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University of South Africa and Deutsche Telekom

30-minute keynote presentation, followed by panel discussion and audience Q&A

The future of telecom won’t be built by spectrum alone—it will be built on steel, fiber, and shared infrastructure.

In the early days of mobile, every carrier built and owned their own towers. Today, we’re in the middle of a global shift: telecom operators are selling off physical assets, TowerCos are rising, and passive sharing has given way to active integration.

This evolution is not just financial—it’s strategic. As 5G, Open RAN, and densified edge networks take hold, infrastructure sharing has become more feasible and attractive, offering a path to faster deployment, lower costs, and more efficient capital allocation. Rather than duplicating physical assets, operators can redirect investment toward innovation, network quality, and service improvements.

Globally, the rise of TowerCos and shared infrastructure reflects a clear trend: over the past two decades, markets have embraced infrastructure separation to enable faster time to market, greater coverage, and more competitive offerings, especially in hard-to-reach and cost-sensitive regions.

This session will explore why this model has taken root—and what it means for policymakers today. Among the questions we’ll examine:

• How has infrastructure sharing contributed to competition, innovation, and affordability in global markets?
• What market conditions and policy frameworks have supported its success?
• How can public and private actors align incentives to ensure that infrastructure evolution supports long-term consumer benefit?

The webinar will open with a keynote from Dr. Pantelis Koutroumpis, Director of the Oxford Martin Programme on Technological and Economic Change at the University of Oxford and one of the world’s leading experts on telecommunications economics and infrastructure policy. He will set the stage with insights from cutting-edge academic research and global practice.

He’ll be joined by two distinguished discussants: Dr. Sven Heitzler, Senior Manager of Spectrum Policy & Projects at Deutsche Telekom, and Mr. Danny Kotlowitz, a senior legal and regulatory advisor at Telstra with over 30 years of experience in infrastructure sharing and network strategy.

This webinar is designed for regulators, policymakers, economists, telecom strategists, and infrastructure investors navigating the future of digital connectivity.

As telecom infrastructure moves from asset to platform, understanding how, where, and why networks are shared may be one of the defining policy challenges of the decade.