These days, it’s almost impossible to find a technology product that doesn’t tout artificial intelligence (AI). Antivirus software uses it to screen out malware. Cars use it to parallel park. It’s only a matter of time before your toaster is using AI to determine whether to lightly toast your bagel or set the controls for the heart of the sun.

While AI certainly has its place in technology, there’s no substitute for human intelligence. Our customer conversations may start with our technology, but they quickly turn to our people—specifically, our Global Professional Services team. Whether it’s a highly experienced human being tackling network changes in your NOC or a sympathetic voice on a Help Desk line at 2:0 in the morning, Professional Services are the face and the heart of our company.

We know that we’re at the cutting edge of something important—advanced networks that will drive the 5G experiences of tomorrow—and our customers know that too. That’s why you’ll often find Affirmed Professional Services embedded where the action is: in Tier 1 carriers that are delivering the world’s first 5G services or the next-generation disruptors that will provide services we haven’t even imagined yet. Our customers know where they want to be in the next three to five years, and they trust our people to help them get there because The Future is our business.

Human intelligence and experience are what make a good product a great solution. It’s the difference between a 4G strategy that leads to nowhere and one that connects seamlessly to your 5G strategy. It’s the competitive advantage of being first-to-market with new services and delivering them at a lower cost than anyone else. It’s the confidence of building the future based on a proven design rather than learning from your mistakes along the way.

Affirmed not only has the expertise in Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) infrastructure design, but we are the only company that is one-hundred-percent-focused on virtualized mobile networks built on the principles of NFV and the Cloud. It’s why the most prominent players in the virtualized space like Intel and RedHat choose to partner with us, and why the biggest mobile service providers in the world are betting their future on us. Whether it’s a resident network engineer, network operations engineers, projects managers, or a remote Help Desk technician, we focus on virtualization so that you can focus on the rest of your business.

Of course, we’re the world’s leading experts on our products, but our virtualization expertise doesn’t stop there. Many of our customers hire us to manage their entire virtualization migration or transformation. We believe multivendor, best-of-breed networks are still the best way to go, so long as everyone is following the same standards; multivendor leadership; however, more often leads to delays and additional costs. Our systems integration expertise allows us to architect, integrate, and support multivendor platforms for our customers, in effect “owning” the success of the virtualization project.

Ultimately, it all comes down to a very human emotion: trust. Our customers believe in our technology, but they trust our people to make it work. Because if you’re trusting technology to just work without the right team behind it, sooner or later you’re going to be toast.