{"id":21072,"date":"2026-05-11T07:15:30","date_gmt":"2026-05-11T07:15:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/21072\/"},"modified":"2026-05-11T07:15:30","modified_gmt":"2026-05-11T07:15:30","slug":"telefonicas-ceo-targets-global-tech-role-for-europe-digital-platforms-and-services","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/21072\/","title":{"rendered":"Telef\u00f3nica\u2019s CEO targets global tech role for Europe, Digital Platforms and Services"},"content":{"rendered":"

Telef\u00f3nica<\/a> has achieved its 2025 goals, is tackling legacy issues that need to be fixed, is embracing risk, and is determined to help put Europe on an equal competitive footing with the US and China, the telco\u2019s chairman and CEO Marc Murta told investors at the company\u2019s annual general meeting (AGM) of shareholders on 26 March.<\/p>\n

Murta, who has been in the hot seat for almost 15 months<\/a>, spent most of 2025 getting to grips with the current state of the Telef\u00f3nica empire and devising the operator\u2019s new five-year strategy, Transform & Grow, which was unveiled last November<\/a>. The new plan made it clear that Telef\u00f3nica is focused primarily on strengthening its four key markets: Spain; Germany; the UK, where the company is active through Virgin Media O2 (VMO2), its joint venture with Liberty Global, and Nexfibre, the wholesale fibre access network operator that is closely aligned with VMO2 and in which Telef\u00f3nica holds a 25% stake; and Brazil (Vivo). At the same time, the operator is exiting the rest of the Latin American markets where it has been active \u2013 in the past year it has sold its operations in Peru, Uruguay, Ecuador, Colombia and Chile.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So the transformation is underway, but achieving organic growth will be tough. The size of Murta\u2019s task was made apparent a month ago when the telco reported its 2025 full year results<\/a>, which were less than spectacular \u2013 group revenues increased by just 1.5% and adjusted EBITDA by 2%. For 2026, the company has forecast year-on-year revenue growth of 1.5% to 2.5% and adjusted EBITDA growth of 1.5% to 2.5%.<\/p>\n

But, as you\u2019d expect, Murta is putting on a brave face. He told the AGM that the Telef\u00f3nica team is \u201cbuilding a stronger, more efficient, more profitable, more disciplined company, better prepared to compete globally\u2026 Spain, Europe and the world are undergoing a profound transformation. Telef\u00f3nica wants to make a decisive contribution to that change. Telef\u00f3nica has met its 2025 targets. The transformation is already underway.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Murta\u2019s passion has yet to stir investors, though. Telef\u00f3nica\u2019s share price didn\u2019t move much during or after the AGM and, at \u20ac3.66 on the Madrid stock exchange, it is 15.6% lower than it was a year ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So how can Murta and his team reverse that decline? By becoming more of a regional powerhouse, innovating, taking risks not normally associated with large telcos, and developing new services, it seems.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are living through a period of unprecedented geopolitical and technological transformation. At Telef\u00f3nica, we want to be at the forefront of this transformation,\u201d stated the CEO, who noted that the company has an \u201cadvanced and robust infrastructure\u2026 with a human capital of immense value.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

But it also has numerous ingrained issues that need to be fixed, such as \u201corganisational complexity, slow execution, limited financial flexibility, structural cost pressures and an aversion to making difficult decisions,\u201d stated Murta, who is determined to overcome those challenges and take tough decisions. \u201cTransformation demands clarity. And clarity means making decisions. We decided to simplify. We decided to focus. We decided to strengthen the balance sheet. And to take calculated risks. Because transformation does not arise from comfort. It arises from determination and execution. Transformation requires taking risks and knowing how to identify when to take them with rigour.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some decisions have already been taken.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There has been notable recent action in the UK, where Telef\u00f3nica opened an office in London in early February<\/a> so it can be \u201ccloser\u201d to UK market developments and ensure the Virgin Media O2 team is \u201caligned\u201d with Telef\u00f3nica\u2019s new strategy. Then, just a few weeks later, Nexfibre announced the \u00a32bn acquisition of major UK fibre altnet Netomnia<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That move is an example of how Murta is aiming to strengthen Telef\u00f3nica through industry consolidation that will add scale and strengthen the telco\u2019s position in Europe. \u201cEurope needs strong operators, with investment capacity, sufficient scale and strategic vision,\u201d noted the CEO, who is very keen on banging the sovereignty drum. \u201cIn the increasingly unstable geopolitical landscape in which we live, we firmly advocate the consolidation of the sector in Europe as a necessary condition for creating European technological sovereignty. The fragmentation of the European market limits scale, reduces investment and hinders innovation. The tech world is not a two-horse race but a three-horse race. It is not just China and the United States; it is also Europe \u2013 Telef\u00f3nica wants to be part of this European response.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Murta also wants Telef\u00f3nica to be more innovative and competitive, and here also the company has an example of what it is trying to achieve with the development of a \u201csovereign cloud with artificial intelligence capabilities and low-latency processing, including a pioneering deployment of 17 edge nodes in Spain\u201d \u2013 see Telef\u00f3nica ramps up its edge datacentre rollout in Spain<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The operator\u2019s edge ambitions aren\u2019t restricted to its domestic market: It is leading a consortium of more than 70 European companies, including other telcos, that has teamed up with the European Commission to unveil EURO-3C<\/a>, which is described as \u201cthe first pan-European sovereign infrastructure, integrating telco, edge, cloud and AI capabilities under a federated, open and secure model\u201d.\u00a0 It has also hooked up with four of those European telcos \u2013 Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Telecom Italia and Vodafone \u2013 to federate their edge environments in a joint effort they are calling the European Edge Continuum<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Murta\u2019s task now is to more firmly establish Telef\u00f3nica at the heart of Europe\u2019s efforts to achieve digital sovereignty, something that other major telcos, such as Deutsche Telekom and Orange, are also keen to achieve \u2013 see CEOs of DT and Orange issue digital sovereignty call to action<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But he\u2019ll have to turn the heads and hearts of a lot of decision-makers, especially those at the heart of the European Commission, if Telef\u00f3nica is to achieve the domestic and regional consolidation goals that would give it the greater scale and regional sovereign clout the CEO is aiming for.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the meantime, he\u2019s pressing ahead with positioning the Spanish telco giant as a lynchpin of Europe\u2019s ambitions. \u201cTelef\u00f3nica is a company that manages critical technology, but we are also a strategic asset for Spain and for Europe. We are an economic driver, we foster social cohesion, and we provide critical infrastructure,\u201d he told the AGM. \u201cWe are a company committed to more than just business. We assert our role as a driving force behind the Spanish economy and European technological sovereignty,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n

– Ray Le Maistre, Editorial Director, TelecomTV<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Telef\u00f3nica has achieved its 2025 goals, is tackling legacy issues that need to be fixed, is embracing risk,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21073,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124],"tags":[155],"class_list":{"0":"post-21072","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-telefonica","8":"tag-telefonica"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21072"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21072\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}