Food for Thought from Our 2022 ICT Visionaries

"By taking the lead in introducing next-generation routing silicon, open optics, and open line systems, we found ways to reduce power consumption of 80-90% per bit with 80% success within our IP domain transition. We have set an ambitious migration plan that will retire 8 different platforms by 2025." Johan Ottosson, Vice President Strategy, Arelion

Topic: The Great Resignation and 5G Labor Needs

"The labor elasticity of developers coding in common "modules" and "platforms" fundamentally is becoming a double-edged sword. It will be critical to establish robust and ongoing training, pipelines into the colleges/universities, and public policy initiatives that incentivize skills pivots to maintain and grow the labor pipeline." Brooks Fitzsimmons, Assistant Vice President, Transportation, AT&T Technology Services

Topic: Fiber Frenzy

"Operators will need to move quickly to hire or contract personnel and work with them to provide the training necessary to perform efficiently. But the days of lengthy training periods over a diverse collection of products and processes are gone. Focused training on specific materials and related processes needs to be developed." Kevin Tusing, Application Engineer, Clearfield

Topic: Earth-Friendly Network

"Many of us were taught an important principal by our parents at an early age: turn the lights off when you leave the room. Our approach is no different in that all our compute equipment, when not in use by our customers, is fully powered down until requested. This adds time to the delivery for compute resources as the power-on checks need to occur before we can deliver to our customers." Ryan Korte, Senior Director, Edge Computing, Lumen

Topic: Smart Cities and Communications Service Providers/Telecom Providers

"Transforming communities does not come without disruption and coordination. Many local jurisdictions do not have staff to handle permitting, locating, and inspection tasks in support of builds thus slowing progress. While our goal is not to build entire smart networks, we often forge strategic partnerships with local communities, helping each other build networks in support of respective goals." Wade Soczka, Director of Network Construction, TDS Telecom

Topic: The Satellite Elephant in the Room

"Satellite services still rely on telcos for ground stations and transport, and operators regularly face barriers to market entry. These issues are often best addressed through mutually beneficial partnerships with telcos. Regardless of which technology is delivered to the end user, there will always be a need for collaboration. Embracing this reality rather than fighting it is the more logical path to long-term success." Noah Drake, VP, Customer Solutions and Architecture, Americas, Telstra

Topic: Earth-Friendly Network

"Our focus is on renewable energy, energy efficiency, green buildings, sustainable water management, and biodiversity and conservation designed to positively impact the environment and advance U.N. Sustainable Development Goals. As of September 2021, Verizon settled our third green bond of $1 billion. In the span of 2 years, Verizon has become one of the leading corporate buyers of renewable energy in the US." Mary Nolan, Executive Director – Network Assurance, Verizon

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