 Welcome to JSA TV and JSA Podcasts, the newsroom for telecom and data center professionals. I'm Jean-Marc Lema and I'm joining today by Bairro Luigis, CEO of Belgium company Kevlinks. And Bairro, welcome to JSA TV. We haven't really spoken much in the past, basically to connect with you. I mean, let's jump right in. You operate the data center in Belgium, a market which is basically the heart of Europe in this day and age. Tell us about the market dynamics in Belgium. Yeah, well, there's a lot to tell about the market dynamics and Charles, thanks so much for having us and of course me in particular. Belgium is, let's say, a very constrained market. It's right in the middle in the flat and it's still an underserved market. Nowadays, you see it becomes more and more on the radar of, let's say, both the data center operators like ourselves with a focus on more prime locations, creating a lot of faiths at the hubs. And also the hyperscalers that we'll see an agile market with a lot of government being present in Belgium as a country specifically and more over Brussels as a city with the likes of a European Union and a NATO that set a standard for nowadays European Union, few on the market. If you had to simplify it in a way, who would you say are the main drivers for the man in terms of customers who are based in Brussels? Is it government, financial services? Because I mean government is what everyone thinks of when we talk about Brussels. I can imagine, but of course there's far more than just government. There's a big enterprise scene as well. Yeah, absolutely with a lot of rules of course that they come up with, but it's a side of that. The financial market is very big in Brussels. It's a very key location. It's a combination of, well, a mainland headquarters being based over there and think the likes of a B&B, an IG bank, a Belgium, very good locations. Another market that's very underestimated in Belgium is the pharma market. It's especially in the COVID pandemic period that we had. People were confronted with a lot of nasty things and then there were pioneers on the vaccination program. Think of a Johnson and Johnson who have a key location in Belgium. Yeah, I mean it's a super important industry, the pharma and the life sciences, especially which has been driving a lot of business to data centers in the past three to four years. I think you're right. It has gone a little bit unnoticed by a lot of people and we are seeing a lot of things and the covers in the US happening in the life science data center space. And I think there's probably a lot happening in Europe as well that we don't even know about. So that's a very good point that you raise. But beyond Brussels and Belgium, I saw on your website, you're also in Madrid or you're going to be in Madrid and in Vienna. So that's two very interesting markets. I mean Vienna is interesting because it used to be the getaway from Western Europe into Eastern Europe and into Russia. Madrid is the up and coming market that everyone is talking about. They might overtake Paris at some point. Give us your skill of what's happening in those two capital cities. Good question. It's a big question as well because it's very long. I like people talking. Well, it's part of our strategy and I can tell a lot about our strategy if that's a wise decision. I'm not sure being this on social media, but we are focusing on growth markets, on emerging markets and nowadays it's really a standard. You also have people talking about edge and with us it's really a combination of things. So we are a data center service provider. We develop and operate the data centers and we do this for complies with the standards of basically all segments and we just want to service them in markets that are not on the FLABD notification. That's how I see it. Okay. If we look into the next 12 months, where do you want Kevlings to be by September, October 2023? What do you expect to have? I know you can't talk too much about it these days. There'll be news coming up, but there will be news coming up exclusively with you. So thanks for asking. Now it's a very exciting time and we just sincerely hope that the plans that we wish to execute it, that will be executed. We have an exciting partner that is helping us in expanding the data center organization that we have. We have a great team and we believe that the plans that we have that we can execute with them collectively and bear in mind we're always looking for new people. Okay. Well that's a good shout out to the industry. I mean there's a lot of movement around staff and resources in Europe at the moment with so many projects happening. So actually what's your view of the talent gap then? Now that you brought it up, is it easy for you to find the right people to work for you or you struggle sometimes with finding the right talent? Yeah, I think for a number of years finding the right technical people is already a big issue and therefore there are great initiatives like the Dutch data center association is doing in the Netherlands, helping and educating people and creating a sort of a university where because the data center industry is still very much unaware with a lot of kids on the radar and one of the things that we want to do in the Brussels campus for instance is to connect with schools and make people more aware of you know what is a data center, what does it mean for society and can this be your future to be part of this? I think in general you know we are facing not only in Europe but also in the US globally basically a lot of lack of people and this goes of course farther than just technical but what I strongly believe in and be as a company is just you got to create the right team because not one person only can do this by himself or herself and you got to do this together and I think we're dealing quite well with that. I face your difficulties but in general yeah but I think you're absolutely right and it is all about teamwork really and creating a good corporate culture and environment for people to thrive and progress and learn as well so I'm very curious to see how your website is going to change over the next few months and the logos and the dots on the map they're going to pop up everywhere. They're going to do that for sure in hours. So another very interesting thing that you've been involved with was the launch of the Belgium Digital Infrastructure Association. I mean we've got associations across Europe but Belgium was lacking one so tell us what's the idea behind this association and what's your role and your objectives. Yeah I'm not sure thanks it's you know I'm born and raised in Amsterdam as I've told you before you know in offline discussion and the thing is we have a very very solid association over here and of course for a sophisticated market there with a Dutch data center association and a couple of years ago I started conversations with Stein Grove and the founder of that idea and I said you know when we're a bit sure that you know we've got to look at Belgium also because that really lacks a good organization that promotes the digital infrastructure and data center space and well we find some other parties that said you know this is of interest to me and I think of a data center united so I'm a great player great guy also very smart thinking entrepreneurial wise and want the best for the data center ecosystem and we just let's say had a number of iterations conversations on what would the best way to proceed on this and then in the end it's just a matter of execution it's the same with everything in life just doing and I think really you know if you compare it to the existing initiatives in Belgium and you can think of an agoria that's more focused on well there's more link with government and that's not really let's say an organization that really promotes or sort of takes care of the of the data center space and this is basically what the Belgium Digital Infrastructure Association is doing you know it's just it's a great initiative and hopefully a lot of people will will become a member or a supporter and will follow us it's very interesting because I mean again this is a sector that keeps changing and transforming and metatforming into something new and there's so many conversations beyond the expansion there's also the adaptation to the times that we live in so sustainability diversity and I think this is the kind of organizations that will kind of drive and push the conversation forward and Baro if people want to find out more about Kev links or the Belgium Digital Infrastructure Association where can they go to or who can they reach out to yeah of course it's easy just go to the website kevlinks.com or pdia.pe that's the easiest way yeah you see my face of course you will find me on linkedin happy to happy to respond in any manner and and to help people and you know the mission behind both Kev links and and and bdia is is really about you know bringing a digitalization further ahead in these underserved and growth markets that I pointed out earlier before and yeah just you know happy to help you if you're looking at this market and can be supplied and everything just bring the ecosystem together of course and those markets are super interesting tier two and tier three markets across Europe because there's so many I mean across the world there's loads of them but even across Europe there's a lot a lot of opportunities out there and it'd be interesting to see how all these cities and known cities come up in the future not just with Kev links but like as an as an industry because I think there will be a good contribution to society overall but Baro thank you so much for your time sure and thank you our viewers for tuning in to JSA TV and JSA podcasts and don't forget to check our social channels for more content until next time happy networking