• Interview published in the Czech business portal “e15”
• The Czech Republic is at the forefront of 5G deployment. At the same time, 5G networks are also expanding rapidly in Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia, and Bulgaria, where operators from the e& PPF Telco Group are active.
• Europe has fallen behind in digitization. Rather than trying to catch up with the United States, however, it should seek to cooperate with them.

You recently completed the transition of your networks to 5G. Compared to other countries, Czechia is doing quite well in this regard. Why is that?
In Czechia, operators tend to adopt and implement new technologies relatively early in the investment cycle, which repeats roughly every eight years. Customers are also used to this, and there are usually enough compatible end devices on the market. Czechs simply have a relationship with modern and fast technologies. That's a good thing. We were one of the first to implement not only 5G technologies, but also extra capacity in higher frequency bands, known as C-BAND. This is nothing unusual; the Czech Republic has always been at the forefront of previous generations of telecommunications innovations.

Is development driven mainly by manufacturers and operators, or by demand?
Both. Of course, it is in the interest of manufacturers and suppliers to come up with something new after eight years. Theoretically, consumer devices would most likely be able to work in existing networks for maybe ten, maybe twelve years.

But the market itself really needs new technology, because today's applications are more demanding in terms of data consumption and network quality. Not so much the so-called “small screens”, i.e., mobile phones, because they have their limits. But people often use their mobile phones to download larger files for gaming, video streaming, or as a modem to power their computers with data services. Or they connect their computer directly to the 5G network instead of Wi-Fi. In that case, they will already see a difference compared to the older generation of networks.

We must also realize that there are limits to human consumption of data-intensive content. We only have two eyes, and despite the declared multitasking, we can usually only watch one movie or sports broadcast at a time. Industrial or security applications such as machine-to-machine do not have these limitations. They can produce, process, and evaluate data from hundreds or thousands of cameras and sensors in parallel, and this trend is accelerating with the rapid development of artificial intelligence.

Is anyone coming forward saying that their devices specifically need this?
Yes, specific requirements are emerging. For example, to cover a manufacturing plant. Or in surface mines, they need wireless connectivity, and it has to be extremely fast and extremely reliable. This was not possible with 4G. Security and defense agencies require very specific parameters. Another example is the rapidly developing field of connected vehicles and transportation systems.

Which is more important, 5G coverage or fibre networks?
Both are important. All data traffic from wireless communications must be transferred via backbone and aggregation networks. And today, these are mostly fibre optic. In every country where we operate, including Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Serbia, we have a clear deadline for when we must have base stations connected to fibre optics in order to be able to handle the growing traffic. In the past, data flow was mostly being transferred only towards the user. Now it is becoming more symmetrical, because users, for example, record videos that they share with others.

How satisfied are you with the rollout of fibre?
We are accelerating its implementation to base stations in all countries. Backbone networks are already running on it fully. Czech CETIN is building the so-called last mile at a record pace and connecting to the recently modernized and accelerated metallic network, which has optical fiber connected to DSLAMs, i.e., devices that aggregate data flows. Germany, for example, is falling behind us.

Germany has fallen behind slightly in terms of digitalization...
Germany has always had, and continues to have, a cutting-edge engineering and automotive industry. But for some reason, the transition to a digital economy has not been entirely successful. However, I suspect that this will now improve, also in connection with the security situation. Germany is starting to invest heavily in digital technologies, including those for defense purposes. But of course, it is true that Europe as a whole has fallen behind a little in this regard.

However, Nokia and Ericsson are at the absolute forefront of 5G network equipment.
These two companies have historically been at the forefront of development and maintain their position. It is very unfortunate that American suppliers such as Lucent, Motorola, and Nortel have dropped out, because it is always better to have a choice.

The United States is trying to make a strong comeback in the industry and is investing heavily in the development of the latest generations, including the OpenRAN concept with the help of AI. It is likely that they will be back at the forefront in the foreseeable future. Today, communication networks are also more closely integrated with data centers, with capacity for artificial intelligence or machine learning, which telecommunications operators offer as a service. Unfortunately, Europe lags behind the best players in this area. We are working on some specific projects with our American partners. I am an advocate of transatlantic cooperation; we should pick up the pace a little in terms of development.

Should we catch up with the US, or focus on the technologies of tomorrow?
My personal opinion is that Europe should not live under the illusion of catching up with the United States and further deepening the transatlantic divide. It should focus on sectors in which it is clearly good or has the potential to be good, and which complement the American leadership. Regardless of the current tensions, we should cooperate and not reinvent what someone else has already discovered.

How are you progressing with 5G in the other countries where you operate?
We are at the top level everywhere, according to network quality community assessment tools. Today, we have 5G networks in operation not only in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, but also in Bulgaria, Serbia, and Hungary. We are heading towards 90 to 95 percent population coverage. In Serbia, we have been ranked best in independent evaluations for nine years in a row. We are completely switching to Ericsson equipment there and are now continuously optimizing the network. In Bulgaria and Hungary, we have already completed the modernization and are rated as the best by a wide margin. In Slovakia, we have also switched to Ericsson, and next year we are aiming for 98 percent 5G coverage. These were huge investments in the order of hundreds of millions of euros per year over several years, which PPF Group fully supported. Our reward is that we are truly ready in terms of capacity for new generation applications.

Telecommunications are now inseparable from the issue of security...
Yes, and in this area we go beyond legal and regulatory requirements. We build and maintain critical infrastructure relied upon by the state, entire economic sectors, and millions of individuals. Our approach to security reflects this.

The growth in dependence on connectivity naturally attracts both organized and less organized crime. Perpetrators see it as an affordable alternative to other criminal activities. Today, the geopolitical situation also plays into the hands of attackers. Some powers use cyber threats as a weapon. So, unfortunately, the rise of this form of crime is natural, and we need to look for mechanisms to defend against it.

What is essential for you?
Today, telecommunications infrastructure faces a whole range of threats that affect not only the networks themselves, but also the IT environment and cyberspace. In addition, our networks are physically and logically dispersed and contain a large number of elements and points through which they can potentially be penetrated.

That is why our security is built as a multi-layered system. The first and absolutely essential pillar is the protection of physical infrastructure. No firewall or advanced detection system can prevent an outage if someone cuts the optical route, damages an active element, or gains unauthorized physical access. This is followed by the protection of other layers of the network architecture and individual components, including segmentation, access rights management, configuration integrity, and continuous authentication between elements. Verification and authorization mechanisms must function between individual parts of the network to ensure that no component can implicitly trust another. Each access is conditional to identity and authorization verification, and the network architecture complies with modern “zero trust” principles.

Continuous monitoring of network operations also plays a key role. We need to be able to recognize anomalies in the behavior of devices, data flows, or users, i.e., situations that deviate from standard patterns. In today's environment, which is also influenced by artificial intelligence, attacks are changing ever more rapidly, with new techniques for masking and automating intrusions emerging.

In every country where we are present, we operate a SOC (Security Operations Center) that ensures these processes 24/7. We use cutting-edge platforms from renowned suppliers, such as IBM's QRadar in Czechia. The SOC not only detects and evaluates threats, but also coordinates responses and cooperates with national authorities within the framework of NIS2 requirements.

We continuously update the entire security ecosystem because the nature of attacks is rapidly evolving and their diversity is growing. Our goal is to maintain a high level of protection, respond quickly and accurately, and minimize any impact on the availability and quality of the services we provide.

Is physical protection sometimes underestimated among the general public?
Definitely. In today's security situation, it is more or less clear that any international attack would always be combined as a hybrid attack. This means that it would also involve disruption of the state's infrastructure, both through cyber attacks and physical attacks. Ukraine is experiencing this repeatedly, and it is not just the energy infrastructure being affected.

Critical technologies that function in times of peace must also be prepared and resilient in the event of a conflict. As an operator, we have methods and means to protect infrastructure and ensure that functionality is restored when an outage occurs. This includes physical damage to cables or radio access networks.

However, these requirements must be taken into account in the network architecture, its configuration, redundancy, backup, and in operational and monitoring processes. Complementarity and rules for crisis situations between state-operated infrastructure and private networks must be defined. I would say, however, that unlike some of our allies, the discussion is progressing relatively slowly in our country and should be accelerated. Some things are not quite finished here.

Skepticism prevails in Europe these days. What role should telecommunications play in reviving competitiveness?
My personal opinion is that, despite all the gloomy debates, Europe has never had it as good as it does now. I am talking about the people living in the majority of the continent, because what is happening in Ukraine is, of course, a tragedy.

We have a well-prepared IT sector and telecommunications environment, and the labor market is equipped with very smart young people. IT technology, artificial intelligence, and communication networks are actually the underlying layer, the foundation on which new innovations can truly emerge, perhaps even a revival of the automotive industry.

What is the primary purpose of telecommunications networks?
Above all, they open up entirely new industrial domains and applications that would otherwise be unthinkable. Many processes are controlled by artificial intelligence, huge amounts of data are constantly being transferred, often everything is in the cloud... for this, you need robust communication networks with adequate capacity, latency, security, and minimal downtime. Artificial intelligence must be able to process huge amounts of data and possible states in real time in order to recommend optimal procedures or make autonomous decisions. So, the whole ecosystem is interconnected today.

This is today. What does tomorrow hold?
Until last year, I always said that in our industry, we could see five to seven years ahead fairly clearly. And in most cases, we were right. Today, however, for the first time in my career, I can't say that. Until recently, in telecommunications and IT, we worked with solutions and technologies whose behavior could be described and predicted relatively accurately and deterministically. Modern artificial intelligence is also based on mathematical principles, but its enormous complexity and ability to learn from data mean that its development and outputs—and thus its impact on all industries, including telecommunications—are much more difficult to predict.

Today, we are deploying AI on a massive scale in the field of network optimization, but expert discussions are already beginning to include ideas for fully autonomous networks. Although we do not yet know exactly how to achieve such autonomy, we are already working with partners to develop and test concepts that will gradually bring us closer to this goal.

For example, an AI-supported security system will recognize a possible intrusion into a monitored area in a timely manner based on signs that are undetectable to the human eye or deterministic algorithms. It will automatically increase the resolution and allocate 5G network capacity to transfer large amounts of data to security cameras in that location. In the same way, autonomous production lines, transportation systems, and systems for security and rescue services will also function in the future.

And here, given my age, I ask myself: won't it end up that the artificial intelligence in my cell phone will start talking to the artificial intelligence in my wife's, children's, or friends' cell phones, and we won't really be needed for that? Nevertheless, I believe that humanity has always been able to find a way to grasp new technologies and direct them to serve people. I believe people will find a way this time, too.

Translated from:
https://www.e15.cz/byznys/e15-a-byznys/v-debatach-uz-figuruji-site-ktere-budou-plne-autonomni-rika-predseda-predstavenstva-cetinu-juraj-sedivy-1429514