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In an interview with Telco Titans, Carla Penedo, Executive Director of Cognitive Automation Solutions at Celfocus, offers a deep dive into the evolving role of AI and automation in telecom networks. With a strong academic background in AI and years of hands-on experience, Carla explains how increasing network complexity - driven by converging fixed, mobile, satellite technologies and legacy systems - demands innovative solutions like network digital twins and agentic AI.
Network digital twins have emerged as an essential tool to address increasing network complexity, working alongside AI and automation to provide deep insights into network behaviour and accelerate the journey toward autonomy. They enable predictive analytics and proactive decision-making, allowing network operators to anticipate issues before they affect services and to trace problems across layers and domains.
Meanwhile, Agentic AI, represents the next step in Celfocus’s AI Strategy. By building on large language models and Retrieval-Augmented Generation, it fosters a more collaborative, agile and intelligent operating model.
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Agentic AI creates a natural, symbiotic bond between engineers and technology — making automation more intuitive and accessible. By simplifying interactions and orchestrating complex tasks seamlessly, it enables operators to focus on innovation and value creation. It’s a new way of working — more collaborative, agile, and intelligent.”
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Carla also stresses that, in recent years, GenAI has brought AI to the forefront, creating a sense of urgency around the implementation of solutions. In this context, Celfocus takes a strategic approach to aligning technology with business objectives, not only being proactive in proposing solutions but also providing advice on feasibility.
As operators become more cloud-native and AI‑enabled, Celfocus’s deep expertise combined with strong partnerships with AWS, Google, and Microsoft Azure (with strong understanding of the technology emerging from the hyperscalers as well as the business needs and priorities of operators), positions the company as trusted bridge between operators and tech giants.
Celfocus is also experienced in managing complex projects supporting greater adoption of cloud platforms by operators, with Carla citing the pioneering and award‑winning work undertaken with Vodafone and Google on migrating the cognitive components of the operator’s Global Network Operations Centre to a secure cloud, making it the primary source of network AI-based capability.
Collaboration with Vodafone continues, including the co-presentation at TM Forum’s DTW-Ignite (know more here). Carla also highlights a joint presentation with Telenet at FutureNet World, where she summed up the key elements for success in three words, “adoption, adoption, adoption”, as she emphasized “Technology must be adopted and used by people to genuinely serve their needs, not the other way around.” (Access the presentation video here).
Carla closes by that successful digital transformation depends not just on technology but also on adoption: “Technology must be adopted and used by people to genuinely serve their needs, not the other way around.”
