• NaaS still a priority amidst AI hype

Laying the tracks for the AI bullet train has dominated industry conversation in the past couple of years. But if the ‘Disrupt to lead: the new telco mindset’ keynote panel is anything to go by, telco leaders are also keeping the main job in mind – giving customers what they want.

When asked whether the telecoms sector was being disrupted, Orange’s Valérie Cussac answered that there were two types of disruption on the menu – one about infrastructure, and one about changing customer behaviour.

And with business customers more focused than ever on getting quantifiable outcomes, telcos are betting heavily on network-as-a-service to provide scalable, reliable connectivity services to their customers.

In the words of T-Wholesale’s Dimitrios Rizoulis, “Naas provides outcomes”, and panelists noted a trend of enterprises wanting to get more involved in defining exactly what they want their architecture to look like. “We’re no longer seeing our enterprise customers really kind of stand at arm’s length”, said Colt’s CO Annette Murphy. “They’re actually wanting to come in and co-create with us because they’re being asked by their own boards to effectively develop their own internal version of NaaS.”

Reflecting this focus, there were two other sessions dedicated to NaaS at Capacity Europe this year. One focused on interoperability and the other on service deliverability – common themes included the importance of APIs and ensuring customers have as much sight and control of usage and costs as possible.

• Telcos: focus on what you’re good at

Related to the previous point, the idea of telcos having specific advantages that are hard for competitors to replicate came up in quite a few sessions.

A panel on the digital infrastructure of tomorrow looked at how telcos can find a role among a tsunami of outside investment, including from sources not previously involved in connectivity. The conclusion? Telcos have something to offer, and they should lead with it.

This is particularly relevant in partnership, according to Telstra’s Roary Stasko. “Figure out where you have something to bring that is more than just capital – relationships, existing scale, what you bring to the table, where you can play a role in the broader ecosystem,” he told the audience. This was backed up by Salam’s Amjad Arab:“You need to specialise in something”.

• ‘Centres of excellence’ can help telcos square the circle

Speaking of specialisation, one of the biggest advantages telcos have in the connectivity market is their longstanding heritage, in some cases going back hundreds of years.

This brings reputational heft, deep consumer trust, and deeply ingrained processes – but it also makes it harder to react with agility to capitalise on market gaps and fast-evolving consumer demands.

The solution? Centres of excellence – specific internal teams and divisions with a defined focus on a particular area of the market. In the “Disrupt to lead: the new telco mindset” panel, stc’s Mohammed Al-Abbadi gave the example of stc founding the center3 division and Orange’s Valérie Cussac discussed internal ‘squads’ dedicated to 5G as a service provision.

Expect more hyper-focused centres and business units to emerge in the coming years – helping telcos address a weakness without compromising a strength.

• European fibre consolidation: happening, but not at huge scale

The 2023 edition of this roundup warned that consolidation was coming to the European fibre sector, with altnets in the firing line. Two years on, this is partially true, but the consolidation has moved at a more managed pace than previously expected, as discussed in the “Fibre economics: when is consolidation coming?” panel. One reason for this, to take the UK as an example, is increased trust in altnets from consumers, with CityFibre now connecting three quarters of a million customers.

Another market aspect under discussion was that the nature of consolidation is less likely to be along the traditional ‘incumbent buys altnet’ pathway. Possible scenarios presented by the panelists included altnet-altnet mergers to create larger challenger brands or international entry to the market. However, many altnets are relying on their vertical integration to thrive in a crowded market – any liquidity squeeze could mean trouble.

Some regional variations were also highlighted. In France an upcoming copper switchoff by 2030 has created room in the market, while the “Rise of Eastern European terrestrial corridors” panel all agreed that market consolidation is coming to this region too, with new opportunities for Middle East-Europe traffic via terrestrial routes.

• Europe isn’t ready for AI, says audience

US domination of AI investment is a numerical fact, as previously covered on this website, but for those in the room at the ”Global perspectives on the digital infrastructure of tomorrow” panel there was a clear visual sign of how Europe is lagging in the AI conversation. When asked to raise their hands if they thought Europe was AI ready, Capacity counted three hands in the air in a room of over a hundred people. Does perception equal reality in this case?

• IoT is M.I.A – but eSIMs are a promising area

IoT came up a lot less often in Capacity Europe 2025 discussions than in previous years. The term was not mentioned once in the opening keynote panel, and other times IoT was brought up were usually in a general context relating to future market size.

However, the eSIM side of the market is highly promising, with long-term IoT deployments being able to rid themselves of physical sims to operate smoothly across national borders and work more autonomously in general. This formed the focus of a well-attended “Here’s how eSim can enhance IoT experiences” panel, where the general advice to MNOs worried about eSims eating their revenues was to seize the day – create the partnerships and develop the use cases now.

Panelist Steffen Sorrell from Aleido Intelligence cited research that half of all IoT connections will be eSim-enabled – this is where MNOs can look.

• Subsea: governments need to talk

A panel on guaranteeing subsea resiliency (as far as it is ever possible to guarantee this) mainly covered operational aspects, such as route diversity and technical protection such as optical switching, fibre-sensing technologies, and double-armouring.

One aspect that can escape notice was also covered, though – governments talking to each other. Panelists gave the Nordic region as an example of internation collaboration, with subsea security chambers created across the five countries of the region.

The example of Syria was also cited – the country’s re-entry into the global connectivity market means direct government engagement is once again possible, potentially unlocking Syria’s potential as a terrestrial alternative to congested Red Sea routes.

As center3’s Abdullah Aldahmashi put it: “Without government engagement, resiliency will remain a challenge.”

• Landing station neutrality goes global

Sticking with the subsea angle, the neutral landing station model (where any operator can pay a fee to connect to landing infrastructure) is extending across the world, after proving its concept with projects such as Sparkle’s Genoa Landing Station in northern Italy.

This will soon happen in the Middle East, according to panelists, where there has been a big move towards regulatory neutrality. Salam’s George Jaber gave the example of Saudi Arabia: “There are more open models with cross-connect and colocation fees. That will make it easier for other licensed operators to access cables landing in the Kingdom.”

This is particularly welcome given the expected shifts in traffic balance in the next decade – with cloud and AI traffic likely to overtake that of telco and enterprise in the near future, open systems will be vital in ensuring the companies of this new business landscape can access the connectivity they need.

• Quantum’s moment is coming

Quantum computing makes regular headlines in the general media with its gargantuan process achievements (here is the latest example), but the Capacity Europe panelists tend to keep things practical.

Quantum use cases featured in this roundup in both 2023 and 2024, and there was more at this year’s Capacity Europe, too. In both a dedicated session for quantum computing and as part of the main keynote panel, speakers gave more examples of real-world quantum implementation mainly related to secure networks, such as Orange’s work for a financial services client outside Paris  and Sparkle’s recent Quantum Safe over Internet initative.

From what the panelists were saying , there is a general understanding that large-scale, unified quantum networks will take time – BT’s Andrew Lord spoke of 2035 as the end point for an advanced quantum network in the UK. So for now, expect more use cases, more testing the water, and more incremental gains for integrating quantum technologies into wider connectivity.

• Telco-hyperscale collaboration still a live issue

The interaction between telcos and hyperscalers is a tricky issue to solve, especially in the European context – this ‘co-ompetition’ is a regular theme at Capacity Europe. This year, a panel came together to discuss the feeling on the groups, with the idea of meeting in the middle culturally – telcos thinking more flexibly, hyperscalers putting forward people to work with telcos who really ‘get’ networks – a thread through the discussion.

Separately, a point was also made during the Tuesday morning digital infrastructure panel that telcos would do well to change their mentality on hyperscale involvement in the market. To use a transportation analogy, all carmakers benefit if you build more roads, and similarly hyperscalers making long-term investments in infrastructure boosts the market in general – creating a better global network, more proof of concept for infra investment, and a better idea of what’s coming in the future.

• Fraud prevention more important than ever

Boards are finally taking full notice of telecom fraud. The eighth edition of the GLF Fraud Report, which tracks attitudes and initiatives in connectivity fraud prevention, found that 69% of carriers surveyed now consider preventing fraud to be a top strategic priority, the highest number the survey has ever recorded.

Encouragingly, this increased focus is leading to reduced negative impacts elsewhere. A heading in this roundup for Capacity Europe 2024 said “Voice fraud is falling; messaging fraud might follow”, and that is exactly what has happened – just 35% of carriers reported an increase in messaging fraud in 2025, considerably lower than this time last year when nearly two thirds of respondents saw this type of fraud on the rise.

The full report has plenty more statistics, quotes and insights – it is available here.

• Capacity Europe officially more interesting than school

A final note of positivity to end this roundup. We have a lot of work to do if we want to bring fresh blood into our industry, but if the 2025 Capacity Europe Talent Programme is anything to go by, young people are keen to learn about connectivity and digital infrastructure – even if it just gives them a day out of the classroom.

The Capacity Europe team expected 65 students to tour the event as part of the programme, but in the end 80 or so young people from schools and universities around the UK showed up. They toured the exhibition floor speaking to companies, listened to sessions, soaked up the atmosphere, and maybe planted the seed of a future career.

“We’ve met up with a decent number of people talking about how they got into the industry themselves – a lot of them by accident, apparently – and it was good to see how we as students can get our foot in the door,” said a student from St. Bartholomew’s school in Newbury (that’s avhigh school for anybody unfamiliar with the British education system) when we asked them how they found the day. Hopefully we see a few of them again with delegate badges on in 5 years’ time…

Want to compare this list to previous Capacity Europe roundups? Here’s what we learned in 2024, and here’s the equivalent for 2023.