Orange CTIO Sees AI as ‘Best Use Case’ for 5G

Paris-based wireless service provider Orange S.A. is gearing up to offer AI-as-a-Service to its customers, and the company’s technology chief says that service component stands out as “maybe the best use case” for the carrier’s 5G services.

Bruno Zerbib, Orange’s chief technology and innovation officer (CTIO), laid out the case for the AI-as-a-service push during an Oct. 3 discussion of the company’s strategy with CNBC.

“We are really getting ready to make sure that we’re going to be one of the best telecommunication companies to deliver AI as a service to our customers,” Zerbib said.

“We think it’s next generation service that, for me, has become maybe the best use case for explaining [and] justifying 5G,” he said.

Asked about other ways that Orange is moving the needle on AI adoption, Zerbib said the company’s thinking begins at home.

“The first thing we’re doing is making sure that anyone that works at Orange knows how to use it,” he said. “We call that responsible AI. We want to make sure that we understand the impact on cost, the impact on energy and resources [with] the way it’s being used. We want to be very responsible.”

“We want to also make sure that we educate every employee with regards to what we call hallucination,” the CTIO said, “and we’re making sure that everybody’s developing some kind of understanding of how it works.”

“We have thousands of developers that are not using AI to help them accelerate the development of their code, so that’s the first thing we’re doing,” he said.

Zerbib emphasized Orange’s thinking that AI in general, and as a service to deliver to the carrier’s customers, has staying power.

“I think we’re all familiar with the hype curve,” he said. “It becomes a big buzz and then at some point it’s disappointing and then it comes back.”

“It’s not happening with AI,” Zerbib said. I don’t think we are following the hype curve like with the metaverse two years ago, I think it will keep exceeding expectations.”

The Orange official also explored the question of where “AI is going to happen first,” and specifically whether and when it will catch on with specific devices.

“Is it going to happen on the device, which is what Apple would love to see, or is it going to happen in the cloud, which is what the hyperscalers want to see, Or is it going to be a mix,” he asked.

“I think the answer is going to be a mix based on the kind of questions you’re going to be asking, the kind of expectation you will have with AI,” Zerbib said. “I think everybody’s been getting ready to make sure that we’re going to be supporting all those use cases.”

“But I definitely believe that at some point what Apple is doing on the device is going to be extremely compelling,” he said. “What Meta is doing – the ability to have glasses that will stream constantly … back to the cloud in real time, that will happen. It’s just a matter of time.”