Sir Peter Bonfield - no regrets

Former BT CEO on 3G, corporate governance and being hung out to dry by the media

Peter Bonfield, former CEO of BT, has blamed the unforeseen enthusiasm of newcomers to enter the mobile market as the main reason for the licence excesses in the UK in 2000 and insisted he has no grudges about his final years at the UK's largest telco. Speaking at a European Technology Forum event this week, he admitted his tenure had been "a rollercoaster ride" and that he left the company with a clear conscience. Asked about possibly unfair treatment in the media, with recent telecoms scandals and perhaps WorldCom's battle with BT to buy MCI in mind, he told silicon.com: "I joined [BT] when integrity and ethics were at the top of the corporate agenda and left it with integrity and ethics at the top of the agenda. That was at a time when that was unfashionable. Now, of course, that's not the way. I have no regrets." On the subject of 3G licence auctions, where BT's then subsidiary BT Cellnet paid around £4bn for a licence in the UK alone, he said: "It was horrible. It wasn't a complete surprise we paid too much in the UK. The people who set up the auction did so very cleverly to maximise the take, but none of us figured on how much new players would pay." Despite naysayers criticising the amounts paid in subsequent years, at the time there was a feeling that a 2G operator that didn't win a 3G licence would see its share price - and prospects - crash. "If we did it all again I guess we'd have to do it [the same way]," Bonfield added. Despite the high sums involved - which forced a rights issue on BT, made it necessary to spin off of what became mmO2 and arguably brought the departure of Bonfield and chairman Sir Iain Vallance - he still has faith that 3G will be profitable for operators over the 20 years of each licence. He said: "One thing I always remember in tech is that you tend to over-estimate in the short term and underestimate in the long term." He predicts capital expenditure will recover by the middle of next year and that over the next decade telecoms will revert to being a "normalised business". Bonfield continues to have an interest in technology, for example he is a director at Ericsson, while also being an executive director at pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, mainly for corporate governance reasons. Asked what might drive use of 3G and other telecoms technologies in the future, he said: "I'm now old enough to realise we've got no idea. Anyone who says they predicted SMS' success is talking baloney."