Ciena’s Kailem Anderson and Paulina Gomez, along with Telstra International’s Wayne Lotter, share their insights into current and future market direction.
Ciena: Using technology to improve network security
With 2025 marking a shift towards using general-purpose large language models (LLMs) in telecoms, 2026 could see a shift towards telco-specific AI models that understand network structure, performance patterns and past incidents.
“These models will underpin AI-driven digital twins that act as real-time simulation engines, allowing operators and AI agents to test actions before they touch the live network,” explained Kailem Anderson, vice president, global products & delivery at Blue Planet (Ciena). “This will be a major step towards genuine multi-domain automation.”
However, increased autonomy can also throw up security challenges like AI agent manipulation, Anderson said.
“If an attacker alters an agent’s goals or behaviour, the system could make harmful changes while believing it’s operating normally,” he added. “In 2026, for operators hoping to successfully introduce autonomous AI agents, securing the AI layer will become just as critical as securing the underlying network itself.”
Another significant trend in the technology industry this year was quantum and it is expected that next year will mark an “inflection point” where quantum safe communications will start to move from awareness to action.
“Faced with the urgent threat of ‘harvest now, decrypt later,’ crypto-agility is no longer optional for those handling high-value critical in-flight data,” said Paulina Gomez, senior advisor, product & technology marketing at Ciena. “We will see the shift towards broader adoption of quantum-safe solutions amongst security conscious entities with the availability of hybrid models, using NIST-approved Post-Quantum Cryptography algorithms and/or Quantum Key Distribution methods.”
She added: “The coming year will be defined by a growing number of trials and real-world deployments of quantum-safe solutions, as operators act to ensure the confidentiality of the data that is transported over their networks.”
Telstra International and the ‘adaptive network’ potential
Looking ahead to 2026, Telstra International predicts a further shift in how carriers, enterprises and hyperscalers consume high-bandwidth capacity for their cloud and data centre requirements.
“The industry is moving towards “capacity as a service” models (or “adaptive networks”), where customers subscribe to flexible pools of capacity that can be deployed wherever needed across subsea and terrestrial routes,” explained Wayne Lotter, head of international networks at Telstra International. “This is a significant change from the traditional model of placing individual capacity orders.”
Lotter expects that instead, customers will work under outcome-based agreements that are designed to meet the demands of AI and cloud services. He argued that shifting capacity across different networks will enable enterprises to get the flexibility and speed-to-market they need.
He added: “As AI and machine learning increasingly enable networks to operate autonomously, offering capacity as a service will become more valuable for customers, since it can quickly and flexibly respond to changing capacity requirements.”
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Metro Connect USA 2026
Welcome to Metro Connect USA, the largest event for digital infrastructure leaders in the United States. You are invited to join over 3,500 attendees from every sector of the US digital infrastructure market. From fiber optics to data centers, the event serves as a pivotal gathering for forging partnerships, securing funding, gaining insights into industry advancements, and getting deals done.
