I spent a couple of days this week at a Telco 2.0 conference in London. Excellent subject and some great presentations and interaction. The premise of the conference is essentially to look at the evolving business model of the telco and how this can take advantage of Web 2.0 like business practices.
We heard from a vast array of 'experts'. Vodafone showed us their new 360 solution which looked great, but sadly the demo failed as there was only a GPRS connection available! We heard from Spotify, the new streaming media service. We had a panel comprising Fergal Sharkey, now CEO of UK Music with representatives from the music industry, the advertising industry and BT and Virgin - all the players in the mix, and guess what? They had consensus on issues such as varying business models to use in the delivery of such content. They also agreed that the 3 strikes rule is not going to make any difference to the illegal download of music.
Another panel looked at SaaS, or Software as a Service. You may not have heard of this but you are probably familiar with the concept of using applications or services that are not resident on your computer but within the 'cloud'. This model is rapidly growing and new applications are available almost every day - both for the consumer and business. It is also a growing trend for people to be using these services (how many gmail users are there now?) and for businesses to put some of their mission critical functions in the hands of SaaS providers (think of the growth of salesforce.com as an example).
Talk was made of the next wave of content: HD video, healthcare services, home networks and many others. All in all I came away with the reinforced impression that we are moving into the age of digital maturity. An age where the Internet has truly grown up, become a ubiquitous tool and a vital part of the lives of future generations.
So yes, we are on the edge. The edge of something transformational, the edge of something truly great. Unfortunately the platform we are standing on is narrow and while we look on one side to the huge benefits such technical advances will bring to us we only have to look down to understand how close we are to falling back into the digital chasm. I cannot tell you how many people I spoke to who have a concern over the broadband infrastructure in the UK - and these are people in the communications industry! I had many conversations about just how good this would be if only we could get it. And I came away with another impression: I have been saying for some time that the economy of the UK could suffer dramatically if we do not improve our broadband position and that has been reinforced but I would like to turn it on its head and express it differently. The UK economy would have a massive boost if we truly embrace our digital future and give unlimited broadband access to all. We are a nation of innovators and entrepreneurs so let's stop stifling that creativity and put in place an infrastructure to support it.
Friday 6 November 2009
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Great Post!
ReplyDeleteThe ROI on a decent infrastructure will be for the country, the people and the government. Investment in the infrastructure has been neglected for too long. Therefore investing now by the telcos will not give a return to them for many years, they have let it slip too far. This means investment has to come from the people/orgs who are going to benefit, and the ownership should pass to them too?
I say to the telcos: 'Either Lead, Follow, or Get out of the way'. They should stop saying everything is under control and misleading government in the way they do and admit they need help. And not help to patch up the copper in rural areas, but to lay next gen fibre into every area. As you said in your post, to compete and innovate in a global village we need the pipes...
chris