VTI strategy: we enable today’s business and shape the future
At Deutsche Telekom, innovation means creating the best (digital) customer experience on the basis of the best network – now and in the future. To this end, we neither manufacture smartphones, nor do we create our own film content, or the automation technology and sensors for industrial campus networks. Our core competency consists in integrating the individual components so that, in conjunction with our network and IT infrastructure, we can guarantee the best customer experience at a reasonable price with resilient and future-proof technology. This is precisely the task of our Technology and Innovation Board of Management department (VTI), which works in close cooperation with our operating segments. VTI is where we combine and integrate our Technology, Innovation, IT, and Security functions. This structure will allow us to meet the demands of the future network generation and the associated requirements not only of our customers, but also of society as a whole – also in terms of network security and sustainability. Our Group strategy includes the claim to “lead in technology.” That applies not only to high-speed broadband access, but also to responsible network production. That is an economic and ecological necessity, especially given growing cloudification, increasing data traffic, and the rising number of active components in our network. 
Gaming exemplifies the comprehensive nature of the role we play. We do not program games, but offer creators of games and gamers themselves a cloud gaming platform that uses the latest NVIDIA RTX servers with powerful graphics cards. Our networks enable a seamless end-to-end experience that also includes access to stable bandwidth. It is a service we can already offer our fixed-network broadband customers, and our LTE/4G and 5G mobile customers. On top of that, we are building infrastructure to integrate distributed cloud capacity (edge clouds) into our networks. That is getting the cloud closer to the gamers. We define and configure our networks in such a way as to provide stable, low-latency gaming traffic, making for a user experience without interruptions and delays. At the same time, we help a large number of people #TAKEPART by facilitating access to our platform.
The crisis triggered by coronavirus has underscored the importance of investing in resilient, future-proof technology: our networks and IT were, are, and will remain secure and stable. That would not have been possible without the IP migration in Europe and the IT turnaround in Germany.
We are thus in a position both to enable Deutsche Telekom’s current business and to simultaneously shape the future. We are convinced that, in line with the priorities of our segments, we can reliably deliver results, constantly develop product, industry, and technological innovations, and simultaneously hone and refine our ways of working – all in the best interests of Deutsche Telekom.
- Delivery Innovation: VTI is a supplier for the Group. As such, it is particularly important that we consistently meet our obligations. That means conscientiously delivering our services, leveraging the synergies offered by centralized production, and working cost-efficiently. At the same time, we can also shape the future, e.g., by promoting agile working methods to make our production future-proof.
- Experience Innovation: We are Deutsche Telekom’s central innovation team. Constantly pursuing innovations that benefit both our customers and the Group is our task and our obligation – but we also consider it an expression of the freedom we enjoy. Our technological innovations form the underpinnings for this. We work in close cooperation with the segments in order to meet all customer requirements, and create useful and meaningful innovations.
- Capability Innovation: Continuing to turn Deutsche Telekom into a software-based company entails transforming our capabilities. We want to recognize future changes in our Company and be able to handle them as they arise. Changes become entrenched especially when accompanied by cultural innovation in the shape of skills transformation and the systematic retraining and further training of our employees as software engineers, AI experts, and network architects. By the end of 2020, we had given 1,000 of our employees intensive training in topics relevant for the future, such as software development, artificial intelligence, and cloud computing in 15 Skill Academies.
