Six tech trends to watch in 2025

2025 is shaping up to be a year of exciting technological advancements. As customer mobile data demands continue to soar, the need for continued enhancements on mobile networks has never been more apparent. To meet the connectivity needs of consumers and businesses and deliver on the promises of Artificial Intelligence (AI) going forward, driving technological advancements and pushing the boundaries of technology are going to be more important than ever. Customers expect us to be ahead of where technology is going and be a future-ready partner that can ensure they’ll be connected, wherever they are.

To stay on the cutting-edge, here are six tech trends to keep on your radar this year.

Cloud-Native Networks Gain Importance. Cloud-native networks will become increasingly important for supporting customers' AI and machine learning workloads with the best performance. For the operator, having full control to orchestrate their own cloud not only will play a critical role for advanced services like network slicing and Edge Compute, but will also add critical flexibility to dynamically adapt to the customers needs in terms of capacity and topology. While cloud-native networks used to be considered a “nice to have”, it’s not unlikely that the industry will now start to recognize they are essential to run AI workloads with specific requirements such as higher speeds, lower latency or added security.

Network Slicing Use Cases Grow. As the 5G Standalone Core expands, we’ll also see network slicing enabling more differentiated services for new applications beyond enhanced video calling. By dynamically matching network performance characteristics to specific application requirements, network slicing could see applications in numerous industries. For example, massive multi-player online gaming that requires occasional high bandwidth upload or download speeds and constant low latency, public safety where slicing can enhance situational awareness for personnel, or on a factory floor using 5G to run Autonomous Guided Vehicles.

O-RAN is here. When it comes to Open Radio Access Network (O-RAN) technologies, the question is no longer if it’s going to happen. It’s here and will continue to evolve and mature. Establishing open and interoperable interfaces between different hardware and software components adds optionality, by increasing competition and creating opportunities for new entrants. This results in deployment flexibility for the operator, faster innovation in the industry, and greater service options. Greater competition, innovation, and increased supplier diversity is already starting to bring cost benefits to both operators and customers and it will continue on this trajectory as it progresses further with wider deployments and wider standardization efforts.

The AI inflection point is approaching. AI and Generative AI, with its predictive capabilities, are poised to be a critical component of digital transformation and future business growth in almost all industries. It’s clear that a reliable, trusted 5G network is essential to the AI ecosystem since it provides the ability to power the processes of AI-generated activity with the ability to move massive amounts of data with minimal delay. For over a decade, we’ve been using AI in our network to enhance internal efficiencies, elevate customer experiences, and optimize our network infrastructure. The transformation that is approaching will be driven by the use of the network for AI instead. This may stretch operators’ networks in several ways. Consider the downlink/uplink balance for instance. While today most AI use cases require exchanges that are usually conversational, low in context and partially transactional, the next iterations on AI may add higher contextual awareness enabling chatbots or assistants to provide much more efficient support or even advise proactively without the need of prompts. This will require a constant feed of information resulting in new wider data streams in the uplink direction from the sensing device of choice on the customer end towards the inferencing point, driving a traffic pattern different from today’s that may require some adaptation. All in all, the continuous investment in network infrastructure will remain key to retain unique strengths in meeting customer needs in the form of low latency, high bandwidth and robust mobile edge compute capabilities.

APIs drive new use cases and add value for customers. Network Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) will come to the foreground making functionality not only dynamic but accessible and configurable by apps and by customers. This new useful interface for network services will help customers by turning the network into a platform where information and functionality are shared with the right industries and with the right privacy and security frameworks. Whether it is fraud prevention for the banking industry or assisting enterprise customers managing fleets of drones, enabling the right APIs can accelerate digital transformation, drive innovation, growth and profitability and help create deeper engagement with consumers, creating a better overall experience and brand loyalty.

Satellite Direct-to-Device technology matures. In 2025, we will continue seeing "text anywhere" services that allow customers to stay connected wherever they are. Satellites will provide access to emergency messaging and location sharing even when a terrestrial cellular network is not available. Satellites can also drive innovation for enterprises by enabling IoT devices to roam onto a satellite network when out of range of the terrestrial cellular network providing enhanced geographic coverage for IoT devices. The challenge as of today remains for satellite technology to enable the operator to offer seamless and robust data and voice services to unmodified devices that match the quality and experience of the terrestrial network. Even if only viable in low densely populated areas, this would be a fundamental step towards a ubiquitous uniform service and this is an area where we may definitely see progress soon.

In today’s fast-paced digital world, cutting-edge, advanced technology solutions like AI, private networks, cloud, edge computing, APIs, satellite or network slicing will be more and more vital to empower industries to adapt and succeed. One thing that for sure is not changing is that network providers will still need to continuously improve the customer experience, and remain trusted experts capable of guiding other businesses on their own AI journeys and working to infuse AI capabilities into their products to deliver more value by making interactions smarter, more intuitive, and ultimately more beneficial.