The Next Generation Mobile Networks (NGMN) Alliance has named Laurent Leboucher, Orange Group’s CTO and Executive Vice President of Networks, as its new Chairman of the Board for a two-year term.
Leboucher takes over from Arash Ashouriha, Deutsche Telekom’s Senior Vice President of Group Technology, who successfully led the alliance for four years. During his tenure, NGMN navigated the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, underwent a strategic realignment and rebranding, and published over 50 key industry guidelines. Ashouriha’s contributions included NGMN’s 6G Position Statement, the Cloud Native Manifesto, a roadmap for Green Future Networks, and frameworks for disaggregated network operations.
NGMN Alliance CEO, Anita Döhler, stated, “We look forward to continue working with Laurent on our focus topics disaggregation, sustainability, and advancing beyond 5G. His extensive industry expertise and leadership will be instrumental in guiding the Alliance’s work as we focus on sustainable, incremental network evolution towards 6G, also considering automation and AI.”
A member of the NGMN board since 2021, Leboucher brings extensive expertise in software systems and network architecture. His leadership is expected to drive NGMN’s mission forward, reinforcing its influence in the mobile industry by fostering innovation, collaboration, and sustainability.
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Laurent Leboucher, Chairman of the Board, NGMN Alliance, said, “I am honored to take on this role and excited to support NGMN in uniting operators, vendors, academia and the wider ecosystem to shape the future of mobile networks. The next two years are pivotal as we work towards network simplification and a smooth transition beyond 5G, towards 6G. With 6G standardization work starting this year, NGMN will play a vital role in providing the industry with the necessary requirements to drive global alignment. The risk of ecosystem fragmentation makes global standards and industry cooperation more important than ever. NGMN is uniquely positioned to bring the industry landscape together and help shap[e] a unified, future-ready network architecture.”
