In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen Orange CEO: Telecommunications Future, Network Investment and Leadership
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Aug 20, 2025 
Christel Heydemann, CEO of Orange Group and a transformative leader with an engineering background, discusses the evolving landscape of telecommunications. She addresses the impact of AI on network traffic and the need for innovation amidst market challenges. Christel emphasizes the importance of connectivity in bridging the digital divide, particularly in underprivileged regions. With her direct leadership style, she shares insights on risk-taking, learning from failures, and navigating corporate culture in a state-influenced environment.
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Connectivity Is In Everyone's Life
- Telecoms are embedded in everyday life and matter most during extreme events when connectivity lets people reach family and emergency services.
- Christel Heydemann emphasizes that networks sit behind simple user experiences and become indispensable when they fail.
AI Is Reshaping Network Demand
- AI adoption is the major current trend and will change traffic patterns, latency needs and compute distribution between edge and cloud.
- Orange studies AI traffic and expects varied use cases requiring new network designs and security responses.
Scale Limits Value In European Telco
- Telecom is capital intensive and faces flat demographics in mature markets, pressing the need to invest while preserving returns.
- Heydemann argues Europe’s fragmented market raises per-customer costs and limits scale advantages.