This week, CENGN headed down south for the 2017 Canadian ISP Summit at the Toronto Marriott Downtown Eaton Centre Hotel.

The Canadian ISP Summit is a multi-day conference organized by the Canadian Network Operators Consortium Inc. (CNOC) to address existing challenges in the telecommunications industry, and discuss possibilities for the future. This annual event brings together hundreds of internet service providers, technology vendors, academia and industry professionals from across Canada, creating a unique environment for learning, networking, and collaboration. This year, the ISP summit attracted a massive crowd from companies like TELUS, Bell, and Rogers. Over the course of three days, attendees got to enjoy event activities including keynote speeches, presentations, panel discussions, exhibitions and lightning talks.

Featured speakers touched on themes like Internet of Things (IoT), security, artificial intelligence (AI) and mobile networks. In a session on machine learning, Viktor Osipchuk, Systems Engineer at Cisco, indicated that the most important component of digital transformation is process automation. According to him, telemetry and analytics will provide real-time, actionable insights about what is happening in future networks. The conference also provided relevant business tips to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the industry. During a presentation captioned ‘Surviving and Thriving in a land of giants’, Queen’s University Marketing & Business Strategy Professor, Kenneth Wong, shared some tactics for negating the size-based advantages that larger industry players enjoy.

CENGN was honoured to receive an invitation to speak about our role in advancing next generation networks. Presenting on our behalf, Business Engineering Manager, Robert McMillan, showcased the world-class CENGN Infrastructure, highlighting how companies can leverage our services to propel their technology from the innovation to the commercialization phase. He also revealed CENGN’s search for collaborators to undertake research, engage in Proof-of-Concept projects and provide recommendations for expansion of broadband services in Rural and Northern communities.

There were several exhibitions on the event grounds throughout the conference. In between presentations, attendees had the opportunity to interact with company representatives and learn about the latest communications technologies. One of the highlights for most people was perhaps getting to drink an edible ISP Summit logo with their coffee from the Espresso stand.

Since the start of CENGN, we’ve been working with service providers and technology vendors to innovate and raise the status of Canada’s telecommunications industry on the world stage. With the support of our consortium members, CENGN has created a neutral and secure environment where competing organizations including Canada’s largest internet service providers, Bell, TELUS, and Rogers, can cooperate to produce ground-breaking technologies for the industry. Events like the ISP Summit, therefore, support our mission and help us reach a wider audience with our message.

Congratulations to the CNOC and all event sponsors for hosting yet another enlightening conference. It was amazing getting to build connections with stakeholders from across all over the country. We look forward to continuing the conversation on advancing Canada’s ICT sector at the 2017 CENGN Summit.

[cherry_button text=”View other CENGN Events” url=”https://www.cengn.ca/events/” style=”default” icon_position=”top” bg_color=”#ffffff” color=”#000000″ min_width=”80″ target=”_self”]Board of Directors [/cherry_button]

About the Author

CENGN, Canada’s Centre of Excellence in Next Generation Networks, drives technology innovation and industry growth through our testbed, technical expertise, talent development, and partner ecosystem. Through our projects, CENGN enables small and medium Canadian Enterprises to test and validate promising technologies, removing barriers to product commercialization and accelerating market growth.

More by CENGN