved in the future with what we are seeing now in terms of remote work and remote teams distributed teams around the globe because that actually brings the talent pool to a more global level and you'll be speaking in a subsea at data centre related session about interconnectivity between those two landscapes it must be an exciting industry to be a part of incredibly diverse and things seem to be moving along quite a relatively fast pace absolutely that's actually our main driver to the capacities here and we are very very excited to what kind of topic we share because the tenecom geography is changing thanks to the subsea and we are looking forward to see what are the future cities where the interconnection can happen and how can we help reshaping that as well now I wanted to tap into a little bit about you yourself as a person so Sammy what's your preferred method to connect with your fellow industry peers given how platforms like teams and zoom have transport liability and convenience and connecting with fellow professionals in the past two years in person or virtual in terms of day to day engagements a nice drink with a great view which I'm going to do I've got a lot of teams and visitors I like that but to be honest it's good for introduction but we're still human beings right so if you want to follow the leadership we need to be a person and I'm looking forward to that you're going to be there well yeah definitely it's a great segue there to capacity you to be there in person in adding to continental the O2 in London so what's the first thing what's the one thing that you are hoping to take away from being part of capacity Europe this year well I think that's the answer to those questions on how do we manage this blurring boundaries between different technical segments how do we manage the new Europe that we come how do we manage the new crisis and energy in Montana those are things that I am looking forward to discuss with my colleagues in the industry but again we have a chance to be able to see growing and that the world is immediately back especially with the crisis so it will be a thing that definitely and it is a huge event as well and taking place in the UK capital of London so tell me tell me about what you most love about London the location of the capacity Europe 2022 definitely the view there in O2 it's really great to know the people but I happen to we have a number of I would actually love being able to do it so yeah one of my definitely my favorite cities in New York and I'm saying that I'm from Paris plenty of competition between Paris and London there but too marvelous so European cities and really modern as well we've got 45 seconds to go so we've basically got a few quick wild questions here for you give our viewers one fact about you that they don't already know most people so I mean no in the industry I see you in France but tell you how it's France most people don't know that I'm actually not French I'm Tunisian and yeah when people yeah discover that is there a person away from this industry that inspires you the most well I would love to meet in person someday if I have the chance I ended up on the CEO of that's that's someone that reshaped the entire community as big as Microsoft and yeah that's the time's up so yeah that's that's our buzzer for that one as well so really great speaking to you Sammy there it's a very quick find to you you just realize how quickly five minutes goes up in the flash doesn't it but thanks so much that's been great thanks and then Sammy will be speaking at Capacity Europe this October in London details of the session will appear in the following closing messages bye for now welcome to Capacity Europe 2022's pre-event coverage we're looking forward to delivering this year's eagerly anticipated blended event on October the 18th to the 20th at the Intercontinental London DO2 and on the SWAT card app I'm David Tran conference producer lead of this year's event and in a run-up to the event we'll have a series of rather light-hearted speaking interviews called Five Minutes With tapping into their industry views but also bringing out the person behind us because that will be taking part in this year's event here in Five Minutes With I have Mateus Freeschrum the vice president and chief evangelist of Aurelian Mateus, how are you first of all and great to have you involved in our conference program for this year's event ready for a five minute quickfire Q&A I'm absolutely ready good to start Mateus so let's start the clock Mateus tell me the current state-of-play situation in global tempos I would say it's in a pretty good shape you know traffic is still growing post pandemic which is a good sign there are though some signs of costs going up because of some circumstances around the world but I would say the overall feeling in the industry is pretty good welcome to capacity Europe extra powered by JSA the live streaming newsroom for data center and telecom professionals I'm Barb Mitchell and joining me today is Michael Winterson managing director at Equinix so great to have you here we're here of course on the exhibit hall floor at capacity Europe at the intercontinental at the O2 in your hometown London and what's it like for you having all of these people finally back in Europe I think the biggest capacity Europe in history so Barb thanks this is like I don't know I haven't seen as many people in ages this is huge they're all behind us hundreds of us I am very surprised but frankly for me I feel like I got to learn how to go to trade shows again it's hard meeting the people drinking the drinks hobnobbing it's fun though busy right there's so many I mean so many we were we were saying there's a lot happening in general this week with all of the different activities and speaking sessions that are happening and of course people that you're probably seeing that you haven't seen for a long time but of course you were one of the speakers earlier today can you give us some highlights about what you spoke about so the first thing was it took me about 30 minutes to walk from my stand to the actual speaker slot because you're right you're bumping into people you haven't seen in ages there's a lot of you know hugging and saying what's up and how are the kids and all that but no the the actual conversation was about sustainability a couple of different data center operators in the same room and the issue here is is it serious and and what are we doing about it and why are there drivers and I can answer those questions if you want yeah well I mean that's thank you for that segue I was going to ask you what are some of your key priorities and some of the challenges that you're you're maybe facing right now yeah so one of the big points was one of the presenters was American and runs well runs data centers in America and we were talking about how even our global customers who operate in the U.S. and Europe have different expectations and predominately this is being driven by two things one that there is a can there is an actual conviction that green deal for Europe is real and two we're already seeing huge amounts of regulation coming in the market and these regulations are hitting us both regulations that are going to force our customers to ask us a lot of really difficult questions and regulations that are actually going to start asking us to report on what we do and how we do it in a sustainable manner so get ready it's happening and you know you mentioned sustainability it's such an important topic right now and I'm sure one of the pillars that you're focused on at Equinix what are some of the others what are your sort of if you think about your key strategic pillars going forward into 2023 what do you say you're most focused on yeah so some people who watch us in the press will have noticed in 2019 and 2020 we announced the acquisition of a company called packet and that became Equinix Metal and what that is is Equinix trying to automate the data center provide data center as a service and so that's another big project and I like work I work on that as business development for our company and one other thing I think that maybe we could talk about too is in terms of the virtualization of data centers and and I think you have some things that you've been working on on that front yeah so over the past a few weeks we made some announcement with with the orange business services who who are here they're a long-standing customer they have 60 points of presence with Equinix around the world but what is interesting is with the with the metal product or the virtualized data center we can now offer them the ability to deploy customer network functions on our metal service if they can't have it or don't have capacity and in a metro or they're not president picked a metro so we are winning some interesting business with new network operators and old network operators have been with us for ages but are looking for new ways to interact with us and so I think we'll be seeing you not only for the rest of this week but probably upcoming events and and for people that are watching this and and want to connect with you and learn more about Equinix maybe connect with you directly how can they reach you well this event's great so we've got here we have our you know a senior leader in our sales organization we have business development we probably got six or seven sales leaders all focusing on this in this market sector you know we number our meetings in the hundreds of this at these kinds of events we also participate in other large global networking events and god if one of if you're in the telecommunications market one of our sales guys aren't calling you or sales ladies we should be ashamed of ourselves so I don't know that should be plenty of ways to reach us thank you so much you know it's been such a great pleasure speaking with you today is there anything else you want to share before we before we you know free you to your the rest of the evening well the first thing is pleasure meeting you and we were chatting about Vancouver and America and Europe and no I think the ability to get back face to face with customers is so important because so much has changed during the pandemic not just around sustainability or virtualization but I just feel like there's this pent up energy for a new world order of the way people consume technology I can't even tell you what it's going to be but I think it's going to be fun to be at these meetings listening to speakers and and just talking to customers about where we're going next yeah I mean you're so right it's an exciting place to be an exciting point in time the right industry at the right time and and it's it's we're excited to to watch what what comes next with with Equinix so just on that point though you don't know about it yet Equinix just has its annual global leadership all of us all of us go to the headquarters we drink the Kool-Aid but we look at the future and actually the reality of what I'm saying about where we're going it's so clear inside of the entire leadership the way the way our business is like what got us here won't get us there is just it's an absolute and so honestly I'm excited about it it's it's rejuvenated myself after 22 years in the business so I'm looking forward to seeing where we go next thank you so much Michael for joining us it's it's been an honor it's been a pleasure to chat with you and thank you all of you for tuning in to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA and we look forward to seeing you for the rest of the week and then don't forget to stay tuned in we'll be coming back to you shortly with with more live interviews until then happy networking so it's a big event for the community it's a great networking framework for all of us and I extremely appreciate the opportunity to have this whole colleagues and partners and stakeholders in the community together and this year we have identified more than ever how important also in-person meetings are after being locked down for almost two years we are at the beginning of a new decade if it comes to the industry development and exciting times ahead of us having the digital transformation everywhere for everyone and everybody this will change our industry as well we're happy to be here in Capacity Europe to be again here and meet the industry and we are going every year because for us it's really big event meeting all of our partners across the carrier industry for us other industry as well technological partners meeting here and one when you which helps us very much to bring all the energy together to face all the challenges and to face all the business opportunities that the market is bringing to us creative ledger to be part of Capacity Europe 2021 a true partner of choice and looking forward for the future success fantastic place to meet customers partners and essentially connect with the ecosystem if we're not all successful no one is I think we'll increase the way we co-create together I think the importance of igniting end user be it consumer or enterprise experience has become more important and I think ultimately because we need to propel more growth so I'll see you at Capacity 2022 and see you at Capacity Europe 2022 we'll see you at Capacity Europe 2022 see you at Capacity Europe 2022 it's annual global carrier awards I think there are an awful lot of events on the calendar it's a bit of a jamboree but I think the global carry awards stand out the capacity events stand out I'm looking forward to network because a lot of people know what's going on around and the rest of the world from partners from other operators from our customers tonight this is the place to be in telecoms we'll recognise the best global and regional carriers projects marketing and sales teams campaigns disruptors and innovations you know really genuinely pretty products a new award category and I think it was brilliant for you and I'm really really happy for you very honoured and proud to be part of this this great group of companies and we want to mend some more so congratulations to everyone I hope you had a wonderful evening thank you welcome to Capacity Europe 2022 pre-event coverage we are looking forward to delivering this year's equally anticipated blended event on the 18th to 24th October at the Intercontinental London DO2 and also on the SWATCARD app I'm David Tran, conference welcome to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA the live streaming newsroom for telecom and data centre professionals I'm Bart Mitchell coming to you today live from Capacity Europe and joining me today is Michael Wheeler EVP and head of global network at NTT Michael thank you it was a lot of words thank you so much thanks for having me yeah so it's great to be back you've come here all the way from Seattle Washington it's great to have you here I mean I'm actually also from the West Coast it's great for both of us to be here but how are you finding it so far is it good to be back at the event yeah it's great to be back I think that ITW really in the summer was kind of the first for a really seeing things return to kind of normal and I think this event kind of really shows that stuff in the case so I mean I think I heard the attendance is over 2500 which is fantastic for capacity it's a great event and we have a lot of our team here and so we're seeing the same thing from our typical customer and partner conversations we're having even this first day so yeah it's really great to be back and great to see everybody in person not just on a team's Zoom call yeah I mean I've been hearing that consistently right that it's just you cannot replace being in person with folks and it's a busy week you said over 2500 people I think I've heard the biggest event capacity Europe event to date and we can feel it right and I'm sure you have a busy week you guys are hosting the reception this evening we're looking forward to that just coming up shortly here but what are you most excited about what's going to fill your week I mean really a series of different kinds of meetings so actually it started for me yesterday the global leaders forum was yesterday all day so we had meetings for that group and we meet three times a year that set of folks and then there's a lot of other activities going on through the course of the year but that was yesterday today and tomorrow we're here our office actually our world headquarters are here in London and so I'll be meeting there actually later in the week as well so it's not just capacity it's kind of a bunch of things but yeah I mean we mostly focus on meetings with customers as well as meetings with partners and you know people that we work with and that provide services to us as part of that kind of the overall ecosystem that we're in and so you know in your role what are you most focused on what are you sort of thinking about these days and sort of what are your priorities going forward I think in general terms we you know continue to look at the growth of the business and from an internet capacity perspective that's not something that's going away anytime soon people and businesses continue to want to use it more and more for all kinds of applications and so it's just kind of our job to make sure we're preparing you know that network and that capacity for their use in the future location-wise it's always a part of the conversations here is where are the next places we should go what are the next kind of opportunities that we need to need to be prepared to move into and that's you know all part of these discussions but in general terms for the business that's true and so we're here it's it's um October right it's October I think time's a bit of a vortex these days but yeah I'm pretty sure it's October we're rounding out 2022 as you start to look forward to 2023 you know do you have if you start to sort of build your plan for next year and of course right in the years ahead what are what are you focused on I think for us and our annual year is slightly off off-center it's we actually go from April through March so we're basically just beginning our budgeting process in the next month or so but as we do that we look at those same kinds of things you know where are we going to be growing from a physical footprint perspective and then from capabilities perspective that's all part of that process that that you go through as a budgeting exercise but I think specifically you know some of the things that are driving us are the move from 100 gig to 400 gig for connections for customers across the network and then you know probably not as glamorous everything but really is continuing to address some of the challenges around network security so distributed denial of service attacks some of the carpet bombing stuff that's been happening lately in that area are you know ongoing challenges and again you know it's something that really will never go away I mean no matter what we do I don't think I mean just being pragmatic about it but I think that that's part of what we have to build into our plans as well as to how do we continue to kind of be as as proactive of those kinds of and be prepared probably is the best way to say it for those types of issues Yeah and interesting as I hear you speak I mean so many of the themes that you're talking about you know come through and so many of the conversations that that we've been having this week and I'm curious this is a bit of a like a challenge question here for you but but yeah bonus points for this one but if you could pick sort of the one thing that you're most commonly hearing across the industry as as a just a really the concern or a need what would you say that was I guess in the conversations that we're having the industry is broader than just what our business does but it would be about network security I think that's some of the area that has the most risk associated to it it can negatively impact our our network but also the experience what our customers have and that's always going to be top of mind in regards to kind of focus and attention so you know growth is very important and all businesses want to grow and want to expand but from a risk point of view you know there you may miss out on a growth opportunity but something that negatively affects your network or one of your downstream customers networks is much more impactful in that way so that's a fairly significant key subject to talk about not only this event but in general terms yeah great well thank you I appreciate your insights and so and so for the folks that are tuning in either live or or you know seeing you around the halls here at Capacity Europe where can they find you how can they connect so we have we have meeting rooms kind of in a couple spots throughout the throughout the hotel and then we also have a stand here in the middle of the conference kind of exhibit section so any of those places would be great and obviously online and all those places as well so thank you so much thank you Michael for joining us and thank you viewers for tuning in to Capacity Europe Extra powered by JSA that's a wrap today for our live interviews but we'll be back again tomorrow and so until then enjoy your evening and we'll see you tomorrow for more Capacity Europe Extra live interviews until then