Walker Walks From CenturyLink
Bill Walker, CenturyLink's director of network architecture and innovation, has left the building.
Walker is well-known for helping build CenturyLink's NFV and cloud services infrastructure, integrating it with the carrier's existing technologies, and then being able to explain it all to us and his colleagues at Light Reading and other industry events.
A frequent speaker at Light Reading events, Walker most recently presented "Transforming Enterprise Service Delivery with Edge Computing" at Light Reading's Denver-based Big 5G Event in May.
Light Reading's Iain Morris recently reported that "A filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission shows that CenturyLink cut around 6,000 jobs last year, equaling 12% of its overall headcount in December 2017, after it acquired rival operator Level 3. Responding to a Light Reading query about the scale of those cuts, a CenturyLink spokesperson blamed them on the removal of "redundant positions," following the Level 3 takeover, plus "transformation initiatives." (See Telco staff face crisis as cuts claim 127K jobs at big CSPs since 2015.)
Walker worked for the service provider for nearly four years after about a five-year stint at Huawei. He has also held positions at Oracle, Sun Microsystems and MITRE, according to LinkedIn.
More later as soon as we hear from CenturyLink or get word on what Walker will do next.
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- CenturyLink: NFV Meeting (Modest) Expectations
— Phil Harvey, US Bureau Chief, Light Reading
Additional reporting by Kelsey Ziser.
