TeleGeography Explains the Internet

As we look at the massive AI boom sweeping across the globe, what does it actually take from a physical standpoint to keep these models running? Why are submarine cable operators building networks just in case a surge of traffic arrives, and how is local power grid availability dictating exactly where the next major hubs are being built? What role are legacy crypto-mining data centers playing now...

The TeleGeography Explains the Internet podcast welcomes Jezzibell Gilmore, General Manager, Service Provider at Kentik. She discusses the profound impact of artificial intelligence on global network infrastructure, and how networks are evolving to handle new technological demands. Key topics covered: The Strain of AI workloads: The explosion of AI and GPU-heavy tasks is exposing the criticality o...

Host Greg Bryan welcomes Phill Lawson-Shanks, Chief Innovation Officer at Aligned Data Centers. With several decades of experience in digital infrastructure, Phill has seen the industry evolve from mainframes and green screens to the massive hyperscale cloud platforms we rely on today. In this episode, we explore: The Shift in Data Center Geography: Why the "center of gravity" for networks is movi...

This episode features Hunter Newby, a veteran of the telecom industry with experience spanning from LDDS WorldCom to building carrier hotels and neutral internet exchange points. Newby discusses how AI inferencing is reshaping network infrastructure requirements and why geography still matters in the internet age. Key topics covered: Low-latency inferencing: Why AI applications require a fundament...

What are the real bottlenecks in AI infrastructure development? How is this infrastructure boom similar to the 90s internet boom? How do we overcome the pricing paradox in telecom transport where demand keeps rising and service prices keep falling? Today on TeleGeography Explains the Internet, we welcome Luis Colasante, Head of Procurement Strategy for Energy & Infrastructure at Colt Technolog...

Host Greg Bryan welcomes Jason Gintert back to the show. As the incoming President of the U.S. Networking User Association, Jason dives into the current state of AIOps in network management. This includes: Low Adoption and Key Challenges: Despite being a popular topic, AIOps adoption remains low due to concerns about trusting AI output (hallucinations) and the indeterminate nature of large languag...

Our latest pod series on all things AI continues with Seva Vayner, Product Director for Cloud Edge & AI at Gcore. Seva joins host Greg Bryan to tackle what is perhaps the dominant topic in telecom today: the impact of AI on the network. The pair distinguish between "AI for networking" and "networking for AI," and explore how AI training models are driving a dramatic increase in power consumpti...

It's a new year and the TeleGeography Explains the Internet team is kicking off a multi-episode series all about AI and its impact on global networks. To start, we're joined by Chalan Aras, Senior Vice President at Riverbed to discuss how the rise of Artificial Intelligence is fundamentally reshaping the way we think about the WAN. In this episode, we dive into: AI for Networking vs. Networking fo...

TeleGeography experts Jon Hjembo and Patrick Christian answer our biggest questions about recent data center and AI booms. In this final episode of our three-part pod series reviewing the year in telecom—and looking ahead to 2026—we cover: How many data center projects were we tracking in 2025? And where are they located around the world? What kind of constraints are those projects encountering, a...

Welcome to the second episode in our three-part series catching up on the most interesting stories in telecom from 2025, and looking forward to what we expect in 2026.  Today's episode focuses on all things pricing and enterprise networks. We're joined by Rob Schult, who leads TeleGeography's pricing practice, and Brianna Boudreau, who manages our SD-WAN and NaaS research. These experts tackle que...

What were the big cable headlines of this year, and what do you need to know about transport networks in 2026? To find out, we're kickstarting our three-episode review of What to Know in the New Year. Joining us for this submarine and terrestrial infrastructure review are friends of the pod Lane Burdette and Paul Brodsky. In this episode of the TeleGeography Explains the Internet  podcast, these e...

While we hear a lot about automated provisioning and NaaS, how long does it really take to get a quote for DIA service? Or more to the point, how long does it take to actually get a circuit installed? What do enterprises really think of their ISPs? In this episode of the TeleGeography Explains the Internet  podcast, Dennis Thankachan, CEO and co-founder of Lightyear, addresses these questions and...

Perhaps you've seen the Aurora Borealis. This is a beautiful example of what we call space weather. But did you know that space weather could take out service on submarine cables? Shibaji Chakraborty, a research scientist at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, joins the show to explain how space weather can affect the critical, metallic power-feed cables that run alongside the fiber-optic lines...

Tony O’Sullivan, CEO of RETN, joins Greg to discuss network resiliency. They address how providers can build networks that withstand outages, whether from someone who forgot to call the utility company or an anchor dragging on the seafloor. The episode covers: Why it's crucial to have a transparent provider willing to share information about their network when they can, including the physical loca...

In our final episode of this special podcast series about undersea cables, we're exploring the rapidly evolving technology of using fiber optic cables as remote sensors. We welcome Mark Englund, CEO of Fibersense. Mark explains the fascinating world of Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS), and how this emerging technology is turning existing fiber optic cables into sentient, continuous sensors. We e...

Today's bonus podcast welcomes Tim Urban, author of the blog Wait But Why (https://waitbutwhy.com/) and the book "What's Our Problem?" For a change of pace, this episode focuses on what happens *on* the consumer internet, not just the underlying technology and business of the web. You'll quickly see that Tim is an astute observer of human trends, with a wealth of insight on how the internet has co...

Where do operators physically place their submarine cables, and why does that matter? Even among those familiar with the undersea cable market, many don't give much thought to where precisely the cables lie on the seafloor and what factors determine this geography. Today's guest knows a thing or two about how it gets done. We welcome James Porter, Cable Route Engineer at Alcatel Submarine Networks...

When submarine cables hit the mainstream media, it might be because something has gone wrong. Especially when faults lead to a bottleneck that slows down or, in rare cases, even stops internet traffic for some people. Our guests today presented a paper at SubOptic 25 detailing their study on global submarine cable maintenance and recommendations for the industry. Mike Constable, Principal at Infra...

Let's talk about keeping submarine cables secure. Ferris Adi, Chief Information Security Officer at Trans Americas Fiber System (https://transamericasfiber.com/), joins to discuss specific threats to submarine cables and how best to build resiliency against them. We also cover various regulatory and compliance issues that submarine cable operators face when landing in different countries, as well...

We're kicking off a brand new mini-series all about *submarine cables.* To start off the series, we couldn't think of a better guest than Senior Research Analyst Lane Burdette, an expert (and nerd) when it comes to cables. She and host Greg Bryan discuss the economics of submarine cables. The conversation covers: A refresher on the cables themselves, and all of the components that go into building...

Joining us today is FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington. Commissioner Simington has served on the Commission since late 2020. He brings a diverse background to the role, including experience with the NTIA. The Commissioner and Host Greg Bryan cover several key issues facing the FCC: 👉 Several issues surrounding spectrum allocation and use. We talk about how FWA and LEO fit in spectrum plans, CBRS,...

We welcome Michael Martin, formerly a global network and security architect at McKinsey.  Michael has extensive experience in the enterprise network space. We get his take on the industry's state of implementation of network automation among enterprises. Podcast HQ: https://www2.telegeography.com/telegeography-explains-the-internet-podcast TeleGeography Blog: https://blog.telegeography.com/ Our Re...

Dennis Thankachan, Co-Founder and CEO of Lightyear (https://lightyear.ai/), is back on the pod. We discuss Lightyear's State of Connectivity Report (https://lightyear.ai/ebooks/lightyears-state-of-connectivity-2025), which dovetails with the topics we research here at TeleGeography. It may be a perfect companion to our State of the Network effort. (https://www2.telegeography.com/download-state-of-...

We haven't been getting enough fiber here at TeleGeography Explains the Internet, but we're about to change that. We welcome Todd Chapman, a veteran in fiber development. Todd walks us through the ins and outs of Layer 0 of the physical infrastructure underlying data transmission.   Podcast HQ: https://www2.telegeography.com/telegeography-explains-the-internet-podcast TeleGeography Blog: https://b...

Our next guest is Fahim Sabir, Director of Digital Solutions at Colt. What is NaaS? Fahim joined us to clarify the often confusing world of Network as a Service (NaaS). We discuss Fahim's definition of NaaS and a breakdown of why it's important in the market. We also discuss the back end, examining what the carrier ecosystem needs to accomplish to make customer-facing NaaS a reality. Podcast HQ: h...