Leadership & Expertise
200+ Combined Years of Sector Expertise
Recognised experts from leading global firms — engaged on-demand to deliver the precise expertise each mandate demands.
Leadership
Founder & CEO
Bora Varliyagci
Founder & CEO
Bora brings over 27 years of international experience in the telecommunications and digital infrastructure industry, with a particular focus on emerging markets across Asia, Central, Southern and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.
Prior to founding digitalthings, Bora was Head of Africa for the digital infrastructure practice at Mott MacDonald. He has successfully established new businesses, built large project teams across emerging markets, pioneered strategic alliances, and led the development of practical solutions to the continent’s most complex business challenges.
Bora served as a board member of FTTX Council Africa (2016–2020), whose work helped bring fibre broadband access to millions of premises across South Africa and sub-Saharan Africa. He is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) by PMI since 2005.
Credentials & Milestones
- ✦ 27+ years international TMT experience
- ✦ Active across 50+ countries, 3 continents
- ✦ Former Head of Africa — Mott MacDonald
- ✦ Board Member, FTTX Council Africa (2016–2020)
- ✦ PMP Certified, PMI (since 2005)
- ✦ Speaker: MVNO Nation, CoNEXT, Pan-African market intelligence body, ABSA Insights, AfricaCom, FibreCONEXT
50+ Countries
PMP Certified
3 Continents
Expert Network
Senior Associates
Recognised experts from leading global firms — brought together on an engagement-by-engagement basis to deliver the precise expertise each project demands.
Roy Blatch
Senior Associate — Broadband & RF Networks
29+ years in broadband, RF systems, optical fibre, wireless, and satellite networks. 19+ years consulting to the African telecommunications industry — network strategy, design, rollout, tower infrastructure, and data centre construction.
Kerron Edmunson
Senior Associate — Legal & Regulatory
30+ years practice spanning South Africa, UK, and 25+ countries. Expert in electronic communications regulation, open-access networks, infrastructure sharing, and licensing. Work incorporated in the 2016 ICT White Paper.
Nick Bartels
Senior Associate — Data Centres
30+ years in data centre design and construction across Southern Africa. First Tier IV Design Certification for a South African data centre and first Tier IV Construction Certification in the southern hemisphere.
Satish Bhala
Senior Associate — Finance & Investment
20 years in finance and investment banking — Harith, Brait, First Africa, NM Rothschild. Expert in project finance, M&A, and valuations across Pan-African infrastructure transactions.
Ken Gafner
Associate — Data Centre Engineering
Specialist in electrical infrastructure for data centres and high-resilience projects. Recent: critical engineering for a major SA banking group and multi-phase hyperscale programmes for two global cloud providers.
Hedley Pougnet
Associate — Data Centre Cost Advisory
Quantity surveyor specialising in data centre and high-intensity engineering. Recent: Uptime Institute-rated Tier III DC in Botswana, turnkey DC cost analysis in Cape Town, electrical/mechanical upgrades for a major SA banking group.
Audrey Solomon
Associate — Programme & Project Management
Seasoned PM in telecoms and digital infrastructure. Former PM on the National fibre backbone operator eThekwini broadband project (Durban). Programmes for City of Cape Town and major SA infrastructure initiatives.
Work With Us
The right expert for every challenge
We match our team composition to each client’s specific requirements — ensuring the most relevant expertise is always at the table.