Matt Bross

Mr. Bros is a man of passion and energy for the telecoms business that is born of an innate ability to master technology, and remarkably he does not hold a single degree qualification despite holding one of the world's top corporate technology positions.

'But I do know exactly how things work together, how things integrate and a vision of the future. I am doing this job because this is what interests me and not because I have to.'

Not many people realize that only nine per cent of BT's profits come from the old fixed line network in the UK. This is a $40 billion-a-year global communications giant which works mainly for major corporations from media groups like Reuters to DP World since the P&O acquisition.

Biological battery

At the World Economic Forum in Davos this year BT presented a new battery technology for mobile phones which grows batteries organically and could replace the poisonous lithium based batteries of today's phones.

'It is a clear substance that functions as a battery and biodegradable unlike conventional batteries,' explains Mr.Bross. 'The idea is to have it commercially available within two years though I think that is being a bit optimistic.

'The pace of technological innovation is accelerating like never before. I believe that never in history has there been so much meaningful innovation going on, even during the dotcom boom, which really only saw a lot of cloning of good ideas. The rate of change is at an all time high'.

Traditionally, technological innovation was confined to the creativity available within in-house research and development departments. The inherent limitations of the insular models of innovation made forward-looking organizations like BT rethink the whole process of creating fresh ideas.

'The number of new ideas that can be developed and brought to market is ultimately constrained by the size and wealth of a company's R&D department,' says Mr. Bross. 'This can be potentially disastrous given the fact that new technologies become obsolete in no time these days or get rapidly cloned or reverse engineered.'

Systems of the future

In the near future BT's CTO believes that the group will be able to build systems for clients out of standardized units much in the way that General Motors assembles a new car. This will greatly accelerate the speed of innovation.

Currently, BT is busy with the biggest telecommunications innovation project in the world, its 21st Century Network (21CN) programme. 21CN will make the UK the first country in the world to move its core telecommunications infrastructure to a next generation all-IP network, enabling BT and third parties to deliver a wide range of new products and services to customers, both business and private.

It will help achieve reduced complexity and a significantly lower cost base, with savings of and estimated one billion US dollars per annum. This strategy seeks to leave behind the limitations of the now outdated closed approach to the creation of ideas.

Mr. Bross advocates that an organization must look beyond its own internal assets and connect to a much larger universe of creative thinkers, including developers outside the company, in order to maximize innovative capability.

'Globalization is driving innovation,' says Mr. Bross. 'There are great ideas coming out of China, India, Latin America and Asia, for example. We are trying to explore opportunities wherever they exist and fuse them together to bring together the best thinking in the world.'