Comms Vision 2022

The channels flagship conference, Comms Vision returned for 2022 at the Gleneagles Hotel. As Silver Sponsors, we were thrilled to be part of the largest network for channel leaders and immerse ourselves in three whole days of unique insights and countless opportunities, including expert-led keynotes and fireside sessions, boardroom breakouts, industry insights, networking and more. Representing Virtual1 was CEO Tom O’Hagan, and Product Strategy Director Neil Wilson.

The theme for this year’s conference centered around 'Maximising the Golden Triennium'. As we all know, the UK is nearing the three-year countdown to all IP, which means that it’s time to accelerate momentum, take collective action and embrace this unique opportunity to drive the unprecedented digital transformation. The conference expanded on this with a range of topics and sessions including:

• What is the new channel dynamic?
• Balancing complexity and simplification
• Strategic leadership priorities
• Industry trends: Bright outlook despite uncertain times

As Silver sponsors, Virtual1 had a strong presence at the conference and took part in several boardroom breakouts, supersessions, and fireside interviews.

Supersession

Neil kicked off with a Super Session on understanding the 'connected catalysts' reshaping the comms industry in the Golden Triennium and beyond. He touched on important considerations such as;

• To what extent will 2025 and all-IP catalyse the comms channel's cyber security agenda?
• How far will 5G catalyse innovation-led growth opportunities beyond supercharged mobility?
• Supply chain transformation - Will collaboration between competing providers also catalyse positive action on the channel's Net Zero goals? And should they be jointly considered now?
• Post-Covid-19 world dawns - To what degree is workplace flexibility catalysing new markets and new partnerships, in addition to activating a power shift to employees as the skills shortage deepens and workplace culture undergoes reinvention?
• Will we see greater collaboration between network competitors to protect margin erosion, extend the reach of siloed fibre providers, and enhance customer value opportunities? What will be the impact of new hyper-local ISPs with a fresh approach to consumers, and what does this mean for the channel?

Fireside Interview

On day two of Comms Vision, Tom O’Hagan discussed the key role of wholesale fibre aggregators in providing partners with access to networks and new market opportunities at scale.

Boardroom Sessions

Throughout the conference, we also took part in various boardroom sessions.

Neil Wilson led the first session ‘Why single site companies are big business’ where he spoke about single office businesses now having the integration, security and performance challenges of their bigger multi-site counterparts and how this presents a big opportunity for them. He discussed how by focusing on exploring how a customers’ business functions, the channel can have much richer conversations involving many more products, and deliver much more value.

Boardroom session two ‘Raise your proposition bar to new heights’ saw Neil Wilson and Dan Richardson, Group COO - TalkTalk Wholesale Services take the audience through how we are bringing together TalkTalk’s national scale and Virtual1’s award-winning portals and automation into a business dedicated to wholesale cloud and connectivity solutions

It was great to connect with so many of our partners and learn about how we can best navigate through and beyond the Golden Triennium!

We’d like to say a massive thank you to Comms Dealer for hosting a great conference and we can’t wait to do it all again next year.

Get in touch to discover how we can help power your potential as we countdown to All-IP.