Open Gateway DevCon 2024

In today’s technology landscape, we telecoms have at our fingertips a wealth of data and capabilities that can help developers design better digital services. Thanks to the Open Gateway initiative, we have transformed our networks to make them programmable by exposing them through global and standardised APIs. This reduces their complexity and paves the way for technological innovation.  
  
Open Gateway DevCon 2024 was a session at Mobile World Congress 2024, designed specifically for developers. Its programme focused on explaining this project led by the GSMA, which already has more than 200 operators and 60% of mobile connections worldwide. The benefits it offers for the creation or optimisation of digital experiences were discussed.

Open Gateway DevCon was much more than a conference at the world's most influential connectivity event. It was a meeting designed by and for developers from all over the world, exploring a new way of designing digital services.

Attendees were able to gain valuable insights into the possibilities of network APIs, how they revolutionise application development and how to make the most of their ideas to turn them into a source of revenue. In addition to theoretical knowledge, they were able to enjoy a practical approach that has given them a clear understanding of how to start their journey with Network APIs and how to apply the learnings immediately.

It was also a way to spark creativity and inspiration. Developers were able to discover how to explore, experiment and test, to take their projects to the next level. It also allowed them to share ideas and find new opportunities for collaboration to optimise their services with Telco APIs.

Here is the full agenda of what was to be found:

 
Session 1: Removing complexity for developers:

• "The collaboration between GSMA, CAMARA and TM Forum", with Henry Calvert, Head of Networks at GSMA; Jill Lovato, Communications & Outreach Director at CAMARA/Linux Foundation; and George Glass, Chief Technology Officer at TM Forum.
• "Driving the future of developer innovation, with Savinay Berry, EVP, Product and Engineering at Vonage.
• "Delivering on the power and promise of 5G network APIs to change the world", with Savinay Berry, EVP, Product and Engineering at Vonage; Peter Arbitter, SVP MACE Business Unit at Deutsche Telekom; Martin Heinig from VP/Head of New Ventures and Technologies at SAP; and Chris Halton, Vice President, Innovation Head of Product Strategy at Verizon.
• "Aggregated Network APIs for the German market", with Markus Kümmerle, Program Lead, Magenta API Capabilities Exposure at Deutsche Telekom; David De Val, Global Director of Open Gateway at Telefónica; and Johanna Wood, Head of Developer Strategy at Vodafone.

Session 2 | Making networks accessible to developers:

• "Are network APIs ready to get out of the lab and into the real world", with Shkumbin Hamiti, Head of Network Monetization Business Unit, Cloud & Network Services at Nokia.
• "The path to programmable networks", with Mikko Jarva, Head of architecture and portfolio at Nokia CNS; Jacob Groote, EVP Innovation & Partnerships at KPN; Mark Henry, Director, Network Strategy at BT; Alex Reichl, Director Mobile Strategy at Liberty Global Technology Limited; y Rajendra Sadhu, Senior Vice President, Hi-Tech SBU at Innova Solutions.
• "Scaling Open Gateway for Developer Success through Cloud Platforms", with Ricardo Villarreal, Product Manager at Azure Programmable Connectivity, Azure for Operators and Microsoft; and Mijo Soldin, VP Telecom Strategy & Partnerships at Infobip.

Session 3 | Open Gateway in action:

• "Why telco APIs are a game changer", with Otilia Anton, Telco APIs Program Director at Orange; David De Val, Global Director of Open Gateway at Telefónica; Johanna Wood, Head of Developer Strategy at Vodafone; Seckin Arikan, EVP and Head of Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS) and Global Network Platform (GNP) Sales, at Vonage; and Aurelija Plėtienė, Director of Engineering at Vinted.

Open Gateway Live coding session, with Eran Haggiag, Executive Chairman of ClearX.

Announcement of the winner of the Open Gateway Challenge GLOMO. Axiata Digital Labs was awarded in Open Gateway Challenge by Dialog Axiata and XL Axiata Meta Stage.

Open Gateway DevCon not only gave attendees a complete tour of the initiative's APIs. In this session, all the details about the commercial launch of Open Gateway in Germany were presented.

Just a few days before it had been announced by David Del Val, Global Director of the project at Telefónica, in his talk "First steps of Open Gateway at Telefónica". The developer conference told how Germany's leading telcos (Deutsche Telekom, O2 Telefónica and Vodafone), have opened their mobile networks to companies and developers to offer two anti-fraud APIs: Number Verification and SIM Swap.

Thanks to these tools, the German market can have new solutions to increase security in the digital environment and increase the security of users. Through our Telefónica Open Gateway Partner Program, companies can access a series of exclusive resources and content, which will allow them to start marketing these APIs to their customers. On the other hand, thanks to the Developer Hub, interested developers can start testing their own use cases to design digital services taking advantage of the network's capabilities.