Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (00:09):
The era of the Invisible Network is coming promising to revolutionize how we experience connectivity by making networks seamlessly disappear from our daily interactions to delve deeper into this transformative shift, joy King, vice President of Go to Market strategy at Optiva joins us to explore what the invisible network era means for the telecom industry. Joy, thank you for being with us today.

Joy King, Optiva (00:35):
It's a pleasure to be here to talk about one of my favorite and exciting topics,

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (00:39):
And I read your article. So can you explain the concept of the Invisible Network and why it's so pivotal for the future of connectivity?

Joy King, Optiva (00:49):
Well, one of the best ways to see the future is to learn from the past. So let's take a few decades back, and I won't give you the exact number, but when I began my career in the telecommunications industry, I was so impressed by how the telecom companies made everything so simple for all of us as consumers. You picked up your device phone handset, you dialed a set of numbers, whether they were seven numbers or nine numbers or 10 numbers, and then it rang, or it was a busy signal, and somebody answered at the other end without any visibility. To me, knowing whether or not this was a local call, a national call, an international call covered by my plan, or actually charged in addition to my plan and sending the ringtone back so I could hear that it was ringing, interacting with other carriers around the country or the world.

(01:50):
All of that complexity was completely hidden from me. It was the definition not only of scale, but of simplicity at a global scale. But then as an industry, we got a bit distracted probably due to the massive amount of capital investment that all the carriers made in 3G four, G five, G five, G plus, and the industry started talking about infrastructure and backend complexity and network bandwidth, and all of us as consumers, we didn't understand, and frankly we didn't care. Now as connectivity becomes as important to us as oxygen, the next level of simplicity is beginning. That's what I call the invisible network era. The everything connected without me having to know anything about how, that's where I see the future and I see the future has already begun.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (02:55):
Well, simplicity definitely has a lot of upside for consumers, but what are the primary benefits of adopting invisible network technologies for network operators?

Joy King, Optiva (03:06):
Well, to be honest, for network operators, there's an enormous opportunity. We've all been reading, hearing, talking about the stagnant set situation of revenue in the industry. But new market entrants see an opportunity, particularly when we're talking about embedded mobile connectivity. This could be any number of different companies. And one recently that I have been working with is a company that many of you have heard of called Humane. They have the humane AI pin. Well, what is that? It is a device that embeds mobile connectivity that also uses AI to be my personal assistant. Now imagine, I say, I want to know what's the weather tonight? Oh, I've got to be sure to pay my bill for the mortgage. Oh, and also I'm craving Chinese food. Could you order some takeout for me? Imagine a world where a device powered by AI connected to the mobile network without me having to pair it to my local wifi or figure out any of that, can handle all of that without me knowing which app is doing what. And for an operator who sees the opportunity here for these new market entrants with embedded mobile connectivity devices, whether it be the humane AI pin or its smart homes, or its healthcare, the opportunity to open the door to simplicity to ensure that they have the simplified backend billing, charging, onboarding, digital productized infrastructure that allows these new innovative market entrants to do what they do without having to worry about the underlying network complexity. That means that that operator is going to make a lot more money.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (05:04):
So joy, what challenges do operators and enterprises face in deploying invisible networks, and how can they overcome those challenges?

Joy King, Optiva (05:12):
There are a number of challenges. Let's be clear now. The first one is very important to both me as a consumer and also to the operator providing the underlying invisible network, and that is security and privacy. The reality is all of our data, all of this is a major issue around the world today. But as mobile connectivity becomes more and more ubiquitous with everything that we have connected to everything else, security and privacy are real issues. This is something that the operators must work closely with. Cybersecurity specialists, with the mobile device manufacturers, the new market entrance, the MVNOs, all of this is a collaborative effort. The reality is the good will outweigh the bad, but we can never forget the risk. That's the first thing, and that's the top of mind for everybody. But there's more. I do think that in order to attract these new market entrants, these new companies who don't want to be labeled Telco in any way, we need to stop talking about acronyms like MVNO and MNO and BSS and OSS and arpu.

(06:32):
They don't care about that stuff. What they want is to see a digital customer-centric, rapid go-to market strategy and infrastructure software, a powered infrastructure that can make their lives easy and allow them to do what they want to do. That's another challenge because some of the larger tier one operators and tier twos as well are pretty stuck on some legacy infrastructure that's got to change. So I'd say those three things. Ensuring security and privacy never are anything but first and foremost, followed by the need to simplify the underlying infrastructure and to stop using acronyms that make everybody think, oh, this telco industry, I don't know about this. That's what I'd say.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (07:22):
In your article, you mentioned that eim technology gives us a look into a component of invisible networks that's already in play. How are eims a good thing for our industry and what are the benefits and risks?

Joy King, Optiva (07:37):
Well, again, simplicity is everything. And if you think about how most of us, not Apple customers anymore with the newest device, but most of us have to activate our devices. You decide to get a new phone like I recently did with my Samsung X 24 Ultra. Well, to do that, I had to go to the carrier's office. I had to get a new SIM card. They then took that SIM card into the back room and activated it, aligned it with my phone number, the usual stuff. My husband and I were only in that office for about 90 minutes to two and a half hours. Can't exactly remember. Now, think about eim technology. I get my device, whether it's a phone or an embedded mobile connectivity device, it's a smart home device. It's a healthcare device. The fact that there's an SEM in there doesn't mean anything to me.

(08:36):
It just means it works. And from a carrier's point of view, it is also a lower cost. It allows for automated remote activation. Does it mean that there's a higher risk that I could jump from one carrier to another with EIM that could then be easily converted? Yep. Are there regulations, especially in countries where eim technology is a little bit ahead of the governments and the regulatory bodies, but eim technology is the future, and I have a great amount of respect for Apple, having known and seen it define this next generation that we're living in today, and the latest Apple iPhone 15 is only available with eim. No more physical SIM cards. I see that as the future.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (09:27):
That just makes sense for sure. And looking ahead, joy, what advancements do you anticipate in the invisible network landscape over the next five or 10 years, particularly concerning privacy and security?

Joy King, Optiva (09:43):
I do believe that this is a major, major area of responsibility. We are going to be moving into blockchain into new levels of encryption, into using artificial intelligence and gen ai specifically to proactively identify and squash cyber attacks, data breaches and all of those things. They're never going to go away. That's a reality. But we can and we will focus on controlling them, and as an industry, as a global population, we can do that. That is the greatest risk that I see and the greatest area of investment that we all need to make. But when you think about the potential, especially in healthcare, the simplicity of knowing that your devices are monitoring your health proactively, identifying that there's a risk engaging you with the right medical professional or the right tools. These things combined with home smart home devices and everything else that we do in a digital world today, education is another one that's very exciting. For me. I see all of these as powered by the Invisible Network era, and personally, I'm very excited that in the not too distant future, I won't have to say, oh, there's an app for that. Right? No, I won't have to know what an app is. I just know what I want to do, what I need to do, and in the backend, just like in the old days of making that phone call to my grandma up in New York City, it'll happen without me knowing how.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (11:27):
Well, joy, thank you so much for your insights and for a glimpse into the future. We appreciate you.

Joy King, Optiva (11:34):
It was a pleasure. Thank you.