NavLink talks on the Cloud Opportunity

April 4, 2011 - PRLog -- Tuesday, March 29 - 2011

Barcelona, Beirut, Doha, and Dubai

Invited by the Qtel Group, NavLink participated in the 3rd annual Innovation Exchange in Barcelona that took place on the 12th and 13th of Feb 2011. The event hosted by the Qtel Group and supported by the GSMA and the Mobile Entertainment Forum (MEF), has assembled leading companies from across the mobile value chain to outline the development path of the next generation technologies.

The major theme of Innovation Exchange this year was "Shifting Gears," with the spotlight on new technologies and business models emerging within the communications industry. Key sessions covered enterprise mobility including discussions on Cloud services. Also sessions covered social networking, mobile media measurement and mobile relationship marketing.

NavLink, a player in Managed ICT and Enterprise Networking and Cloud services in the MENA region, shared its experience and insights on the Cloud opportunity, potential and business models.

NavLink’s Vice President of Strategy & Planning, Naji Chakhtoura, took part of the “What’s in the Cloud” panel discussion on the role that Telcos could play in the growing Cloud opportunity, the business cases for deploying cloud services, market segments and the barriers to end-user adoption.

Naji Chakhtoura highlighted “the cloud model is not new, but now more mature networks, infrastructure, applications, smart devices and growing number of users on-net is driving the growing demand and adoption of cloud-based services”.

Chakhtoura added, “The Cloud is the convergence between utility computing, virtualization and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). As more services are pushed towards the network and as smart mobile devices emerge, it is inevitable that Telcos are best positioned to grab this opportunity. Operators have the foundation Data Centers, Operating Centers and Network assets to leverage and put the 1st building block infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) to home and power the growing number of SaaS”.

He continued, “Scale-on-demand and pay-as-you-go are key requirements across market segments; today we see SMEs as early adopters to SaaS while large Enterprises & Governments on the other hand are opting for hybrid models, maybe putting their less critical applications on the public cloud while maintaining mission critical applications under their management in their premise or on dedicated hosted infrastructure or on private clouds”.

Chakhtoura concluded “telcos should have viable business models, with X-as-a-Service; there is Capex shift from end-customer to service provider, where a large addressable market is needed for a good ROI”.

Held on the eve of the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the Innovation Exchange reflects the increasing international crossover between mobile network operators, application developers, large consumer brands, advertising agencies, social networks and even universities.

The Qtel Group Innovation Exchange 2011 hosted key participants from the industry and beyond -   Google, Oracle, BMW, Opera, Skype, NavLink, to name a few. Qtel Group companies were also heavily present, including Indosat, Wataniya Kuwait, Nawras, Tunisiana, Nedjma and Qtel.

Taking part in this event were Laurent Delifer President & CEO of NavLink and Bassem Soubra, Vice President Global Market Development who contributed in the discussions about Cloud services to the Enterprise Market and how NavLink can help in having a holistic approach as a Group in order to move faster when it comes to delivering services from the Cloud and to capture a bigger market share.


About NavLink
NavLink is a provider and enabler of managed ICT services, managed enterprise networking solutions and cloud services to telecom operators, medium and large enterprises in over 17 countries throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

Founded in 1996, NavLink was one of the early adopters and pioneers in introducing IP services in the Middle East (ME) and has since established a stellar reputation with its customers and partners, based on trust, outstanding technical skills, mutually beneficial partnerships, and delivering on commitments. Currently, NavLink enjoys deep, strategic relationships with leading telecommunications carriers.

NavLink’s vision is to be recognized as the leading provider and enabler of managed ICT services, managed enterprise networking solutions and cloud services in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region by 2015.  

About the Qtel Group
Qatar Telecom (Qtel) provides a full range of telecommunications services in Qatar and across its presence in 17 countries. Our vision is to be among the top 20 telecommunications companies in the world by 2020 through expansion in both the MENA region and South East Asia.