Meet the Management
Management at Estel
Philippe Bolle
CEO
Philippe Bolle has been deeply involved in the telecommunications and photonics industries since the beginning of his career, bringing more than 35 years of experience in laser technology, optical communications, and company leadership.
He began his career as a development engineer working on laser technologies for military applications at Canon Delcourt (1988–1990), followed by roles developing laser solutions for the diamond and textile industries at Benelux Laser System (1990–1992).
In 1992, Philippe founded Optilas Belgium, part of Optilas SAS, which was acquired by BFI Avnet in 1998. He later founded and served as Managing Director of Laser 2000 in the Nordics, Benelux, and Italy (1998–2009), while also acting as European Telecommunications Coordinator for the Laser 2000 Group working closely with Ericsson, Finisar, Nokia, Alcatel and Lucent.
In 2009, Philippe founded Skylane Optics, expanding operations across Sweden, Belgium, and Italy, and later establishing Skylane Optics do Brasil with a production facility launched in Campinas in 2014. He further expanded the business with the creation of Skylane Optics USA in 2018. Skylane Optics was acquired by Halo Technology (USA) in January 2021, where Philippe subsequently served as Chief Innovation Officer. Later that year, Halo Technology was acquired by the Amphenol Group.
More recently, Philippe founded Boltic in 2022 and Estel in 2024, continuing his entrepreneurial focus on advanced technologies and telecommunications. He is also an active angel investor, supporting multiple European start-ups in the telecommunications sector.
Magnus Olson
CTO
Magnus Olson has over 30 years of R&D experience in optics for telecom and datacom applications. Currently he is CTO at Estel, an optical transceiver manufacturer, and Managing Director of its subsidiary Estel Sweden AB.
Prior to joining Estel in 2024, Magnus held multiple leadership positions within Infinera, including VP Hardware Engineering. In this role he was heading up the development of Infinera’s pluggable transceivers. These modules were vertically integrated digital coherent transceivers, based on the company’s own DSP ASICs and Indium phosphide PICs (photonic integrated circuits). During this development, from 2018 to 2024, he was leading the global development across 8 different sites including direct report teams in California, Canda and Sweden.
Magnus was also Global Head of Product Lifecycle Management Pluggable Modules, responsible for the introduction, qualification and sustaining of all sourced pluggable transceivers, deployed in Infinera’s multiple system platforms.
From 1994 to 1998 Magnus was pursuing photonics research at the Institute of Optical Research in Stockholm. His areas of interest at that time included diode pumped solid state lasers, non-linear optics, erbium-doped fiber amplifiers and advanced indium phosphide lasers for telecom applications.
Between 1998 and 2005 he had various leadership roles at the Swedish R&D institute Acreo. During these years the focus was on fiberoptic access technologies, including multiple development projects for Ericsson Corporate Strategic Research.
2005 to 2008 Magnus was Manager Project Office and HW Manager at Packetfront, a Swedish system provider of routers and fiberoptic modems for access applications.
He joined the Swedish telecom system provider Transmode 2008, heading up the optics team and overall hardware development. From Infinera’s acquisition of Transmode 2015, he served as Senior Director HW Development, including an expat assignment in Infinera’s headquarters in Silicon Valley, California 2017-2019.
Magnus holds 8 granted patents and a Master of Science Degree in Physics from the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm.
Quentin Bolle
CCO
Quentin Bolle is CCO and a member of the Board of Directors at Estel, where he supports the company’s strategic governance and long-term development. He is actively involved in shaping Estel’s vision and reinforcing its positioning as a European OEM/ODM manufacturer of optical transceivers, with a strong focus on quality, traceability, and innovation.
Prior to his role at Estel, Quentin developed a strong entrepreneurial and industry background within the optical connectivity ecosystem. At Skylane Optics, he played a key role in the entrepreneurial development of the company, contributing to production strategy, market positioning, and go-to-market execution for optical transceiver solutions serving network infrastructures for telecom operators.
This experience provided him with hands-on exposure to the full lifecycle of optical transceivers and strengthened his ability to align technological innovation with business strategy in highly demanding, standards-driven environments.
As a Board member, Quentin leverages this combined strategic, entrepreneurial, and industry experience to support Estel’s sustainable growth and long-term value creation.
Meet the Board
Board of Director at Estel
Bill Gajda
Chairman
Bill Gajda is an angel investor and advisor with 25 years of payments and telecoms industry experience. He currently is Chairman of Estel, an optical transceiver manufacturer, and Dataiera, an agentic commerce company. He is also co-founder of Cafells Capital, a Spanish company investing in real estate.
He was Global Head of Strategic Partnerships, Venture and Innovation at Visa Inc. from 2010 to 2020 in San Francisco, New York and London. He joined Visa with nearly 15 years’ experience in the wireless industry, including seven years with the GSMA as Chief Commercial Officer and Chief Marketing Officer.
He has held other executive positions including Global Director, Brand and Marketing Communications for Ericsson in Stockholm, Vice President, Corporate and Marketing Communications for TELUS Corporation and Vice President Communications for Bell Canada International.
He started his career as a diplomat in Canada. He holds an MBA from the University of Chicago, and studied Arts at the University of Alberta.
Grant Greatrex
Non-Executive Director
Grant is a former Managing Partner of Deloitte Consulting and Arthur D. Little with a background in telecommunications strategy and consulting. He is an Economist by training and graduate of the London School of Economics (Bsc), College of Europe (Masters) and Warwick Business School (MBA).
He held positions as Managing Partner Iberia Deloitte Consulting, member of the European Management team and was a European Partner representative on the Braxton Transition Board. At Arthur D. Little he was a member of the European Telecommunications team and Global Partner for Renewable Energies.
He is Co-Managing Partner of Elan Expert Witness International, a boutique dedicated to economic and technical expert witness services in complex international arbitrations for States and private companies.
He holds, and has held, positions as Board Advisor to global businesses in the power electronics, electric mobility and energy transition fields. He is a founding shareholder and advisor to SUN Mobility, the world’s leading battery swap company for electric vehicles. He supported the growth of the Spanish power electronics player eks Energy to become a world leader in BESS (Battery Energy Storage Systems) and now a division of Hitachi Energy.
He is an Angel Investor and entrepreneur in his own right, with investments across the energy transition and digital sectors. One of his most prominent investments is Eco2Fly Power, where he co-founded the company that is building the 100kMTs/yr eSAF facility in Spain in partnership with KKR and Ignis.
His native language is English, and he is fluent in French, Portuguese and Spanish.
Michael Naylor
Non-Executive Director
Philippe Bolle
Board Member
Philippe Bolle has been deeply involved in the telecommunications and photonics industries since the beginning of his career, bringing more than 35 years of experience in laser technology, optical communications, and company leadership.
He began his career as a development engineer working on laser technologies for military applications at Canon Delcourt (1988–1990), followed by roles developing laser solutions for the diamond and textile industries at Benelux Laser System (1990–1992).
In 1992, Philippe founded Optilas Belgium, part of Optilas SAS, which was acquired by BFI Avnet in 1998. He later founded and served as Managing Director of Laser 2000 in the Nordics, Benelux, and Italy (1998–2009), while also acting as European Telecommunications Coordinator for the Laser 2000 Group.
In 2009, Philippe founded Skylane Optics, expanding operations across Sweden, Belgium, and Italy, and later establishing Skylane Optics do Brasil with a production facility launched in Campinas in 2014. He further expanded the business with the creation of Skylane Optics USA in 2018. Skylane Optics was acquired by Halo Technology (USA) in January 2021, where Philippe subsequently served as Chief Innovation Officer. Later that year, Halo Technology was acquired by the Amphenol Group.
More recently, Philippe founded Boltic in 2022 and Estel in 2024, continuing his entrepreneurial focus on advanced technologies and telecommunications. He is also an active angel investor, supporting multiple European start-ups in the telecommunications sector.
Quentin Bolle
Board Member
Quentin Bolle is a member of the Board of Directors at Estel, where he supports the company’s strategic governance and long-term development. He is actively involved in shaping Estel’s vision and reinforcing its positioning as a European OEM/ODM manufacturer of optical transceivers, with a strong focus on quality, traceability, and innovation.
Prior to his role at Estel, Quentin developed a strong entrepreneurial and industry background within the optical connectivity ecosystem. At Skylane Optics, he played a key role in the entrepreneurial development of the company, contributing to production strategy, market positioning, and go-to-market execution for optical transceiver solutions serving network infrastructures for telecom operators.
This experience provided him with hands-on exposure to the full lifecycle of optical transceivers and strengthened his ability to align technological innovation with business strategy in highly demanding, standards-driven environments.
As a Board member, Quentin leverages this combined strategic, entrepreneurial, and industry experience to support Estel’s sustainable growth and long-term value creation.
Clement Bolle
Board Member
Clement Bolle is a Board Member and co-founder of Estel. He plays a key role in the development of production processes and in defining Estel’s long-term automation strategy. Clement is a leading contributor to critical production line automation developments and NPI projects bridging R&D and manufacturing to scale production while maintaining the highest quality standards.
Prior to Estel, Clement co-founded Boltic, where he developed industrial automation systems for telecom applications. Earlier in his career, he worked for optical transceiver testing and monitoring solutions, at Skylane Optics, and worked at Schréder, where he contributed to mechanical and modal optimization of lighting systems.
Clement holds a Master of Engineering from Imperial College London and a Master of Arts from the Royal College of Art London.