Connected Britain returned to London’s ExCeL in mid-September and the busy two-day event brought the UK’s connectivity leaders together to reflect on public and private sector progress towards a gigabit future.
The keynote programme opened with individual interviews and presentations followed by a panel debate. Marc Allera, CEO, EE and consumer division, BT Group, shared his thoughts on how to connect the nation to the future.
He highlighted the company’s recent 5G standalone launch in 15 cities, as well as the beginning of the wave of AI applications and services.
Then Paul Alexander, head of cloud infrastructure business, Europe, Nokia, Julian David, chief executive officer, techUK, Iain Milligan, chief network officer, Three UK, Keri Gilder, CEO, Colt Technology Services came together for a panel discussion looking at how to secure the UK’s position as a global tech leader.
The new government was a hot topic of conversation, with agreement that the current regulatory environment is largely facilitating competition and progress.
Later in the morning, Strategic Imperatives led a discussion around the future of wholesale in the UK fibre market alongside PXC and Netomnia.
Donal Hanrahan, director of strategy, Strategic Imperatives, explored how channel companies can reduce risk in the face of consolidation by finding the right partners, with Neil Wilson, chief product and marketing officer at PXC, and Jeremy Chelot, CEO, Netomnia and Brsk, sharing their thoughts.Strategic Imperatives’ Fibre Café platform uses an open API that enables fibre and service providers to easily and cost-effectively integrate and collaborate.
PXC and Netomnia/Brsk both work with Strategic Imperatives to integrate their services.Wilson discussed a proposed agreement between PXC and Netomnia/Brsk, which would see the latter company onboarding customers through the PXC platform. At the time of publication, discussions on the proposed agreement between the three companies were at an advanced stage.
Wilson explained that the company is working to integrate altnets so the company’s wholesale partners can get “all of the solutions they need, regardless of the geographic area”.
He added, “The partnership that we’ve had with Strategic Imperatives for a number of years [is helping to solve the]... challenge of bringing different networks and different suppliers together in one homogenous way that is easy for our partners to consume. We’ve got a passion for standardisation, and [Strategic Imperatives] has always helped us do that.
“We’ve got some breaking news that PXC is entering into a partnership with Netomnia to bring their products and services through to our wholesale customers.” Partnerships like this, Wilson explained, means channel companies can have access to the right infrastructure without needing to enter into a multitude of new partnerships.
Channel focus
There was more channel-relevant content on day two, with a panel discussion on how the channel is evolving its commercial strategy.
Ian Newbury, head of business product strategy at CityFibre, moderated the panel featuring Dave Ferry, sales director at ITS, Paul Anslow, CEO of Triangle Networks, Magnus Wright, head of sales at Jola, Will McKay, senior commercial manager at Vodafone, and Toby Shute, account director at FluidOne.
ITS’ Ferry highlighted the expertise channel companies can offer businesses looking for support in selecting, deploying and managing their technology investments. He said, “Small businesses are out there, looking for someone who can create a solution that meets their needs. It’s about giving a business what it needs to survive and thrive.”
Later in the day, a panel featuring UK Power Networks, WM5G, Gamma, and 2Connect Digital Solutions, discussed the industry preparations for the retirement of the PSTN.
Paul Wakefield, head of product management at Gamma, joked that he has been “banging the ISDN is dead drum” for a decade. He emphasised the difficult situation whereby the industry is prepared and ready to play its role, but it is facing confusion, low awareness and apathy when trying to work with businesses to migrate them away from ageing networks.
Gamma has joined the Comms Business Fit To Switch campaign and Wakefield said this is helping add weight to industry efforts. But more fuel is needed. Wakefield said, “This is a government problem. When you think of the digital TV switchover, there was a big above the line campaign. This isn’t just business critical; it is life critical. With telecare services [not working], already people have lost their lives. And government – whether it likes it or not – will be held to account at some point.”
Time for connections
The overriding message from all participants was the shift towards meaningful customer connections. Premises passed figures were not even mentioned as infrastructure and network providers accepted the march towards consolidation will not be kind to networks without the connections to back up their footprints.
Elsewhere, Chris Bryant, the minister for data protection and telecoms, addressed the industry in a speech. He said, “We know that investment needs to be driven by competition and we recognise the challenging investment climate against an international background, so we want to support industry to invest - through a stable fiscal framework and the right regulatory framework.”
Bryant said the government wants to make “timely and evidence-based decisions”, with a focus on the rollout of gigabit-capable networks, the retirement of legacy networks, and tackling digital poverty and coverage gaps.On the retirement of legacy networks, Bryant emphasised “government must and will do its part here”.
We’ll keep an eye on that in the months ahead.
This article was included in our October 2024 print issue. You can read the magazine in full here.