e& UAE, the flagship telecom arm of global technology group e&, has achieved “Running on ODA” status from TM Forum, the world’s leading alliance of telecom and technology companies. The accreditation marks a major milestone in e&’s transformation into a cloud-native, component-based digital enterprise.
e& becomes the first organisation in the UAE to receive Open Digital Architecture (ODA) accreditation, the industry’s de facto standard for modern, cloud-native systems. ODA enables agility, interoperability, and rapid innovation across digital ecosystems, allowing organisations to operate on a common, open digital foundation.
By adopting ODA, e& can accelerate service delivery, simplify integration, and scale innovation across its businesses and partner network. The framework supports modular design, API-first operations, and composable platforms that align with the demands of modern digital services.
Marwan Bin Shakar, Chief Technology Officer at e& UAE, said the achievement reflects the company’s success in operationalising TM Forum’s architecture across live environments. He noted that embedding open standards, modular components, and API-first principles into daily operations has created a cloud-native foundation capable of scaling with e&’s ambitions.
“This milestone strengthens our ability to move at ecosystem speed, deepen integration with partners, and consistently deliver differentiated digital capabilities that create measurable value for customers and partners,” he said.
George Glass, CTO of TM Forum, described the accreditation as a signal of e&’s commitment to modern digital architecture and industry-wide standards. He said alignment with ODA and Open APIs helps organisations simplify complexity, accelerate time to market, and unlock new innovation opportunities.
The journey to “Running on ODA” involved a structured transformation roadmap aimed at dismantling legacy silos and building a future-ready digital foundation. Key milestones included:
- Standardising APIs using TM Forum Open APIs to enable seamless interoperability
- Decoupling legacy systems in favour of modular, microservices-based environments
- Expanding cloud-native operations for agility and resilience
- Coordinated efforts across engineering, product, and IT teams to meet global benchmarks
The accreditation demonstrates e&’s ability to translate open architectural principles into day-to-day execution, strengthening business agility, operational efficiency, and the speed at which new digital products and services reach the market.
