When we think of a telecom company, we are used to imagining heavy infrastructure consisting of many towers, transmitters, data centers, cables, and wires, etc. While all of this is true, today more and more telcos are deciding to transform their physical infrastructures into digital, cloud-based applications. The cloud telecom market is one of the many service industries witnessing disruptive growth. The telecommunication industry is turning to cloud resources to improve business productivity and improve service for their end-customers.

A difficult task indeed, but for Martina Klingvall, Founder and CEO of Telness, being part of this change was an opportunity worth pursuing, “I know many have tried, but we have actually managed to build something unique that changes the prerequisites for an operator to be lean, digital and user friendly. It is exciting!” shares Martina.

The success of a telecommunication business depends upon successful delivery of services to its customers. Unfortunately legacy telecom IT infrastructure cannot fulfill these requirements in terms of scalability, agility, and cost-efficiency. For Telness, solving this problem was a part of their vision for the future of telecommunications. Describing the issues faced by telcos and their customers, Martina elaborates, “Telecom is not an industry with great examples of trust, hassle free customer experiences or efficient operators. Most countries consist of a few mobile operators dominating the market, but with legacy in back-end technology, manual and large operations and customer satisfaction scores that have a lot to improve on. We saw an opportunity to challenge the industry and use the benefits of being tech-entrepreneurs and build a world unique end-to-end telecom platform for both mobile and PBX. We also launched our own mobile operator in Sweden, making sure we built our tech from real experiences and now have a proof of concept of what results the platform can enable.”

The Cloud Advantage

Cloud computing today is becoming popular not only among end-users but also for telcos themselves. The clear cut advantages that come with the use of cloud technologies is responsible for this shift in attitudes. Some of the advantages that telcos can avail of by transitioning to the cloud are as follows:

• It promotes IT independence as telcos can provide a wide array of services with help of the vast network the cloud provides.
• Cloud computing reduces operational cost of hardware and software and enables infrastructure scalability based on a telecom service provider’s needs.
• Managed cloud services enhance data center efficiency for carriers. Thus, the longevity of a data center and server utilization is increased through cloud and telecom collaboration.
• Cloud provides a scalable engine for telecom providers to build scalable and managed services. Therefore, telecom providers can expand their products and services to generate more revenue.

It is these kinds of advantages that have contributed directly to the success of Telness, “Since launch of our Digital Telco in Sweden (mobile virtual network operator) we have onboarded thousands of customers, and today are at no. 1 position on Trustpilot in Sweden. The cloud advantage results in great efficiency in operations through automation and helps provide successful self service”, elucidates Martina.

Why not Me?

Like empathy and self-awareness, curiosity is a useful leadership skill that many struggle to integrate into their leadership style. Curiosity is the critical skill that results in transformative growth and change for an organisation. Unfortunately, tt is a trait that many executives seem to undervalue or dismiss entirely. For Martina, her curiosity played a big part in her decision to start Telness, “I love to be curious, learn new things and face challenges together with my team. Seeing telcos struggle to provide great servIce to their customers was difficult for me to fathom, especially in the age of technology. It made me wonder ‘why’? That was the fundamental reason behind the founding of Telness. I thought “someone” should do this. And why not me?” shares Martina explaining her thought process behind the founding of Telness.

Changing the Status Quo

It is a sentence that is quite often repeated by people in the corporate world and in their personal lives. And that sentence is, “That’s just the way we’ve always done it”? It’s a common mentality among people and corporations and a dangerous one at that for those who want to improve and grow. It hampers the possibility for change and prevents progress, both of which are essential for long-term success of an organisation and a person.

Every challenge involves changing the status quo. What that means is that we have to test the unproven, dive deep in the unspoken, and challenge the unchallenged. It is this attitude that Martina hopes can be cultivated in the next generation of leaders, especially women. “I believe more women should take more space, be more confident and dare to aim for higher goals. You will never succeed with more than your highest ambitions! And you cannot expect others to believe in you if you do not believe in yourself”, shares Martina.

It is the same reason that inspires her to continue pushing forward in the telecom space. “My current goal is for Telness to be a world leading teltech company, representing the gap of innovation and disruptiveness in the telecom space. We have proven what we can enable on a smaller scale in Sweden, the following years it is time for us to scale up and expand our product and my leadership on a global basis”, finishes Martina in describing her and Telness’s efforts in changing the status quo.