AT&T, Intel execs land top Telecom Infra Project roles

AT&T VP of RAN technology Rob Soni (pictured) was named the successor to Santiago Tenorio as the chair of the Telecom Infra Project (TIP), swiftly advancing the US operator’s involvement with the open RAN industry association a matter of months after joining the board.

Alongside naming Soni as its chair, TIP revealed Caroline Chan, VP of Intel’s Network and Edge Group, will be its next president. The executive is the longest-serving member of the open RAN group’s board, having joined in 2017, and brings a clear focus on network and cloud service providers, and enterprises to the table.

TIP thanked outgoing chair Tenorio for close to five-years’ leadership in statements and comments on X, where it said the Vodafone Group executive had been “instrumental” in advancing open RAN innovations and collaboration.

In a statement, TIP explained Tenorio had fuelled “significant strides in advancing open and disaggregated network solutions”.

Soni joined TIPs board in May to head AT&T’s involvement with the group. At the time he explained the move would help the US operator to achieve ambitious targets around its use of open and disaggregated radio systems.

He branded the move to chair TIP an honour at a time when the open RAN sector was moving into a critical phase in terms of “accelerating deployment” and pushing the programme to “every market”.

Chan flagged Soni’s “deep understanding of our industry’s technological and strategic demands”.

Tenorio asserted the group had made “incredible progress in transforming the telecom landscape through open innovation” during his tenure and expressed excitement over where Soni will “lead TIP next”.

Soni said Chan’s experience with 5G and network infrastructure position her well to lead TIP “into its next phase”, while executive director Kristian Toivo hinted at expectations of transformation and expansion based on the executive’s knowledge and “ability to bridge collaboration across diverse industry players”.