Chief Executive Officer (BTC)

Being an archipelago, The Bahamas relies more than most countries on its connectivity in order to function, communicate with the rest of the world and further its development agenda. How would you describe the telecommunications sector in the country today?

For The Bahamas, the telecommunications’ structure - the topology of the network and the vastness of the network - is one of the most complex networks in the Caribbean. We have to cover over 700 islands, rocks and cays that span over 100,000 km of the Atlantic Ocean. Using a map, if you put your finger and measure from the western most island, Bimini; down to Inagua, the most southern island; then, take that same finger and measure it across the Caribbean starting from Trinidad up to Puerto Rico; that is the size of The Bahamas. Our telecommunications’ network has to provide services in terms of high speed internet, mobile and fixed line services to all of the major islands of The Bahamas. We have an inter-island submarine fiber optic cable network , which was built in 2005, and an intra-island submarine cable connecting more than 270 cell sites. The Bahamas has more than 40 LTE cell sites covering almost 99% of the population of a country with three hundred plus thousand persons. When you compare this to Jamaica, which has 2.75 million people and still doesn’t have 4G or LTE cellular services that a major accomplishment.  Additionally, if you look at the fact that the Bahamian cellular subscriber can roam in the US on any major carrier’s network, in particular, ATT and their LTE network (which is the latest technology mobile), this suggests to you the advanced network and infrastructure present in The Bahamas.. Existing in BTC technological infrastructure are vendors like Ericsson, Huawei and CISCO who all work together to advance BTC’s Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) agenda. We are also constantly refreshing our network. For example, in October 2015 we suffered around $25 million worth of damages as result of the last hurricane. The networks in the south-east islands will be refreshed - the WIMAX network, wifi network, cellular 4G, LTE networks and the copper cable network. We’ve made a determination that rather than replacing the copper network  in many of the islands, we will put in an all fibre network; again continuing to build a network in The Bahamas that we can boast as the most sophisticated networks within the Caribbean.

BTC is the largest provider of electronic communications services in The Bahamas and operates fixed, mobile and broadband networks. From your perspective, what would you say are the company’s biggest strengths at present?

If you go back to when telecommunications first came to The Bahamas in 1892, when the government of The Bahamas did a joint venture and built a submarine cable between Jupiter, Florida and into Goodman’s Bay, Nassau, which as a result of that the area became Cable Beach, the fact is that generations of Bahamians - both whites and blacks - have been responsible for the maintenance, development and growth of the network. So I suppose our biggest strength is that up until 2011, when the company was privatised, it was a 100% Bahamian owned company ran by Bahamians, not withstanding the fact that it was a state-owned enterprise. It competed very well with companies of similar nature that were privately owned in the Caribbean. So when you look at it in retrospect, you go as far back as 2003/2004 and you can see why the International Telecommunications Union stated that The Bahamas was the most deeply connected country in this region. It was number one in the Caribbean and number three in the Americas following Canada and the US. So it speaks volumes about the quality of the network that is here. BTC was under the government up until 2011, and under the leadership of Prime Minister Perry G. Christie when we built the submarine cables connecting 40 islands of The Bahamas. The question once asked by me to Mr. Christie was, “if you don’t deploy the submarine cable to Rum Cay, Salvador and Inagua, will the students in the classes have the same access to high-speed internet and GSM services as students in Nassau”, my answer was no, so he said “build it”. He just wanted to ensure that citizens - under his leadership - were not marginalised in terms of communications. So, for example, to install services to supply 80 people in part of Acklins would cost $6 million and no private company would build a submarine cable south of Eleuthera because it would have been cost prohibitive, but BTC did it prior to privatisation basically because it was driven by the philosophy of Prime Minister Christie at that time that every Bahamian should be brought to the same level of telecommunications awareness and have access to it, and that he was Prime Minister not of Nassau but of The Bahamas.

In 2011 the Bahamian government completed the privatisation of BTC with the $210 million sale of 51% of the company’s shares to Cable & Wireless Communication (CWC), a global, full-service communications business that operates in 38 countries. Then Prime Minister - Hubert Ingraham - asserted at the time that privatisation was essential for the development of the Bahamian economy as it is no longer about telecommunications; rather we are now in a world of converged communications. In your opinion, what impact did this move have on telecommunications services in the country?

Yes, to clarify, BTC was privatised in April 2011, 51% Cable & Wireless and 49% Bahamian government. Then in 2012 a committee appointed by Prime Minister Christie started the negotiations with Cable & Wireless and as a result of that, in 2014 a special foundation fund was created and 2% of the shares of Cable & Wireless were invested to that foundation so 49% was owned by the government, 49% owned by Cable & Wireless and 2% goes into this foundation. So the government has 49% and the foundation has 2% but the Bahamian people have access to 51%.

In response to your question, we need to go back to say, for example, the IDB 2012 Report on telecommunications broadband employment within the Caribbean. The figures indicate, for example, 10% increase in broadband penetration would have impacted around 2.6% increase in GDP and 1% lowering of the unemployment rate. Since telecommunications/ICT is the crude oil 21st century, governments of Caribbean countries - if they want to see the Caribbean move forward - cannot leave it all to private sector. I would love to quote a former minister of telecommunications from Antigua, Dr. Edmond Mansoor, who says “Caribbean citizens are paying more for less”. This means that if you compare the speeds of the broadband that the average citizen in the Caribbean is paying to those in OECD countries, for example, the speeds are lower but the prices are higher. So the question for governments is if broadband/ICT is the fuel of the 21st century, how do you make that fuel affordable to get sustainable growth? What is the cost you are prepared to pay to contribute to that or do you leave it in the hands of private investors whose first motive is dividends to the shareholders?

So within the context of The Bahamas, the government owns 49% + 2% shares of BTC and Cable & Wireless owns 49% with management control. The question is moving forward, how do you influence the position, for example, when there is a major cost consideration and it is not financially viable to make the investment? Prior to 2011, when I was CEO of BTC, the Prime Minister would say go ahead and build a submarine cable, he can’t do that today and so how do you get your vision aligned with the shareholders’ vision and the stakeholders when you know quite well that the country cannot move forward without a very solid telecommunications ICT infrastructure. Hotels won’t come, banks won’t come and businesses won’t come unless they can have a reliable, 24/7 telecommunications network. Even if it wasn’t for the investor, how do you move forward in an archipelagic nation like The Bahamas with 700 islands, rocks and cays to be able to effectively handle your national security risk, if you can’t have some input and influence on how that is handled when there are 53 airports that need telecommunications network, or police who need the ability to communicate between the remote islands of Inagua back to the centre, or the defence force, nurses and doctors in the clinics. How do you manage and contribute to that process moving forward?

Your mission is “to always believe in better.” In 2000, BTC and the government invested over $350 million to build the Bahamas Domestic Submarine Network International (BDSNi) and since 2011, it has invested $62 million in setting up the NGN. Early last year, BTC committed to investing $200 million through 2017 to reinforce cellular coverage and introduce new fixed and mobile technology. It also launched its 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) service for a New Providence, Grand Bahama, Abaco and Eleuthera, bringing mobile service on par with standards seen in major international markets. How are these investments helping BTC to overcome its biggest challenges?

Telecommunications companies like BTC really need deep pockets. You have to overcome the high obsolescence in telecommunications gear and the mere fact that when a vendor comes in to sell you a piece of equipment and tells you that it is the best, you know better. If it’s not investing in research and development, his competitor is and he will be history. Look at Blackberry, which owned almost every mobile phone in the Caribbean. They didn’t stay current and you can see what Samsung and Apple iPhones and smart phones have done to them. They’re history. I could give you a list of companies that just got it wrong. It’s about keeping in step and whether you meet the needs of the customer and so when you would have had two CEOs at Blackberry, and one of them asks “Why do I need my emails in colour?” you know that you are out of touch with your customer base. Then people said a couple years ago that nobody would sit down and watch videos on a small telephone so it shows you how when you make these pronouncements, the manager is seeing down the road but the leader is not seeing around the corner. Your product, your service and your company will be history because the demographics are changing. There are seven billion people in the world, 50% under the age of 30, and in The Bahamas the same applies. There are 350,000 Bahamians and the average age for Bahamian females is 29.8 and for males 30 years old, so if you are not in touch with those customers, you will miss the boat. So today sitting in my stores are iPhones 6 that we bought last year, and next week or two we will be selling the iPhone 6s, and nobody is going to buy iPhone 6. Next year this time we will be selling iPhone 7 and the same thing happened with Samsung 5 and then Samsung S and H, and if you are not in the business of seeing the future in ICT you are going to be history in a short time. So BTC has to stay on the cutting edge, keeping in mind that the cutting edge is also the bleeding edge. Blood will be shed but it is the risk you have to take to remain relevant to your customer base and it’s all about them, not what you think will and will not make money.

There are always disruptive technologies. In telecommunications, Skype came and now it’s WhatsApp. As a result of that telecom companies like BTC will find their profits and revenues just going south so how do you mitigate what we refer to as the ‘over the top operators’ who use our network, have no costs and pay no taxes. They make revenue and the more you build and invest in your network, the more they will use it, but they don’t revenue share with you. They don’t pay customs duty for the equipment that comes into the country and so if you don’t change the DNA of the company to cope with these changing realities, you’ve got a problem. Someone always asks what is it that keeps you up late at night, for management it is about getting conformity and everybody seeing the same policies and procedures in uniformity. For leaders it is about managing change. General managers work well in peaceful times but in war time the leader goes to bed every night and wakes up and the battle field has been rearranged so it’s the ability to cope with change and be able to manage it.

Innovation is critical to the long-term survival of any company. BTC is starting “IPTV”, which is currently being testing with 130 channels on a number of islands. You are also introducing new cloud services. As CEO, what new developments are you most excited about and why?

We will be changing the whole DNA of the company moving it from a fixed line, where we will be doing brand new fibre to the home, and ripping out the copper plant, which is a very expensive ordeal. Right now, for example, almost 60-70% of the revenues will come from mobile services. I could see that changing over the next couple of years and liberalisation will take place and there will be a competitor in the market. How do you go about retooling the company to look for every dollar that is lost in the mobile space—you introduce IPTV. The question is, so you get a bonus, you get a hit from there, but how long is that going to last? Once I pass an idea onto my marketing team and we get it rolling, I am looking at the next idea. I can’t rest on helping them to develop IPTV, I have to be looking for the next thing, and that is to introduce a data centre for data services and cloud services, and see how you could introduce these services to bring the cost down. Looking at the mobile unit, do I need to continue to have a network for data and a network for voice or do I go ahead and introduce the multi-voice over LTE and reduce my network down to a simple network. I am always looking at what technologies are available, looking at the construct and how it applies in-country because what works in Jamaica, might not necessarily work in the Bahamas. So my job as CEO is to vision down the road rather than just coming up with an idea. There are always entrepreneurs that have been doing disruptive technology and finding ways of creating a new type of technology, so you just have to plan to innovate. This business is about innovation. Before, Generation X would use the phone to make a phone call, but generation Y, Z and alpha won’t pick up the phone and make a call, they pick up their mobile phones and start using their thumbs. They are using WhatsApp and are not interested in sending you emails. They want instant-gratification and what you to answer and chat with them. So whoever controls the thumbs of generation Y, Z and Alpha, controls the wallet. So I built my network years ago when an average customer picked up their phone five times to talk five minutes a day. The average customer of generation Y, Z and Alpha picks up their phone and they are on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn etc., for up to 10 hours a day, they are not doing five-minute calls. So the network has to be able to handle that kind of traffic. I’ve seen over the last two years since I’ve been here an increase of over 100% in traffic but the revenues are still going south, because rather than spend $10 per day for calls, young people are taking $3 per day for data and are calling free of charge through apps. It’s a different demographic and you have to get in that demographic and be a part of it, to see what drives them.

It is very dynamic and that is why you need innovative people around you with. For me those people require three main qualifications: one, they must be able to think outside of the box and two, they have to be able to execute at the speed of thought. I don’t have the luxury of sitting down forever and doing a SWOT analysis as my competitor is not allowing me that amount of time. The time between the conception of the thought and getting that product into the hands of the consumer has to be reduced as much as possible if not eliminated, all together. Qualification number three is that you have a choice for me, you can walk on the broad path or you could walk on the edge. If you are not walking on the edge, for me, you are taking up too much space. This business of telecommunications sometimes needs guts, it’s about risk. Calculated risk yes, but it’s about risks as you are dealing with millions and millions of dollars. I say to my staff “if you want what you have never had before, then you have to do what you have never done before, if you continue to do what you have always done, you continue to get what you have always gotten and doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result is madness”. Whether things goes right or wrong, as a CEO, you are responsible so it takes a certain level of fortitude and some people just don’t have what it takes to make the tough calls.

For many decades BTC was the sole telecommunications provider, however, over the past 10 years that monopoly has been systematically dismantled. It began with Internet service, then landline and in 2014 the final pillar - mobile - became liberalised, with Cable Bahamas and Virgin Bahamas both submitting proposals to become the second mobile operator. How are you going to ensure that BTC can compete with the new entrant and remain the market leader?

We have years of investments. BTC is a telecommunications company that has been around for 100 years, so you could imagine the value of our assets. A new player coming in has the potential to come in with new equipment, which means that you have replace equipment if you want to keep up. Number one, you have to get the technology, you have to get the employees trained on the technology and then the technology has to be relevant to The Bahamas. So from Inagua in the south, to Abaco in the north, the technology has to be relevant, it just cannot be for the persons in Nassau. Once you start doing that and developing your value proposition, you have to win the hearts and minds of Bahamians. You have to convince them  that you will be there for them in the good times and in the bad times. Answer the question of “Why they should stay with you?” Pricing, technology and customer service are the sort of things that you have to go after, and you should be doing this whether there is competition or not.

So, for example, just last Saturday, we split our technicians in the family islands into two groups. We brought them into Nassau, put them in the Hilton Hotel for the weekend and had a retreat for them. Following the devastation on Hurricane Joaquin, many BTC staff members were impacted. The staff on New Providence collected over $10,000 and we gave the affected staff cheques yesterday, and placed them on the plane and sent them back to their places of work today. These technicians have been busy restoring almost 59 cell sites in places like Crooked Island. They will not have power before Christmas, so you can imagine that they can’t cook and many of their houses and cars have been destroyed. I am the CEO and for me, that stands for “Chief Enthusiasm Officer”, not Chief Executive Office. I’m not a boss, if I can’t look after my people first, could you imagine what kind of relationship I would have with those people if all I’m doing is driving them just to get the phones restored and do not care about them. I brought them in yesterday, had a chat with them and told them to go home and hug your wife, go hug your husband and your children and tell them Leon Williams says “thanks, thanks for doing what you are doing, because you don’t have to do it because I can’t pay them.” There was a young man after the hurricane who took his mother’s generator to power a cell site, just so the community could get cell service. You can’t pay someone for that, and so things like that I highlight, I go to the islands, meet the team and hug them.

The University of Liverpool said there are 25,000 scholarly definitions for leadership, which comes from the root word of ‘lead’. This is both a noun and a verb, for example, I lead this project and I am the lead on this project. I love Colin Powell’s definition, which says “leadership is the art of getting more out of people than the science of management says is possible”. I love that because you can have all the 8x10s on the wall talking about your degree and MBA, but if you can’t connect with people and people are not following you then you are just taking a walk in the park. So my rule is that I would never ask people to do what I wouldn’t do. When I go out to look at a matter that needs five technicians to find out what is wrong with it, I take off my coat, role up my sleeve and climb down into the manhole because leadership is about what you do, not who you are, that is not a position. So my thing is I have to get my 614 employees committed to the products and services that we sell, and have them become my ambassadors, and I must get the people in the family islands to see that BTC has been there for them, BTC contributes to them rather than just taking from the community—BTC adds value. So when we went to Rum Cay with the Deputy Prime Minister a week ago, a school couldn’t open, we cleaned out BTC facilities and moved all the school into the BTC’s facilities. The children had air conditioned offices with high speed internet and 150 channels so they could watch TV before school starts and before they leave to go to their houses where they don’t have power. So we gave theam a degree of normalcy, that’s what BTC does for the community.

How do want BTC to be perceived by domestically and internationally?

I think locally BTC must be seen as one of the most beloved and benevolent companies. We have enabled a text number for Hurricane Joaquin asking customer to text“Help” to 5200 For every dollar you contribute, BTC will contribute a dollar. We partnered with a vendor of ours who will also give a dollar for every dollar. I spoke with Phil Bentley from Cable & Wireless who will also give a dollar for every dollar. The fact that our staff in Nassau raised $10,000 to donate to their sisters and brothers is indicative of the type pf company BTC is. BTC is not here to rake all of its profits from the community on the backs of people, but BTC gives back. We give scholarships, we contribute and we sponsor, and I don’t think there is anyone else in this country that sponsors like BTC. When we can’t, we partner with people and we find people to sponsor.

From an international point of view, I want BTC to be perceived as knowledgeable and on the cutting edge with technology that is as good as it gets in the US or other first world countries. So when someone comes into the Bahamas, their mobile device must work the same way they work in London or in New York. There should be no services that you can get in New York or London that you can’t get in The Bahamas through BTC. Cable & Wireless’s acquisition of Columbus for $3.25 billion in November of last year gives us a footprint, which means that we can provide to any customer in The Bahamas, fibre optic connectivity from Nassau all the way down to Latin American countries and throughout the Caribbean.

Corporate social responsibility is an invaluable way for companies to give back to the communities in which they operate. BTC is engaged in a number of CSR initiatives, for example, sponsoring homes, education and more recently matching donations by staff to support communities affected by category four hurricane, Joaquin. Which initiatives have you been, or are you currently involved in, that you feel most proud of, and why?

I would probably have to go for the “adopt a school program”. This year, for example, BTC would have given to the schools in the family islands 11,000 backpacks with books at the start of the school year in August/September. A number of other companies have done similar so I said to my marketing team, I don’t want to do backpacks next year. I want to put smart boards into the schools, we’ve done this in the past with our adopted school H.O. Nash where a smart board was donated to them.. I think that in order to change the country, you really have to change it at this level--Education. Our children today are tech saavy and when I went to school I sat down and I read a book. This technology doesn’t come with instructions, adult people and generation X want a book to see how to operate an iPhone 6, whereas you give it to a child in this age and they would download all the games and applications without a moment’s thought. They are digital natives and are born almost with a chip, so you don’t have to teach them and you can’t put them into the regular classroom with teachers, who I call digital immigrants. Only if you give them Shakespeare in some kind of format of technology, will they take it.

Unlike Trinidad and Jamaica, we don’t have a laptop for every child program in The Bahamas. We put computers in the classrooms some time ago but when you do this, it’s not about giving the computer, it’s about the maintenance of the computer. If there is no infrastructure in terms of human resources to repair and keep it up, you go back to the classroom two years later and out of 30 computers you’ve donated, you might find only five working so you need to have a sustainable program. So my thing is let’s put some smart boards in the schools and let the other companies give the backpacks. I’m always pushing the envelope.