What the Room Believes: CASA26 Votes on Intelligence, Telcos and 2030
On day one we asked the room to vote. On day two the analysts came back with the answers: intelligence already sits inside the products, the uplift is expected to more than triple, and most of the room bet on the platforms.
The CASA26 closing session: what the room voted, and what our analysts made of it
On the first morning of CASA26, after Andrew Collinson set out four futures for intelligent engagement, we asked the room to vote. Not on which future they liked, but on what they see in their own business today and expect by 2030. On the second afternoon, with the bar waiting, Andrew came back with the answers, joined by Amy Cameron of STL Partners and Raúl Castañón of 451 Research.
The room was a good cross-section: operators, cloud communications and engagement platforms, AI and conversational intelligence companies, analysts, industry bodies and visitors from other industries. Some groups were small, so the numbers below are the room as a whole.
Intelligence is already in the product, mostly for free
The first answer surprised Andrew. On average, the room said about 17% of their revenue already comes from products that include intelligence at no extra charge. The second answer is the one to watch: today, intelligence adds about 11% in extra revenue. By around 2030, the room expects that uplift to reach roughly 40%.
The room also expects better margins on that revenue, some of them much better. Andrew’s reading was that the industry is getting wiser about using the right model for the right job instead of burning money on frontier models, and that it is a vote for open models too. It is also a vote of confidence in what this industry adds: governance and skill in applying intelligence, not just access to it.
The telco share of the revenue is expected to shrink
Today, by Andrew’s estimate, around 70% of CPaaS revenue flows through telco services, mostly SMS. Most of the room expects that share to fall to between 20% and 40%. Andrew admitted he was surprised by how far, and by how little the answer differed from group to group.
Raúl could live with the range, on one condition: that operators take on the role of the trusted source of communications. His research shows how much engagement money is wasted today because consumers no longer trust what reaches them. Winning that trust back is a big task, he said, and it falls on the telcos first.
Asked who will run the AI voice conversation, just under half the room said the intelligent engagement players: the platforms, CPaaS and UCaaS providers. The rest spread across telco-integrated, hyperscaler and enterprise-controlled models. Andrew took that as encouraging. The industry believes it can keep control of the intelligence.
The bet: platform-led intelligent engagement
Then the big one: which of the four futures will we be living in by 2030? Most of the room voted for platform-led intelligent engagement, where the value stays in this industry but the network plays a smaller part. A smaller group put us at the gloomier end.
Raúl was pleased: an optimistic view, and consistent with what the two days had shown, including the challenge to the CX incumbents. He still sees the hyperscalers as a significant threat. Amy explained her own vote for the same future, and it was not a vote of no confidence in operators. It was about timing. Network APIs have years of industry coordination behind them and are starting to scale; network inputs into voice AI are earlier, though simpler. But enterprise workflows absorb new technology slowly, and by 2030 she does not expect enough supply-side scale for intelligence to be truly network-centric. Ask her about 2035, she said, and the answer may be different.
Andrew pushed back. If operators are not in the game by 2030, is it not too late? What if the transcription simply happens in a WhatsApp call, and the telco never sees it? Amy’s answer: the conversation on a voice call will still be valuable, voice calls are not disappearing faster than they have for fifteen years, and the full value needs every input, the network’s included.
Aspirational, which is the point
Rob Kurver closed the discussion by calling the result a little aspirational, and welcome for it. Everyone in the room believes the future is intelligence built on a trusted foundation. The question is what this ecosystem has to do to get there: find the blockers and remove them. That is the job we have set ourselves for the year ahead.
A room that expects intelligence to add roughly 40% to its revenue by 2030 has stopped debating whether. It is now arguing about who. Our thanks to Andrew, Amy and Raúl, and to everyone who voted.
More from CASA26
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CASA26 ran 21–23 September 2026 at the Tobacco Theater in Amsterdam, hosted by CPaaSAA. This is part of our Monday series on Transformation.
