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Insightful audio from the global tech advisory firm.
(upbeat music)
- Hello, and welcome to the IoT Chat
where we explore the
latest technology trends
and innovations.
I'm your host, Christina Cardoza,
Editorial Director of insight.tech.
And today we're going to be
looking at the network landscape
with Ian Fogg from CCS Insight
and Wei Yeang Toh from Intel.
But as always, before we get started,
let's get to know our guests a bit more.
Wei, I'll start with you.
What can you tell us about
what you do at Intel?
- Hey, glad to be here, so yeah,
thanks for all the intros.
Hey, my name is Wei Yeang.
I run the ecosystem developments
for 5G and edge computing for Intel.
Right, so this function
reside within the network
and edge solution groups.
The challenge is really
working with the ecosystem,
develop the market, make
sure that the long tiers
of the value chain will come
together, working together,
say, to accomplish a common
goal to address the challenges
that the end user is looking for.
And this cut across a
pretty broad market, right?
So we do need a broad set
of ecosystem partnership
to cultivate these solutions
driving towards a form of maturity,
and at the end of the day, to
solve our customer problem.
- Awesome, looking forward to getting
into that a little bit.
At insight.tech,
the articles that we're writing,
there's been this ongoing theme
we're seeing better together.
So excited to get into that
ecosystem a little bit more.
But before we get there, Ian,
welcome back to the podcast.
For anybody who hasn't
seen the recent episode
that Ian did on predictions
for the next year and beyond
for the network landscape,
which is, some of them,
we'll get into probably today.
But Ian, what can you
tell us about yourself?
- So I'm a research director
at a company called CCS Insights.
We are a advisory and research company.
We track global trends in networks,
and a whole lot of other areas,
included the circular economy on handsets,
in terms of media, in terms
of enterprise research.
My coverage area's around what
we call network innovation.
That's what the practice is that I lead.
So a lot of focus the moment
around things like virtualization,
the Open RAN developments,
private mobile networks.
There's obviously still interest in things
like non-terrestrial networks.
And one of the big trends at the moment is
around how AI is transforming
different parts of the network
and driving greater needs
to use cloud services
within the telecom operator.
- Yeah, AI everywhere seems
to be the big theme of 2024,
especially in the network space.
And since we're talking
about the network landscape
and the different trends and
predictions that we have,
the Mobile World Congress
event recently just ended,
and there was a lot of themes
going around private 5G,
A lot of network things
happening in that space.
So Wei, I want to start
the conversation there,
since both you and Ian were at the event.
What were you hearing on the show floor?
You know, what were the
trends and the themes
that you've observed?
And how do you think those
are going to push the industry
or this space forward over
the next couple of years?
- Yeah, certainly.
I'm pleased to see
how things evolve, in fact,
right, every year.
So yeah, having attended
Mobile World Congress
for close to about a decade by now,
things been progressing, right?
And there are few pretty
clear noticeable key themes
from this year, right?
That we have to discuss.
Number one, of course, right?
AI is everywhere, right?
Not only during the show floor,
but as well as in any of the
customer meetings, right?
Towards the end, there's always a question
from the customer,
tell me more about your AI strategy.
It's kind of funny, getting
ready for that question.
Oh, you're not going to ask for AI, right?
So yeah, AI is everywhere
and we see this is the beginning, right?
Ecosystem is exploring how to leverage AI
for different type of the
usage in the telco domain,
because we're talking
about Mobile World Congress
over here, right?
So we're talking about
things like leveraging AI
in the area, like the
network optimization,
predictive maintenance,
customer service, right?
And many more others,
the possible use cases.
And again, it is at the beginning
of looking at the form
of AI adoption journey
for the telco community, right?
But then there are few more topics
that both dimensions, right,
that surface up during these shows, right?
And again, it's a progressive update,
and telco API is another key topic
that surface up quite,
quite big highlights
during the show as well, right?
And this is all about,
hey, we all, as telco communities here
managed to accomplish quite
a lot in 5G deployment,
and then what next, right?
And it's really about, hey,
CapEx already invested in,
how do we speed up
authority and monetization,
through edge application,
and therefore telco API
brings a set of the standardization,
if you will, right?
And helping the community
to look at how to capitalize
any form of the emerging opportunity
across multiple industry.
We really talk about cross
vertical industry over here,
and telco API will opening up
a new era of how connectivity,
how edge computing come together
and able to create a form
of revenue generation
not only for telco, but at the same time
for the edge and verticals
ecosystem partner
come together to utilize
the API for a better
services creation, right?
Better customer experience, so on.
And then the third thing
I want to mention real quick is
the entire software
defined network transition
is carry on, right?
And we see vRAN as virtual
RAN, vRAN, Open RAN
as a continuously as
the next major milestone
to go and accomplish, right?
We have done network
function virtualization
for call networks, for OSS/BSS,
and so on, journey continue.
And vRAN continue to make progress.
And we see how much that we manage
to accomplish it together,
stay up to date right now
with our partners and telco operators,
and the commitments remain there, right?
To modernize the infrastructure, right,
to software define the network infra.
And through that, we're able to unlock
the infrastructure constraint,
and get into a truly cloud
native in the future.
And AI will be there meeting
at the junction, right?
To unlock the futures capability.
And then lastly is
I'm excited about how
the partners talking more
about collaboration, right?
It's all about synergizing the ecosystem
as a catalyst, right?
To drive innovation and grow, right?
And this is a very clear path
always to accomplish success
because in this world right now,
when we bring 5G edge computing AI.
It is like cross three domain, right?
And we live through the first,
I shouldn't say first,
we live through the past
AI transformation for NFV,
and that involved cloud
layer, IT layer, and so on.
And now we're getting
into more complex, right?
IT, CT, OT, AI, right?
All the cross domain.
And this will require
very strong ecosystem
collaboration to get that.
So we are excited.
We see company reaching out, right?
They would like to formulate
a strategy collaboration
towards a common goal, right?
And it's very healthy sign,
showing that the ecosystem partnership,
how it should look like,
towards a very clear, common goal.
- All exciting stuff.
One thing that I love
that you mentioned is
this isn't only happening
in the telco space.
This is impacting across
the main, across vertical,
across industry, and also
bringing improvements
to edge computing.
I think that's really important
that a lot of these advancements,
they're not happening in silos.
It's really having a
huge impact in all areas.
I want to go back to what
you were talking about
in the beginning of
your response about AI.
We opened up that AI is a
theme going on everywhere.
So I'm curious, how is AI
coming to the networking space?
We've written about on
insight.tech using AI
in manufacturing for
predictive maintenance,
like you mentioned.
But what are the advances that
AI can bring to networking?
And what did you see at the
show within the Intel ecosystem?
How were they showcasing some
of their AI advancements?
- Yeah, yeah.
The whole show is a big highlight again,
for sure is about AI, right?
And telco is at the different stage
of the AI adoption journey, right?
And what I meant is
depending at which stage of
this network modernization
and monetization as well, right?
The different telcos,
they're really at
different stage right now.
But regardless what we are going to see
across various of the
objective and intention, right?
It is still within the same objective
of how do we harvest the best
outcome of the AI, right?
And we are talking about
whether it's to orchestrate
the intelligent network,
or do we looking at gaining
more insight about the network?
Or creating a new business opportunity?
Right?
So most of the conversation
that we run into, right?
I could structure it down to probably
like threefold, right?
To make it slightly
simple to follow, right?
Telco, they're planning the
AI adoption journey, right?
And again, based on
maturity, based on the KPI,
they intend to accomplish,
because any form of investment,
it costs CapEx, it costs a OpEx.
And there isn't a lot of extra,
excess CapEx to spend, right?
With a lot of CapEx
already invested in 5G.
So therefore every single step
will have to be well planned, right?
With a KPI in mind,
and the maturity of the certain use cases
to get into production, right?
All those in mind, right?
So we see three major areas
that telco is looking at, right?
One across, the board we
see a lot of the discussion
and showcasing, right?
Around the inserting AI into
the network layer, right?
And we're talking about
use cases like vRAN, right?
With AI coming in, right?
To help things like power
managements, wind farming,
antenna selections, channel
estimation, and so on.
There are tons of other, say
opportunities could look at,
but it is about making vRAN, TCO,
look better, right?
Comparing with traditional RAN, right?
And Intel itself.
We do take this opportunity
to introduce the vRAN
toolkits, AI toolkits
that we've been working on
for really a while, right?
It's a great timing
that we release it, announce it, right?
It is again, all about helping partners
who already have the strong
Intel install base with
Intel vRAN platform,
and helping partners to unlock
the AI capability, right?
Within the same platforms
that they're already using, right?
Again, it's a journey, right?
So adopting AI, it will be
journey, don't rush it, right?
Look at the KPI and adopt
based on the maturity.
So we are doing that,
right? That's one, right?
Inserting the AI into the network layer.
And then we see the second
thing is GenAI, right?
Because a ChatGPT
and so on, GenAI become a big topic.
But for player that
working on AI for long,
AI is not all about GenAI, right?
GenAI is one form, right?
Yes.
It's very much needed technology, right?
It could do goodness.
But GenAI,
it's not the only part about AI, right?
GenAI will bring benefit
for different parts
of the telco network,
and if there's a set of KPI defined,
the implementation could be
done in more cost effective way
by enabling the GenAI capability
at the right location,
and with more sustainable way, right?
Because it will require
their power consumption
as well, right?
So we have a lot of conversation
with the customer around
how are you going to
activate GenAI, right?
Is it all about
consolidating, concentrating
the centralized computing for GenAI?
Or taking advantage of what have learned
through the OpenAI right now, right?
And able to select the
right language models,
and fit that into the
location to do the job
that require for what you need, right?
Rather than get into a
big centralized AI, right?
And get to know what to
get out of it, right?
It going to cost investment, right?
So GenAI, we have a lot
of discussion, right?
How to get there, don't rush, right?
How to get there, we
we're here to help you
to unlock the GenAI by phase, right?
And then third piece of it
is something not too new,
but get blend into
cross domain discussion,
which is this telco edge use case
that talk about API and so on early on.
Right?
As the deployment of the 5G
will need each use case
to come along, right?
We see telco is embracing themself
as a channel and as a platform, right?
Telco as a platform to
deliver the services, right?
To the vertical customer,
enterprise customer,
and all form of services
will require AI capability
as well, right?
And again, AI capability
will involve things like
computer vision, right?
We're talking about a lot of cameras,
installation out there,
and all the video feed coming back, right?
It will require form of
computer vision, right?
To do video analytics and so on.
And telco's they're data network pipe.
In fact is video is one of
the biggest traffic, right?
Occupying the pipe, right?
So telco have the right
infrastructure to go
and not only helping the deployment,
but able to look at way to monetize it,
through the data analytic and so on.
And then plus GenAI, right?
All in all become a more complete,
edge solution that require it, right?
So yeah, all those are
three big areas, right?
AI, inserting the networks,
introducing GenAI, right?
Within the telco different
location, new use cases, right?
With different form of AI,
computer visions, right?
machine learning, data analytics.
- Yeah. One thing that
I love that you said
was AI is a journey and not to rush
and that this is, you know,
still an early adoption
for the telco space.
I feel like we've been
talking about AI so much
and the benefits it can bring
in all of these different areas,
but it's still early on in some instances.
And not to rush that application of it,
to be really strategic about
how we want involve it.
Ian, last time we spoke,
we were talking about
how AI is coming to the network space,
maybe bringing some
self-healing capabilities
to the networks.
And you had some predictions there.
You mentioned in the
beginning that AI was actually
one of the big themes
you were seeing, too.
So since you were at the event,
curious from a research perspective
and from CCS Insight,
what themes and trends did you see you?
Do you want to touch on
anything that Wei mentioned,
or add anything to that?
- So yeah, I mean I think Open Gateway
was clearly one of the massive
initiatives of the show,
as Wei mentioned.
I mean that particularly
driven by the operator side.
I think there was vendor support, too,
but really the operators
were really the main drivers
of that side of things.
AI was everywhere at the show.
What struck me about many of the AI demos
and stands was that
not everything was new.
Like, a lot of the
stuff I'd seen last year
when there were demos on the stand,
but AI wasn't such a big thing.
They didn't have massive AI labels on it.
So for example, I saw a demo
of RAN optimization
orchestrating cells together
to reduce energy uses in the RAN,
but still maintaining a good
enough level of performance.
And that demo I saw last year.
This year I think it
was actually a launch,
and it had AI plastered
all over it in big letters,
but it was there last year, too.
So one of the things about AI is
although it's really high profile
at the show this year,
it's built on a kind of a
long runway of foundations.
This hasn't happened overnight,
it's just that this year
because of what's happened with ChatGPT,
and Anthropic, and Cohere, and Gemini
and all the rest of it,
it's a lot more high profile than it was
a year ago or two years ago.
There was also AI in different
parts of the network.
We toured the RAN optimization piece.
You know, you talk with the BSS/OSS people
and there are people there using AI tools
for revenue optimization,
and maximizing revenue generation.
There's stuff happening
in the operations domain.
There's stuff on the security domain.
One of the things that was
new this year was GenAI
as Wei mentioned.
And what is generative AI?
Well, descriptive API
categorizing information
like categorizing photos
has been around for years.
Generative AI doing things
like large language models,
creating photos, creating videos,
creating fluid text
interactive interfaces,
that is a much newer trend.
But where I saw the
GenAI models being used
was often to democratize knowledge.
So it wasn't doing ChatGPT
and training on the whole of the internet.
It was vendors taking GenAI models,
training them on very
defined data sets about say,
vendor tools or regulatory
requirements, or whatever.
And basically democratizing
the information
and making it something more accessible
to more people than an organization.
So that particularly,
that was happening in the security space,
but not just that.
It was also happening in
the operations domain.
It was happening in a whole
load of different areas.
And I think that was one of
the really interesting things
was seeing that use of GenAI tools
to democratize information.
I chaired a panel at the
SecCon event at MWC this year.
So SecCon is a security
event filled with CISOs.
And AI was the key theme
of that event within an event.
So it's an event within MWC.
And all the sessions were AI focused,
and what was becoming very apparent
was from a security point of view,
GenAI increases the
velocity, the sophistication,
and the quality of those security threats.
Why does that matter on what we're seeing
on private mobile networks and IoT?
Well, if you think about
what are the main benefits
of private mobile networks,
it is that security element around it.
That if you have a dedicated network,
you have total control
over how that behaves.
If you go to a hybrid model
where you're using the
macro network as well,
and you are tying that back
into the enterprise security,
again, a lot of that advantages.
It's not just about the performance
and the reliability
and the predictability.
It's about a security element, too.
And you can see with
those AI based threats,
security's becoming higher
profile in the market.
It's also one of the
other things we're seeing
in the private mobiles network space.
It isn't just the growth
of the hybrid model.
It's also the increasing use of 5G
over older technologies for
private mobile networks.
And that's important because 5G
is a more modern standard
and it has more robust security
than legacy mobile technology.
So there's a benefit there, too.
I think.
The other benefit of 5G
is you can tap into things like REDCap.
So reduce capacity, lower cost 5G devices.
They're still able to
tap into the benefits
of that 5G core network,
and are still able to
use 5G specific spectrum
that isn't available for 4G or 3G,
but they're much cheaper devices.
And that's something we can
see coming down the pipe
based on those 5G standalone roll outs,
which again, was one of
the other things we saw
momentum around at MWC this year,
was this shift to a second wave of 5G.
5G advanced, which requires
a standalone network,
not a non-standalone network.
So it's purely 5G.
It's not using the old 4G core network,
what you have in a non-standalone world.
You're moving onto real 5G, complete 5G.
And I think that was one of
the other trends we're seeing.
And that enables things like REDCap.
And that will give us a greater momentum
in having 5G IoT devices.
5G devices suitable
for private 5G networks
in all kinds of areas.
You know, different form
factors, different cost elements,
different performance profiles.
And that will cause an
acceleration I think
in the private 5G space.
- Great.
You know, I'm not surprised
that you mentioned at the event, you know,
AI was obviously very prominent
all over the show floor,
but a lot of things that
you were seeing were demos
that you saw last year,
or weren't necessarily new things.
I think this industry, you
guys probably both have
experienced it throughout
your years in technology.
We love our buzzwords,
and AI is one of the
biggest buzzwords right now.
But I think what makes it different
from all the other
buzzwords we may have seen
is just all the benefits
you were just mentioning.
It's real, it's not going anywhere.
It's more than just a buzzword.
So excited to see how it
continues to progress.
Like you said, it's not
happening overnight.
So we're going to continue to see more
of these advancements and changes.
But talking out a little
bit outside of AI,
you mentioned second wave
of 5G and other things.
I'm curious because I know at the event,
CCS Insight was also talking about
the private mobile networks report
that you guys recently put out,
which is available on insight.tech.
I'll make sure to provide a
link for any of our listeners
who want to dig deeper into that.
But what were some of
the findings that came out of that report,
and were you seeing any of those
on the show floor actually, you know,
in real life, in real time?
- Yeah, sure.
So we were seeing that momentum
around the hybrid model.
That was very, very noticeable,
I think, at the show.
I think one of the other things
that was striking at the show
in the private mobile network space
was we've still got a very large number
of vendors in the private
mobile network space.
But there's still consolidation happening,
there's pressures happening
and I think there's a kind of momentum
around bigger players in the space.
I think that's one of the
other dynamics we're seeing.
I don't think it's
necessarily flowing through
yet into the numbers behind the report,
but I think it's something
that was very apparent at the show,
and what's happened just after the show
is this shift of consolidation.
This shift to greater scale
in some of the vendors coming through.
This hybrid model is very important, too,
because historically, private
networks were just dedicated.
You put in your core,
you'd put in your equipment.
You'd have some spectrum.
You'd have your devices connecting to it,
and that's what it would be.
And it would be in a factory on a port,
on a logistics facility.
The hybrid model, what that does is
potentially extend
a lot of the benefits to private network
onto a macro network.
Now that could be dedicated spectrum,
say 450 megahertz or something.
Or it could be a network
slice on the macro 5G network.
Now what a network slice is,
is a way for an existing mobile operator
or mobile carrier to have
an end-to-end quality
of service managed experience
that's segregated from other
traffic on the network.
So it has a security segregation as well,
as different quality performance metrics.
That's a characteristic
that's possible with 5G.
Once you have this 5G standalone network.
And as we're seeing operators finally
deploying standalone networks,
finally having 5G calls,
we see increasing opportunity
for this hybrid model.
Now where that's useful is, say,
take that logistics
situation for a second.
You have your logistic hubs,
you have maybe lorry drivers,
or couriers or something
going outside of that.
Maybe you want them to stay
connected to your network
with many of the security
benefits of that.
But you can't have your
private dedicated network
everywhere around the country.
So what you can do is have
your dedicated network
in the logistics hub in that facility,
but when those transportation
workers leave that,
they could be on a network
slice on the macro network.
On the main mobile operators
network infrastructure.
And that's something that,
we're seeing that momentum
around standalone.
We're seeing that momentum
in our data already
around the hybrid model
alongside the dedicated model.
It's one of the big growth
areas at the moment.
And we can see these 5G technologies
enabling that opportunity.
So that will open up
some different dynamics
in the private mobile network space.
- So still no 6G yet out there.
- Plenty of things happening
on 6G at the moment.
It's just, you know, these
things all happen in parallel.
The 6G work is all
happening behind the scenes.
We had the WRC last autumn talking about
spectrum usage of 6G.
The R & D guys are all working on it.
I think one of the things
that's interesting about
the 6G discussion,
which is relevant back to this,
is a lot of the efforts
are to have a 6G standard
that is simpler than 5G.
Because one of the things that
I think everyone's noticed
on the vendor community around 5G is that
there has been this non-standalone
access rollout of 5G,
which is sort of,
it's kind of hybrid 5G and 4G.
But it's being called
5G by all the operators.
And a lot of complexity around that.
And it's slowed down the
availability of real 5G features
where you need that standalone experience.
So one of the things that
that's hitting around
when you talk to people about 6G is
a general consensus to keep 6G simple.
And to only have a
standalone version of 6G.
Because I think everyone in the industry
in the technology space
has been frustrated by
how long non-standalone
access hung around on 5G.
And probably the damage it's done
to people's perceptions of
what 5G technology can do.
So the focus on 6G is we're
just going to do standalone.
- Great, yeah, I agree.
I think with all these technologies
and advancements coming out,
everybody sees how it can make
their lives a little bit more simple.
So that is going to be
interesting how it goes,
and impact some of the technologies
and standards that are going to come out
to make it more simple,
to make it easier for people
to adopt or to access.
I want to change the
conversation a little bit.
We've been talking about all the benefits
that we can get from
these core technologies,
and from the network going forward,
but I think it's interesting to talk about
how we actually get to those benefits.
We talked about the collaboration aspects,
we've alluded a little bit
to the Intel ecosystem.
So Wei, I am curious, you know,
how can companies partner together
and partner with Intel to take advantage
of some of these latest innovations,
and to really be able to get
to network modernization,
edge monetization,
and these AI advancements
we keep talking about?
- We believe it's better
to gather in the journey
of creating journey the connected world
that almost,
we need the different player, right,
across industry to come together.
And this been at the heart
of our ecosystem program.
Like, the network builders program,
that'll be running for close to decade,
as well as the newly introduced
Intel solution builder
just this week in software,
doing embedded work, right?
And the idea is really to
bring the cross domain,
ecosystem partner to come together, right?
So I think couple examples, right?
For a network space, right?
It's a perfect opportunity
for the cross industry
to look at a way to
upscale themselves, right?
By working with their partners,
and at the same time
through the collaboration
help to upscale their workforce, right?
To understand the cross
domain knowledge, right?
Bring the technology in, right?
Adopt the technology.
And are able to hire and
retrain the workforce, right?
So that it will blend
in the technology into
the respective domain.
And it will look and feel
and emit the right KPI as well, right?
Within their own domain, right?
You cannot just look at the
solutions, the cross domain,
try to take it and, and stab it into it,
and make sure that it works, right?
It might be the beginning,
but across different phases,
where you have to blend
into your own needs, right?
So we see a couple
things happening, right?
And Intel's been cultivating, right?
Pushing this forward,
supporting the ecosystem,
making sure that happen, right?
I point back to Ian said.
Earlier example, right?
For private 5G, right?
This is how we see
a pretty strong maturity, right,
of private 5G software.
Our partners from US,
from Europe, from India,
from AsiaPac, right?
They're different pockets
of partners, right?
They come with a pretty
wide selection, right?
So this no longer be just a
big equipment vendors like
Classic Ericsson, Nokia,
Juniper, and so on.
A play field, right?
It is a market that
because of the technologies
of the barrier entry lower,
we see a lot of the innovator coming in,
and over past few years, right?
We see this solution getting
into a form of maturity, right?
So I'm amazed when I stopped by
and my partner both look at
the out of the box experience, right?
The different capacity of the private 5G.
It's just getting better
and better right now, right?
You have this radio distributed 5G call,
network blending right?
And of course,
they will plus AI as the
Ian mentioned, right?
It looks the same last year, now plus AI.
But I was amazed by the maturity
of a different set of solution
that will help the
respective vertical market
player to lower down, right?
Their barriers to entry because
it speak the same language.
Some of the player,
they more tuned towards one
vertical than the other, right?
And it's really to help to
unlock the adoption rate
of private mobility as
a form of connectivity,
just like Wi-Fi over the password
into the system itself.
So we see that happen, right?
It's coming together, right?
This year is way more mature than last,
and every year we just getting
better and better, right?
So we see that happen, right?
And we need this side of the ecosystem
to continue to come up with a solution
to help the industry move forward, right?
One example, right?
We see ecosystem partners
stepping in as well.
Stepping up and stepping
in as well to offer
like telco API gateway, right?
So we have couple partners
coming up from Europe,
US and India, right?
Particularly three pockets
of the country, right?
They're offering
interesting solution, right?
It's a form of API gateway.
And from edge perspective,
we see interesting
things happening as well.
We see some of the edge
verticals, their ecosystem,
they participate at MWC, right?
They're not classic telco, right?
But they come here
because we see the trend
of the edge or IoT verticals.
They are enterprise verticals, right?
They are at the middle of
digitizing their solution, right?
Software defined.
And by de-coupling the
different layer of the solution.
It is the same journey
that we we going through
with telco as well.
How to put it back together, right?
And by putting that together,
when you take it out and
put it back together,
there's opportunity to insert
the right solution they want right
into the software defined, right?
So we're talking about
again, connectivity, right?
Private 5G now have a opportunity
to insert into the software
defined environment.
We see security, right?
Cross domain collaboration,
they're reaching out to Intel,
asking about the software
defined security solution
that can insert into the stack, right?
And then the player figure
out how to integrate
that all together and
it's a better solution.
It's an evolved solution
from the previous one, right?
And we see those trends
happening in retail,
manufacturing, healthcare,
media, entertainment, and so on, right?
It's exciting, right?
So working with the right leader
in the industry is important
because the leader will bring you
the rest of the ecosystem, right?
And Intel is one the leader here, right?
Yeah, we're proud about it, right?
And I would love to share more, right?
When partners say getting
into these journeys, right?
And we always welcome more partners.
Come and knock on the door,
hey, we need help, so yeah.
- Yeah, it's always so powerful
to see that ecosystem
and see how partners can work together
and can work with Intel.
We've been talking about a
lot of different advancements
and solutions going on in this space.
And I think it's clear
that no one partner
organization can be the expert
in all of these different in innovations.
So it's great to see
them leverage on Intel,
and leverage other partners
to really connect the dots
and to bring a bigger solution together,
and to market.
And to, you know,
help with some of these advancements
that we see going.
I know we are running out
of time, but before we go,
I just want to hear from each of you again
if there's any final thoughts
or key takeaways you want
to leave our attendees with,
or you know, where you guys anticipate
the next significant
focus of the network space
or the next challenge to be
over the next couple of years?
So Ian, I'll start with you.
- Sure, so I think
there's a whole lot of things here.
I think, you know, many of these buzzwords
that we hear, all these technologies,
we're still really at the start.
So Open RAN, virtualization RAN,
is still really quite early.
ATT made that massive
announcement in December.
Vodafone in Europe's
got some Open RAN stuff.
In Japan, it's called Open RAN.
But really, it's really right
at the early stages of that.
There's a lot of runway ahead of us.
A lot of opportunity for growth in that.
As you virtualize the RAN,
you alter the hardware infrastructure,
you order the software play.
The vendors can change.
Lots of things happening there.
AI is still very early in the RAN,
and in the core, and
everywhere else as well.
I think the takeaway
I'd have on AI is that
AI has fundamental benefits,
which is why it's been
worked on for so long
before this hype kind of rose.
And I think the key thing
I'd say there is that
if and when, probably more like when,
there is this collapse
in perception of AI,
don't stop working on AI.
It is something that's
going to be important.
It's going to stay important,
it's going to be fundamental
to many different areas for the future.
And I think that's
one of the big takeaways from this.
And then how do you choose
to use AI in your networks
or in your solutions is also important.
It's not always clear where the best way
and how to best to apply it is.
So it's going to be around long term,
even if sentiment moves
against it, you know,
the bubble collapses.
- I'm excited to see that evolution,
and how we'll get there.
And then what will be the next big thing
we'll be talking about,
or how AI will sort of
go behind the scenes.
Wei, is there anything else
that you wanted to add,
or any final thoughts or key
takeaways you have for us?
- I'll probably just hit
three tricky point, right?
I say a lot just now, right?
And to Ian's point, right,
vRAN is making progress, right?
Continue to, it will continue
to make progress, right?
And it's a part of the
network modernization
that will happen, right?
But then do execute
in a more sustainable way as well, right?
Because power consumptions, yeah.
The carbon footprints will
be still top in mind, right?
In everyone's head, right?
That we have to collectively
make it happen, right?
So vRAN continue to make progress, right?
But as execute the network modernization
in more sustainable way, right?
And therefore, whenever every step,
plan it ahead, right?
In terms of adoption rate.
Second, right?
Starting to unlock the
5G business value, right?
I have couple conversations
with the telcos
that some of telcos,
they been telling me that, hey,
if we can't unlock the 5G,
there will not be 6G, right?
It's going to run out the cash, right?
So it is in all best interests, right,
among the telco community to
unlock the business values
for 5G faster.
And telco API, right?
It represent the opportunity, right?
To speed it up, right?
In terms of the path
to monetization, right?
So start with that, right?
And then the third things is
the telco AI adoption journey, right?
The reason I use the word
telco AI adoption journey,
because it is a journey, right?
And it is a journey that helping telco,
becoming a techco right?
Telco been talking
about for quite a while,
becoming a techco by combining
the network modernization, right?
Monetization and AI,
it will help the telcos
that are transforming
become a techco and going
to be an adoption journey.
- Great. Well, I want
to thank you both again
for joining the conversation.
I urge our listeners to
get in contact with Intel.
See how you can partner together.
And also take a look
at some of the reports
out of CCS Insight, like I mentioned.
The recent private mobile networks report
that just came out.
Because we've talked a
lot in this conversation,
but I feel like we've
barely scratched the surface
of what's going on and
what's still to come.
So dive deeper into some of those reports
to see what other innovations
and trends are happening.
And you know, again, thank
you both for joining us.
So until next time, this
has been the IoT Chat.
(upbeat music)