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Ooredoo Forges Ahead with Digital Services, Cloud and 5G: Interview with Ooredoo Group CTIO Nigel Bryne Featured

Ooredoo Forges Ahead with Digital Services, Cloud and 5G: Interview with Ooredoo Group CTIO Nigel Bryne Image Credit: Vink Fan/BigStockPhoto.com

Spearheading the rollout of 5G in the region and rapidly expanding its footprint across the globe, the Ooredoo Group continues to make new strides in the telecoms industry. Following up on the company's journey and milestones, Tara Neal, Executive Editor of The Fast Mode spoke to Nigel Thomas Bryne, Chief Technology Officer at the Ooredoo Group on their on-going initiatives and plans as well as key strategies for the future. The discussion also includes the impact of the pandemic on the telecoms industry, as well as Ooredoo’s technology leadership - including digitilization, the shift to 5G, Cloud adoption and the transition to an asset-light model.

Tara: How far has the Ooredoo group come since its inception? What are some of its most notable milestones?

Nigel Thomas Byrne, Group Chief Technology Information Officer, Ooredoo

Nigel: The company has come a long way since it was originally founded as Qatar Telecom in 1987. We have expanded well beyond our home market of Qatar and now provide mobile telecommunications and internet services to over 121 million customers in 10 countries across the Middle East, North Africa and Southeast Asia.

In recent years, Ooredoo Group has accelerated its transition into a digital telco, one that offers customers across our global footprint access to a wide range of digital services from their mobile.

These digital services are increasingly being enabled by the power of 5G. In 2018, Ooredoo Qatar was the first company in the world to launch a commercial 5G network and Qatar now leads the world with the highest fibre penetration per household. In fact, Ooredoo Group is currently a market leader in the adoption of 5G technologies across much of our footprint.

Tara: How has 5G changed the competitive landscape of today's mobile market, and what are some of Ooredoo's strategies in this space?

Nigel: Ooredoo Group is placing a strong emphasis on 5G and I fully expect the technology to be a key driver of the company’s ongoing success.

In Qatar, preparations for the major upcoming sporting events are well underway. We have already tested several 5G use cases that will significantly enhance the fan experience in ways never seen before. From superior connectivity, speed and reliability, to augmented reality, 5G will play an integral part in these events and entirely transform the way fans experience the spectacle.

Looking beyond this year’s sporting events, 5G has the potential to dramatically improve our customer’s experience of a wider variety of data intensive applications that can improve their everyday lives, including wireless video, video games and virtual reality. Ooredoo Group has also trialled a range of other amazing use cases, such as an aerial driverless taxi, 5G services in moving vehicles, a 5G drone, and an ambulance offering 5G-enabled remote medical services. These incredible applications just highlight the immense potential of this technology.  

Tara: How has the shift to digital and the widespread dependency on Cloud and SaaS influenced operator business, in particular their traffic growth and the breadth of applications being delivered on both fixed and mobile networks?

Nigel: Ooredoo Group has seen a significant acceleration in demand for Cloud services among our business customers during the pandemic. In response our operating companies have strengthened their partnerships with global cloud services providers such as Microsoft. Microsoft Azure Cloud has been hosted in Ooredoo Qatar Data centres since 2020, but we have expanded this partnership to cover Kuwait since April 2021. These partnerships with Microsoft Azure offer enormous potential for Ooredoo in the Qatari & GCC markets in the areas of B2B & B2C cloud services.

Tara: With what values would you associate the Ooredoo brand?

Nigel: Ooredoo is on a mission to enrich people’s digital lives, and to empower customers across our global footprint to access and enjoy the internet. In doing this we always look to abide by three values; to connect, to care and to challenge.

Our commitment to digitalisation sits at the core of our brand and central to how we engage with our customers and seek to deliver on our mission. Through the application of digital technologies, Ooredoo Group has been improving our customer journeys and experiences, making it quicker and easier for customers to find, buy, and use our services online.

Our customers appear to be responding to our efforts; we increased our customer base by 3% to 121 million across our global footprint in 2020. While the international benchmarking consultancy, Brand Finance, named Ooredoo a Top 40 Telecom Brand in 2021.

Tara: With presence in more than one region, how do you ensure that the products and services provided are tuned to the local needs? What are the challenges in doing this?

Nigel: Understanding our customers and anticipating their needs is crucial in tailoring our offerings to the various different communities we serve. We leverage analytics to enable us to help understand our customers and offer a more personalised customer experience and product offerings.

Naturally, some of our markets are further along the journey to digitalisation than others. We see this as an opportunity, rather than a challenge. For our more advanced markets, we leverage our innovative technology and partnerships with major global tech brands to ensure we are offering the very latest digital services. The knowledge and experience we gain in these markets can then be applied in our emerging markets, where we offer different services that fit their unique stage of development and customer appetite.

For example, we are pioneers in 5G, but the effort and investment we have put into becoming a leader in this technology is invaluable to us when servicing customer in countries with a developing telecommunications industry who are reliant on 3G and 4G.

Another example is Myanmar. Here a whole generation of people will encounter telecommunications for the first time through smartphones, rather than transitioning from voice. Noting this, we are investing to support Myanmar’s development through the building of video-grade networks. This may seem like a big challenge, but our early adoption of technologies has set us apart and has also given our customers access to great services that they enjoy!

Tara: How important is innovation among operators today? In which areas do you see this as most important?

Nigel: Given the nature of our industry, it’s imperative we keep pace with the development of technology and innovation has long been an integral part of Ooredoo’s strategy and business operations.

Now, as the world begins to emerge from the pandemic, digital innovation is more crucial than ever. The needs of our customers have changed as they have adapted to online lifestyles. To ensure that we can continue to support our customers we must continually innovate and offer new services that are relevant in the post-pandemic ‘new normal’.

Technology innovation is also being applied to improve our business operations. Artificial intelligence, machine learning, and automation are all being applied across our organisation. For example, we recently started “Smart Network Planning” to enhance the efficiency of network investment decisions through the use of Machine learning algorithms. Also, Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is being piloted in Kuwait, Oman and Qatar to improve day-to-day operations.

Tara: How do local ecosystems impact the development and growth of the telecoms market? What has been Ooredoo's role in spurring the growth of these ecosystems in countries where Ooredoo has a presence in?

Nigel: Local ecosystems can greatly influence the development of an operators’ network footprint. For example, the demand for high-capacity data networks is rising exponentially as customers are increasingly accessing video streaming. In some markets, like Algeria and Tunisia, incumbent, government-backed operators benefit from large fibre networks. Challengers, such as Ooredoo, often need to rely on cost-sharing and partnerships to grow their networks since rolling-out fibre to multiple sites across the country is not financially feasible.

Ooredoo’s strategy across all the countries in which we operate rests on three pillars: core, infrastructure, and portfolio. In essence, this means that we are continuing to invest in our core business and our people, while striving to become more efficient, flexible and asset-light across our global portfolio.

For example, our Indonesian operating company, Indosat Ooredoo, has invested extensively in improving its 4G network infrastructure and in readying the network for 5G, which it will soon begin piloting. However, in Indonesia - like elsewhere - we are transitioning to a more asset-light model and recently signed a major sale and leaseback agreement for more than 4,200 telecommunications towers. This deal was valued at around USD750 million, making it one of the largest transactions of its kind in Asia.

Tara: How has the pandemic impacted Ooredoo? How has it responded to this?

Nigel: Ooredoo has responded well to the challenges created by the pandemic and we have continued to support our customers throughout.

Thankfully, years of investment in our networks ensured we could meet the surge in demand for data as customers became more reliant on fast, reliable internet connections. However, throughout the pandemic we have continued to upgrade our networks to ensure reliability and boost capacity and internet speeds even further.

The pandemic has also served to accelerate Ooredoo digitalisation strategy. Notably, we are adopting more modern, efficient, and agile ways of working and conducting business, which are empowered by digital technologies. Digital marketing techniques are being used to inform and excite our customers about new products and services. While, online sales and customer engagement platforms, like our My Ooredoo app, are helping to make the customer experience as simple and hassle free as possible.

Internally, we have remained flexible and rolled out a work-from-home policy that is ensuring service continuity for our customers, while also keeping our employees safe and well. The safety of our staff around the world remains our top priority.

Tara: Looking into the future, what are some of the major growth opportunities for Operators in emerging markets? Which industry verticals do you foresee contributing most to this growth?

Nigel: Today we aim to offer our consumer and business customers a wide range of the best value-added digital services available, from financial services and TV content to business data centre, IoT and connectivity.

Looking to the future we expect to see demand for content, entertainment services, faster broadband, and larger mobile bundles continuing to grow. The pandemic has greatly accelerated demand for online access to entertainment and we continue to identify new content providers and already partner with the likes of Netflix, BeIN, OSN Streaming App and Disney+.

Our growth will also be driven by our strategy to create more value from our infrastructure portfolio. As such, we are in active discussions over several infrastructure agreements that could help to further reduce costs.

Through digitalisation and our transition to a more asset-light model we aim to build on our growth momentum and lead the way in digital transformation across our global footprint.

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