DTW Ignite is returning to Copenhagen in June, bringing together the telecommunications industry to examine how artificial intelligence can reshape networks and operations. The event, organized by TM Forum, is scheduled to run from June 17 to June 19 at the Bella Center, with Huawei’s Operations Transformation Forum (OTF) preceding the main program on June 16. Under the overarching theme Pathways To Growth: Real challenges, real solutions, real change, the conference aims to translate AI research and industry innovations into practical strategies that telcos can deploy to create measurable business value. The gathering emphasizes hands-on collaboration, real-world use cases, and practitioner-led discussions designed to accelerate the adoption of AI-powered capabilities across communications networks, operations, and ecosystems. In sum, DTW Ignite 2025 positions itself not merely as a knowledge-sharing event but as a constructive platform for building the AI-enhanced telco networks of tomorrow.
DTW Ignite 2025: Event Overview and Strategic Context
DTW Ignite 2025 arrives at a moment of heightened emphasis on AI-driven transformation within telecommunications. The sector is increasingly recognizing that to meet rising demand, deliver differentiated customer experiences, and manage complex, globally distributed networks, operators must integrate AI capabilities in a structured, scalable way. The event’s program is built around three focused pathways that reflect the most pressing missions for the industry: Composable IT & Ecosystems, Autonomous Networks, and AI & Data Innovation. Each pathway is designed to address distinct but interconnected challenges, ensuring that attendees walk away with actionable plans that cover technology architecture, governance, data strategy, and operations.
A central aim of the conference is to move beyond theoretical discussions about AI and into practical implementation. The organizers emphasize a transition from talk to action, inviting telecom leaders to co-create solutions that can be piloted, scaled, and integrated into real networks. The summit’s strapline underscores this shift toward concrete outcomes: real challenges demand real solutions, and real change requires collaborative action. Delegates will have opportunities to explore demonstrations, review case studies, and engage with peers and technology providers to accelerate AI-driven improvements in network performance, reliability, and efficiency. This approach aligns DTW Ignite with broader industry trends that see telcos increasingly adopting open, modular architectures and data-driven operations to stay competitive in a rapidly evolving digital economy.
The format prioritizes interaction and peer learning, offering formats that range from expert-led talks to live demonstrations, hackathons, and collaborative problem-solving sessions. The scale of participation is substantial: more than 130 speakers have been confirmed from globally recognized technology and telecom organizations, including AWS, IBM, Microsoft, Nvidia, and T-Mobile. The breadth of participation signals a serious commitment to cross-pollination across cloud platforms, AI tooling, networking hardware and software, and service-provider experiences. In addition to the main conference, the event provides a dedicated Innovation Zone and Innovation Hub, where attendees can observe and participate in live demonstrations and collaborative projects, illustrating how AI and data-driven methods can be embedded into day-to-day network operations.
A notable feature of this year’s DTW Ignite program is the expansion of Catalyst projects—collaborative initiatives that bring together multiple companies to tackle shared problems. The event will present over 50 Catalyst projects involving more than 200 participating companies, highlighting a robust ecosystem approach to innovation. These collaborative efforts typically emphasize practical outcomes, such as accelerated product development, accelerated testing cycles, or the creation of transferable frameworks that other operators and vendors can reuse. By prioritizing these projects, the conference fosters a culture of open experimentation and shared learning, which is especially important in a field where interoperability and standardization can accelerate adoption of new capabilities.
In parallel to the main event, Huawei’s Operations Transformation Forum (OTF) continues its decade-long tradition of focusing on all aspects of intelligent operations. This year, the OTF sits as a prelude to DTW Ignite, marking its 10th anniversary with a theme that centers on accelerating intelligent operations to fuel new growth. The joint scheduling promises participants a streamlined experience, where attendees can access both the OTF insights and the main Ignite agenda, maximizing opportunities to learn about and integrate AI-powered operations into real-world telco environments. The convergence of OTF with Ignite reflects a broader industry trend toward more integrated, end-to-end programs that bridge strategic planning with practical deployment.
To support an immersive and practical experience, the program includes the Solutions Room, which brings together real-world challenges and targeted problem-solving sessions. This space lets participants engage directly with pressing issues and work toward actionable outcomes, moving beyond passive observation to active collaboration. The Executive Connect initiative is another important element, designed to foster high-level dialogue between communication service providers and technology vendors. With an anticipated attendance of around 400 CSP professionals, this program is positioned to accelerate decision-making and alignment on priority AI initiatives, standards, and collaboration opportunities. The combination of these formats—keynotes, demonstrations, collaborative problem-solving, and executive-level networking—creates a comprehensive engagement ecosystem that aims to translate insights into scalable results for telcos.
Open Digital Architecture (ODA) and its components will be demonstrated as part of the event’s technology showcase. ODA represents a modern approach to architecting telecom platforms with open interfaces, standardized APIs, and modular components, enabling easier integration, interoperability, and rapid experimentation. In line with this, masterclasses and hands-on sessions will provide deeper dives into ODA concepts, practical implementation considerations, and governance aspects necessary to maintain secure, scalable AI-enabled networks. Attendees can expect to see practical demonstrations of AI integration across different layers of the telecom stack, from network infrastructure to data governance and security, underscoring the practical viability of AI-driven transformation.
An additional dimension of the event is its emphasis on practical outcomes and learning formats. Attendees will have the chance to nominate and vote for project demonstrations, ensuring that the most relevant, actionable initiatives receive prominent visibility. This participatory element helps align the conference program with the real interests and needs of the industry, increasing the likelihood that new ideas will translate into tangible business value. The conference also celebrates achievement through awards and recognition, highlighting notable work across the ecosystem and inspiring continued innovation.
Sponsors and supporters form a critical backbone of the event, with more than 35 prominent technology and telecommunications companies providing backing. This level of sponsorship indicates a broad ecosystem endorsement of AI-driven telco transformation and ensures that the event features a wide range of perspectives, from software platforms and cloud services to network equipment and managed services. The mixture of vendors, operators, and system integrators helps to create a holistic view of the AI-enabled telco future and fosters opportunities for partnerships that can accelerate deployment.
In summary, DTW Ignite 2025 is positioned as a forward-looking convergence point for telcos, technology providers, and research communities that are focused on turning AI and data-driven innovations into scalable, secure, and value-generating network capabilities. The event blends strategic leadership with practical, hands-on experimentation and collaboration, designed to help participants translate vision into executable plans that can be piloted, refined, and scaled across complex telecom environments.
Pathways Driving the AI-First Telco Era
DTW Ignite 2025 centers its programming around three primary pathways, each addressing a core dimension of AI-enabled telecom transformation. These pathways are designed to complement one another, creating a cohesive blueprint for operators aiming to modernize their IT stacks, automate networks, and exploit data-driven insights to optimize operations and services. The pathways are not isolated tracks but interoperable lanes that together form a comprehensive strategy for the AI-first telco era.
Composable IT & Ecosystems: Building Modular, Interoperable Platforms
The Composable IT & Ecosystems pathway focuses on creating modular, interoperable information technology architectures that enable telcos to assemble and reassemble capabilities in response to evolving business needs. At its core, this pathway emphasizes open standards, shared APIs, and a vibrant ecosystem of partners whose offerings can plug into a common platform without excessive custom integration. The aim is to reduce vendor lock-in, accelerate time-to-value, and empower operators to experiment with new services and business models by combining best-of-breed components from different vendors in a seamless, repeatable manner.
In practice, Composable IT & Ecosystems involves decoupling software layers so that network management, service orchestration, data analytics, and customer experience functions can be developed, tested, and deployed independently while still delivering integrated outcomes. This approach supports rapid innovation by enabling operators to swap out components as technology evolves, adopt cloud-native architectures, and leverage best-in-class analytics, AI tooling, and automation capabilities without triggering a full platform rewrite. The pathway also encompasses governance and security considerations, ensuring that composable systems maintain adequate control, compliance, and risk management as new components are introduced.
One of the structural enablers of Composable IT is the Open Digital Architecture (ODA), which provides a blueprint for modularity, interoperability, and scalable integration. ODA components, interfaces, and APIs are designed to be vendor-agnostic, promoting broader collaboration and reducing friction when integrating with cloud services, edge computing platforms, and AI engines. The pathway emphasizes practical demonstrations of how businesses can implement composable architectures to accelerate AI adoption, control costs, and improve the speed at which new services reach the market. Attendees can expect to see case studies detailing successful modular implementations, lessons learned from early pilots, and approaches to governance that balance agility with security and compliance.
Beyond technology, the pathway highlights the importance of partnerships and ecosystems. By nurturing an environment where operators collaborate with hyperscalers, software vendors, system integrators, and startups, telecoms can access a broader set of capabilities and reduce the cycle times required to bring AI-powered services to customers. The discussions under this pathway also cover organizational changes, such as how to structure product teams, how to manage multi-vendor portfolios, and how to align incentives to promote collaboration rather than silos. In sum, Composable IT & Ecosystems is about enabling telcos to assemble the right mix of components, services, and data practices to unlock rapid, reliable innovation.
Autonomous Networks: AI-Driven Operations for Level 4 Maturity
The Autonomous Networks pathway centers on the deployment of AI-powered capabilities to automate and optimize network operations. A primary emphasis is on Level 4 autonomous networks, which represent a high degree of autonomy and decision-making capability within the network, supported by machine learning, AI, and data analytics. This pathway explores how AI can streamline routine management tasks, improve fault detection and remediation, optimize traffic routing, and enhance network reliability and performance. The overarching goal is to reduce human-intensive operating costs while increasing the agility and resilience of telco networks in the face of demand fluctuations, outages, and evolving service requirements.
Key topics within Autonomous Networks include real-time telemetry, predictive maintenance, closed-loop automation, and AI-driven network optimization. Attendees will explore how AI, ML, and analytics can be applied to automate provisioning, fault isolation, configuration management, and performance optimization across complex, multi-vendor environments. The pathway also addresses the governance, safety, and security considerations that come with higher degrees of automation, including risk assessment, override mechanisms, and transparency in AI decision-making. The practical demonstrations associated with this pathway are expected to illustrate how operators can implement autonomous workflows with confidence, ensuring that automated actions align with business objectives and policy constraints.
In addition to technical demonstrations, the Autonomous Networks pathway provides a forum for discussing the organizational and cultural shifts required to realize Level 4 automation. This includes changes to network operations centers, new skill sets for engineers and data scientists, and strategies for managing the transition from traditional, hands-on operations to autonomous, analytics-driven processes. The conversations aim to translate theoretical capabilities into roadmaps that operators can adopt, pilot, and scale across their networks. By bringing together operators, vendors, and researchers, the pathway seeks to drive practical standards, interoperability, and a shared understanding of best practices for autonomous network deployment.
AI & Data Innovation: Standardizing AI Deployment for Secure, Scalable Telcos
The AI & Data Innovation track concentrates on the governance, deployment, and operationalization of AI across telecom environments. The emphasis is on creating a standardized blueprint for AI adoption that ensures secure, scalable, and responsible use of data and AI technologies. This pathway addresses data management, data quality, privacy, governance, and security considerations that are essential for maintaining robust telecommunications infrastructures while unlocking AI-driven value. The discussions emphasize designing data architectures that support AI workloads, establishing governance frameworks that ensure responsible AI usage, and implementing scalable deployment practices that can grow with an operator’s business needs.
A critical focus within AI & Data Innovation is the development of repeatable playbooks for AI deployment in telecoms. These playbooks cover the end-to-end lifecycle of AI initiatives—from problem framing and data collection to model development, validation, deployment, monitoring, and iteration. The pathway also explores risk management, compliance with regulatory requirements, and the establishment of ethical guidelines for AI use in customer-facing and operational contexts. By standardizing approaches, operators can reduce implementation risks, improve cross-functional collaboration, and accelerate the translation of AI concepts into real-world business outcomes.
Security and resilience are central to this pathway, with attention given to protecting sensitive customer and network data as AI systems are introduced into mission-critical environments. The track discusses architectural patterns such as data marketplaces, secure data sharing across partners, and privacy-preserving AI techniques that enable collaborative innovation without compromising confidentiality. By focusing on secure data ecosystems and governance, AI & Data Innovation aims to create a foundation upon which AI-driven services—ranging from personalized customer experiences to optimized network performance—can be responsibly delivered at scale.
Together, these three pathways form an integrated blueprint for AI-enabled telco transformation. They connect architectural considerations with operation models, governance frameworks, and collaborative ecosystems so that operators can move from isolated pilots to broad, enterprise-wide AI adoption. The program is designed to yield practical takeaways, such as steps to mature automation capabilities, how to structure governance for AI, and how to orchestrate a portfolio of AI-enabled services that deliver measurable business impact. By addressing both the technical and organizational dimensions of AI, DTW Ignite provides a holistic view of what it takes to compete in a rapidly changing digital landscape.
Participants, Projects, and the Knowledge Exchange
DTW Ignite 2025 brings together an impressive lineup of speakers and contributors from leading technology companies, telecommunications operators, and industry partners. The event features more than 130 speakers drawn from a mix of global technology leaders and telecommunications brands, including cloud and software giants such as AWS, IBM, Microsoft, Nvidia, and T-Mobile. The breadth of participation is designed to foster cross-pollination of ideas across cloud platforms, AI tooling, network management, and consumer services. The presence of such a diverse speaker roster ensures that attendees are exposed to a wide range of perspectives, use cases, and technical approaches, enabling them to benchmark practices and identify opportunities that can be replicated or adapted within their own organizations.
In addition to the robust speaker lineup, the conference will spotlight 50 new Catalyst projects. These initiatives bring together more than 200 participating companies to collaborate on shared challenges and to explore innovative solutions that can be scaled across the industry. Catalyst projects typically emphasize practical outcomes—new frameworks, reference architectures, tested methodologies, and working prototypes that participants can adapt for their own deployments. The sheer volume of collaborators underscores the industry’s collective commitment to accelerating AI-driven telecommunications innovation through cooperative development and shared learning.
A key feature of the DTW Ignite program is the Innovation Zone and Innovation Hub, where attendees can experience hands-on demonstrations and engage in collaborative problem-solving sessions. The Innovation Zone showcases catalysts and new ideas in action, while the Innovation Hub serves as a collaborative space for developers, engineers, and business leaders to experiment with new tools and approaches. These environments are designed to accelerate the translation of theoretical concepts into practical capabilities that can be piloted in real networks. Hackathons and result sprints are expected to be part of the experience, offering structured formats for teams to work on defined challenges within limited timeframes, culminating in tangible outputs that can be evaluated, refined, and potentially adopted in wider deployments.
Demonstrations of Open Digital Architecture (ODA) concepts and components are also a centerpiece of the knowledge exchange. Attendees will see how Open APIs and modular ODA components enable more rapid integration, testing, and deployment of AI-enabled network functions and analytics. Masterclasses led by industry experts will provide deeper technical dives into ODA practices, illustrating how operators can leverage open standards to create scalable, future-ready platforms. This combination of real-world demonstrations, expert-led instruction, and collaborative problem-solving is designed to deliver a practical, decision-ready set of insights for attendees, rather than theoretical discussions that remain confined to white papers and slide decks.
The event’s collaboration-oriented approach extends to governance, standards, and best practices. By gathering a broad cross-section of operators, vendors, and research organizations, DTW Ignite creates a fertile ground for harmonizing approaches to AI deployment, data governance, and security. The program is structured to foster ongoing dialogue beyond the conference, encouraging participants to continue collaboration through Catalyst projects, partner programs, and cross-organizational pilots. The emphasis on tangible outcomes—whether in the form of reference architectures, tested models, or scalable deployment patterns—helps ensure that the knowledge gained at Ignite translates into measurable improvements in network performance, operational efficiency, and service quality.
Huawei’s OTF presence adds another layer to the knowledge ecosystem. With OTF preceding the main event, attendees gain early exposure to intelligent operations topics and practical insights into how AI can drive growth through smarter, more efficient operations. The 10th anniversary edition of the OTF reinforces a long-standing commitment to advancing AI-enabled operational capabilities, reinforcing the message that intelligent operations are foundational to unlocking new business value. The collaboration between OTF and Ignite expands opportunities for attendees to explore how AI can be embedded into day-to-day operations, from forecasting demand and optimizing resource allocation to automating routine maintenance tasks and accelerating issue resolution.
Interactivity is a hallmark of the event. The program invites attendees to participate in the nomination and voting process for project demonstrations, ensuring that the most relevant, high-impact initiatives are showcased. This participatory approach helps align the program with the actual needs of telecommunications professionals, amplifying the practical relevance of the findings and the potential for widespread adoption. The combination of live demonstrations, collaborative problem-solving, and practitioner-focused content makes the event a rich learning environment that goes beyond traditional conference formats.
Sponsorship and industry participation underpin the event’s scale and reach. With sponsorship from more than 35 major companies across the telecommunications and technology sectors, Ignite is well-positioned to showcase a wide spectrum of capabilities. The sponsor roster includes prominent players such as Amdocs, AWS, Ericsson, Huawei, Netcracker, Oracle, Tech Mahindra, and Tecnotree, among others. This level of industry backing signals broad consensus on the strategic importance of AI, automation, and data-driven innovation in telco ecosystems. It also provides attendees with diverse perspectives on implementation approaches, technology choices, and go-to-market strategies, contributing to a more holistic understanding of how to navigate the AI-enabled transformation journey.
The event will feature several high-level voices, including statements from TM Forum’s CEO, who frames Ignite as more than a conference—it is a proving ground for the industry. The CEO’s remarks emphasize the collaborative, action-oriented ethos of the gathering, urging participants to move beyond discussion of future possibilities to the creation of shared solutions that can be built, tested, and scaled together. The emphasis on collective action and practical outcomes reflects a broader industry shift toward open collaboration and standardized practices that reduce complexity, shorten deployment cycles, and enable faster time-to-value for AI initiatives.
Looking ahead, attendees can expect a robust program that blends strategic insights with hands-on experiences. The knowledge exchange is designed to equip operators with a clear path from idea to deployment, offering concrete steps, reference architectures, governance considerations, and best practices that can be adapted to a wide range of network environments and service portfolios. The collaboration-centric atmosphere aims to foster partnerships and pilots that translate into tangible capabilities and business outcomes, reinforcing DTW Ignite’s role as a catalyst for the next wave of telco innovations driven by AI and data.
Huawei OTF: A Convergence of Intelligent Operations and Growth
A distinctive feature of DTW Ignite 2025 is the alignment with Huawei’s Operations Transformation Forum (OTF), which precedes the main Ignite program by a day. This alignment marks a significant milestone—the fusion of a legacy forum focused on intelligent operations with a broader industry conference devoted to AI-enabled telco transformation. The OTF’s guiding theme, All Intelligent Operations Ignite New Growth, highlights the core idea that intelligent operations are not just a cost center but a driver of growth, efficiency, and new capabilities for telecom operators. By combining OTF with Ignite, the organizers create an integrated platform that allows attendees to explore how intelligent operations underpin strategic growth and how AI can empower more proactive, data-driven decision-making across the network and the business.
The OTF has earned its 10-year milestone by consistently focusing on practical, operation-centric AI applications. As it merges with the Ignite program, participants can benefit from a comprehensive view that spans both the strategic, architecture-centric discussions and the hands-on, operational realities of deploying intelligent systems at scale. The 10th anniversary edition serves as a symbolic moment to reflect on progress while accelerating momentum for the next generation of intelligent operations. Attendees will have the opportunity to explore a wide range of topics, from automated fault management and predictive maintenance to resource optimization, service orchestration, and end-to-end visibility across multi-vendor, multi-domain networks. The integrated program aims to deliver a more cohesive experience, breaking down silos between strategic planning and operational execution, and enabling a smoother translation of AI-driven ideas into tangible efficiency gains and new service capabilities.
The collaboration between Huawei OTF and Ignite also expands access to the Innovation Zone and Innovation Hub, where participants can explore a broad set of Catalyst projects and collaborative efforts with Huawei and other partners. The combined program emphasizes hands-on experimentation, with hackathons and result sprints designed to yield quick, demonstrable outcomes. This approach aligns with Huawei’s emphasis on practical, scalable solutions that can be deployed in real-world networks, reinforcing the notion that intelligence in operations can drive growth by reducing downtime, improving service reliability, and enabling faster time to market for new offerings. The convergence underscores the industry’s shared belief that intelligent, automated operations are foundational to the telco future, enabling operators to scale AI capabilities across complex networks and business processes.
Attendees at the combined event will gain exposure to more than 50 Catalyst projects, along with numerous demonstrations and collaborative sessions that illustrate how ODA, AI, and autonomous network concepts come together to deliver tangible benefits. The integration of OTF’s focus on intelligent operations with Ignite’s emphasis on AI-enabled transformation creates a more comprehensive learning and collaboration environment. Operators can learn how to architect and operate networks that are capable of self-optimizing, self-healing, and self-managing to a degree, while also exploring new business models and services that can be enabled by smarter operational practices. The collaboration thus reinforces the message that growth in the telecom sector is increasingly dependent on intelligent, data-driven operations as a platform for broader digitalization and value creation.
Interactive Experiences, Masterclasses, and Networking
DTW Ignite 2025 places a strong emphasis on interactive experiences and practical engagement beyond traditional keynote sessions. The Solutions Room is a notable addition to the program, providing a dedicated space where participants can engage directly with industry challenges and work toward actionable solutions. This format encourages immediate collaboration and the co-creation of potential answers to real-world issues facing telcos, service providers, and technology partners. The aim is to convert insights into concrete steps that can be piloted, refined, and scaled in actual network environments. The Solutions Room supplements the broader conference program by offering a focused environment where problem-solving can occur in a structured, outcome-oriented manner.
Executive Connect is designed to deepen dialogue between communications service providers and technology vendors, with a target audience of several hundred CSP professionals. The goal is to accelerate alignment on priorities, standards, and investment decisions, facilitating productive conversations that can accelerate the adoption of AI, automation, and related capabilities. The emphasis on executive-level engagement helps to ensure that strategic perspectives—such as business models, customer experience, regulatory considerations, and long-term roadmaps—are central to the discussions, complementing the more technical sessions and demonstrations that populate the rest of the program.
As part of the technology showcase, attendees will gain exposure to advancements in Open Digital Architecture (ODA), including Open APIs and ODA Components. These demonstrations illustrate how modular, interoperable architectures can accelerate the deployment of AI-enabled network functions and data analytics. The masterclasses associated with these demonstrations provide deeper dives into architecture design, integration strategies, and governance considerations, equipping participants with practical guidance on implementing ODA-driven transformations in their organizations. The emphasis on practical demonstrations helps attendees evaluate new tools and approaches in the context of their own network environments, reducing risk and accelerating time to value.
The autonomous networks segment, open APIs, and ODA-focused masterclasses will be complemented by sessions in the Autonomous Network Summit. This portion of the program offers rich content focused on the practicalities of deploying autonomous, AI-powered network operations. Attendees can expect masterclasses and hands-on sessions that illustrate how AI, machine learning, and analytics work together to streamline network automation, optimize performance, and reduce operational complexity. These sessions are designed to be highly actionable, with takeaways that operators can translate into pilots and, ultimately, full-scale deployments.
The event’s interactive platform also enables attendees to nominate and vote on project demonstrations, ensuring that the most relevant and impactful content receives prominent visibility. This democratic element helps ensure that the conference remains responsive to industry needs and emerging trends, while also encouraging attendees to engage more deeply with the content, provide feedback, and identify priority areas for future exploration and investment. High-quality networking opportunities are woven throughout the program, with formal and informal breaks designed to maximize connection opportunities among operators, vendors, researchers, and thought leaders.
Sponsorship and partner organizations also contribute to the event’s robust networking environment. With sponsors spanning a wide range of telecommunications and technology players, attendees have abundant chances to explore partner ecosystems, examine interoperability considerations, and identify potential collaboration opportunities for pilots and joint ventures. The event’s sponsorship structure reinforces the message that AI-enabled telco transformation benefits from broad ecosystem participation, shared risk, and collective learning. Attendees can engage with a diverse set of perspectives on technology choices, business models, and go-to-market strategies, enriching the experience and expanding the horizon for practical implementations.
Open Digital Architecture, Demonstrations, and Practical Applications
A central theme throughout DTW Ignite is the practical demonstration of Open Digital Architecture (ODA) concepts and components. Open APIs and modular ODA building blocks enable operators to assemble, test, and deploy AI-enabled capabilities with greater speed and reliability. The masterclass sessions focused on ODA provide attendees with actionable guidance on how to design, implement, and govern digital architectures that support AI workloads, data sharing, and secure integration with cloud and edge environments. These sessions delve into architectural patterns that promote interoperability across multi-vendor ecosystems, enabling operators to mix and match components without sacrificing performance, reliability, or governance. The emphasis on ODA underscores the industry’s shift toward open standards and modular design as essential enablers of AI-driven telco transformation.
In parallel, the event’s demonstrations and talks about AI-enabled network automation illustrate how real networks can benefit from data-driven decision-making. Attendees witness how AI and ML can monitor, predict, and optimize network behavior, improving service quality, reducing latency, and increasing resilience. These demonstrations cover the end-to-end lifecycle of AI deployments—from data collection and model training to deployment, monitoring, and ongoing optimization—providing a practical narrative that operators can apply within their own environments. The masterclasses on AI governance and security complement these technical sessions, equipping participants with frameworks for risk assessment, model governance, and compliance with regulatory and privacy requirements. The intent is to ensure that AI deployments are not only technically feasible but also secure, ethical, and aligned with business objectives and customer expectations.
The Innovation Zone and Catalyst program provide a venue for collaborative exploration of AI-enabled concepts. Participants can observe prototypes, review results from hackathons, and engage with teams developing new methods for AI-driven optimization, automation, and service delivery. The zone fosters a spirit of experimentation, enabling operators and vendors to explore novel approaches, validate hypotheses, and identify scalable use cases that can be implemented in real networks. The Innovation Hub complements this by offering a space for deeper technical dialogue and hands-on experimentation with new tools, platforms, and methodologies that support AI at scale. The combined effect is a practical evidence base—comprising tested architectures, performance metrics, and deployment guidelines—that operators can rely on when planning their own AI initiatives.
Networking remains a core driver of the event’s value proposition. Beyond formal sessions, Ignite facilitates organic conversations and relationship-building opportunities that can accelerate collaboration, co-investment, and knowledge sharing. The mixture of structured sessions, informal gatherings, and targeted executive discussions creates multiple channels through which attendees can connect with potential partners, learn from peers, and identify opportunities to work together on AI-driven telco initiatives. This multi-layered approach is designed to maximize learning while also supporting practical outcomes such as pilot approvals, joint ventures, and the creation of standard-setting collaboration in subsequent cycles.
Sponsorships, Supporters, and Industry Endorsement
The success and scale of DTW Ignite 2025 are underpinned by robust industry support. More than 35 key companies across telecommunications and technology ecosystems are underwriting the event, reflecting a broad consensus on the importance of AI, automation, and data-driven innovation in the telco sector. Sponsors span a diverse array of service providers, software developers, cloud platforms, and hardware vendors, demonstrating a shared belief that AI-enabled telco transformation requires collaboration across the entire value chain. This support also enhances the event experience, expanding the range of demonstrations, labs, and hands-on sessions available to attendees and enriching networking opportunities for participants.
Among the prominent names associated with the event are Amdocs, AWS, Ericsson, Huawei, Netcracker, Oracle, Tech Mahindra, and Tecnotree. Each sponsor contributes a unique angle to the AI-enabled telco transformation narrative: Amdocs brings customer experience and service orchestration perspectives; AWS provides cloud infrastructure, data services, and AI tooling; Ericsson contributes network infrastructure expertise; Huawei adds intelligent operations and integration capabilities; Netcracker offers software and service management solutions; Oracle contributes data management and enterprise software expertise; Tech Mahindra and Tecnotree bring consulting and platform capabilities for business process optimization and digital transformation. The combination of these perspectives enriches the program, enabling attendees to explore a broader set of use cases and implementation patterns.
According to TM Forum leadership, Ignite is not only about showcasing capabilities but about actively shaping the industry’s trajectory. The event is framed as a space where practitioners, vendors, and researchers can come together to test ideas, exchange lessons learned, and identify practical steps that organizations can take to accelerate AI adoption in a way that aligns with strategic business objectives. The sponsorship model supports a resource-rich environment that fosters experimentation and collaboration, creating a conducive setting for pilots, proofs of concept, and early deployments that can inform product roadmaps and industry standards.
Implications for Telcos: Strategy, Transformation, and Execution
DTW Ignite 2025 has the potential to influence telcos’ strategic thinking and execution in multiple ways. First, the emphasis on three interconnected pathways—Composable IT & Ecosystems, Autonomous Networks, and AI & Data Innovation—offers operators a structured framework for prioritizing investments, aligning organizational capabilities, and sequencing initiatives. The composable architecture approach can help operators navigate multi-vendor ecosystems, reduce time-to-market for new services, and improve the resiliency and scalability of their platforms. By adopting open standards and modular components, telcos can accelerate the deployment of AI-enabled capabilities, while maintaining governance, security, and compliance.
Second, the focus on Autonomous Networks highlights a shift toward higher levels of automation in network management and operations. Level 4 autonomy represents a significant capability that can improve network reliability, reduce manual intervention, and enable faster issue resolution. However, it also demands careful governance, robust data pipelines, and secure AI models to manage risk and ensure predictable outcomes. Telecommunication operators will need to invest in data quality, telemetry, and continuous learning processes, as well as in organizational changes that empower engineers and data scientists to collaborate effectively with operations teams.
Third, the AI & Data Innovation pathway emphasizes the importance of data governance, privacy, and ethical AI. The establishment of standard blueprints for AI deployment can help operators implement AI in a repeatable, scalable manner while mitigating risk. This pathway’s governance focus is vital for ensuring that AI systems operate responsibly and transparently, particularly in customer-facing scenarios or in operations where AI decisions can impact service quality and customer trust. Operators will likely explore data marketplaces, secure data sharing, and privacy-preserving analytics as means to unlock value from data while maintaining regulatory compliance and customer confidence.
The convergence with Huawei’s OTF introduces an important operational dimension to Ignite’s strategic narrative. The emphasis on intelligent operations as a driver of growth reinforces the view that AI-enabled automation is not merely a technical upgrade but a strategic capability that can reduce costs, improve service levels, and unlock new revenue streams. The collaboration creates additional opportunities for operators to learn from Huawei’s experience in scalable AI deployments and to incorporate practical lessons into their own transformation programs. The opportunity to engage with Catalyst projects, live demonstrations, and collaborative sessions provides a robust platform for operators to identify, refine, and accelerate AI initiatives in a controlled, collaborative setting.
From a practical perspective, attendees can anticipate a clearer pathway to piloting and scaling AI-enabled capabilities. The event’s emphasis on interactive formats—such as the Solutions Room and Innovation Hub—offers a structured way to turn insights into plans, prototypes, and pilots. Operators can expect to gain exposure to reference architectures, deployment patterns, and governance frameworks that can help them manage risk, drive value, and demonstrate ROI to stakeholders. The knowledge exchange also supports the formation of partnerships and networks that can accelerate the adoption of AI across networks and services, a crucial factor in realizing the business benefits of AI investments.
Finally, the event’s scale and breadth—coupled with a strong sponsor ecosystem—signal a maturing market for AI-enabled telco solutions. The presence of major cloud providers, software vendors, network equipment suppliers, and system integrators indicates a convergence of capabilities that can help operators implement end-to-end AI-based transformations. This ecosystem breadth increases the likelihood that telcos will find ready-made solutions, interoperable components, and shared best practices that can shorten implementation timelines and reduce the risk of failed deployments. By facilitating collaboration across a broad community, DTW Ignite 2025 aims to accelerate the telecom industry’s transition to AI-driven networks and operations that deliver measurable improvements in efficiency, reliability, and customer experience.
Conclusion
DTW Ignite 2025 represents a pivotal moment for the telecom industry as it accelerates the adoption of AI, automation, and data-driven strategies. By centering the program around three interlinked pathways—Composable IT & Ecosystems, Autonomous Networks, and AI & Data Innovation—the event offers a comprehensive framework for operators to modernize their platforms, automate operations, and derive value from data in secure, scalable ways. The convergence with Huawei’s OTF adds a practical, operation-focused dimension to the discussion, reinforcing the view that intelligent operations are essential to growth and competitiveness in a digital-first world. With a strong lineup of speakers from AWS, IBM, Microsoft, Nvidia, and T-Mobile; a vibrant slate of Catalyst projects; and immersive experiences in the Innovation Zone and Solutions Room, attendees will walk away with concrete, actionable next steps for piloting and scaling AI-enabled capabilities across their networks. The event also emphasizes governance, security, and open standards, ensuring that AI-driven transformations are not only innovative but sustainable and responsible. As telcos navigate an era of rapid change, DTW Ignite 2025 positions itself as a practical, collaborative forum designed to turn AI ambitions into real-world outcomes that drive growth, efficiency, and enhanced customer experiences.