THE FORUM @ ITU TELECOM ASIA 2008

ITU TELECOM Forums draw the most exciting and influential speakers from around the world – true visionaries of the ICT industry. Forums for regional events are adapted to reflect the regions’ most topical and timely issues. The theme for this year’s Forum at ASIA 2008 is certain to inspire and shape your participation in the ICT industry of the future!

NEW GENERATION, NEW VALUES

The Forum, Exhibition and other activities for ITU TELECOM ASIA 2008 reflect this year’s theme: New Generation, New Values. Asia is indeed unique as a vast region with a highly diverse set of markets spanning every stage of economic development.

No other region in the world innovates and embraces technology like Asia. Entire generations have defined themselves, their jobs, their social relationships and their future by the innovative ways they use technology. People’s needs may not have changed, but their ability to meet those needs certainly has.

WHAT DO ASIAN MARKETS HAVE IN COMMON? OPPORTUNITY
Opportunity caused by disruption. Disruption caused by the collision of industries creating new players leveraging new business models that create new value for themselves and for users who are quick to mass adopt. And in Asia, that’s a lot of users! But that’s just the beginning.

Consumers and technology users are impatient, unwilling to let technology providers slow their progress. If a provider can’t meet or predict their needs, they will find another provider who can or devise a solution on their own - and they can do it too.

INNOVATIVE, EMPOWERED, OPTIMISTIC AND EAGER - THAT’S ASIA.
Growth is coming from many directions, and users are driving demand and demanding more. Providers must learn to innovate with compelling services to meet these demands, rather than relying solely on product and device growth.

All this growth and the disruptive forces that drive it require close partnering with regulators and governments who can either speed innovation or squash it. Asia provides an enormous laboratory to deploy best practices by governing bodies.

The ITU TELECOM ASIA 2008 Forum programme brings together and merges three major tracks. Good Government recognizes the need for modern, innovative oversight by regulators and policy makers to meet the needs of society. The Connected Generation recognizes that new users are driving new usage behavior of technologies by proactively seeking solutions to everyday problems. And New Business Generations recognizes the need to build new business models that are both flexible and scalable.

TRACK 1: MEETING THE NEEDS OF SOCIETY
Public Policy is about determining the goals, aspirations or objectives of society with regard to the good of its citizens and the greater good of the world at large. These values refer to the fundamental beliefs and principles of any society concerning its internal and foreign affairs. By their very nature they must be evaluated with care and vision. They require long term views as to the ‘greatest good for the many’ while protecting the legitimate interests of the ‘few’.

Good regulation should:

• Be proportional, so that regulators only intervene where there is an actual or likely problem to be addressed with the least disruption to the legitimate actions of a free market;
• Be consistent and ‘joined up’;
• Be transparent, understandable and achieve the objective addressed; and
• Require regulators to be fully accountable for their acts including the cost of regulatory intervention.

The regulatory sessions assume the perspective of public policy in the 21st century world of communications. They consider what would legitimately facilitate and enhance the true development of the sector as envisaged in the rights and obligations of the ITU Constitution and Convention “with the object of facilitating peaceful relations, international cooperation among peoples and economic and social development by means of efficient telecommunication services”.

TRACK 2: CONNECTED GENERATION
The speed and breadth of technology use and adoption in Asia continues to surprise and challenge existing ideas about the future of communications in the region (and beyond). What we see in Asia is the impact of mass connectivity: as millions of people have gained access to the fixed and mobile Internet, new usages, behaviours and needs, and above all, new innovations have blossomed. Asia’s communications revolution has been about connectivity. Understanding this is the key to grasping what new opportunities and challenges face the region.

On the one hand we see a huge demographic shift with huge implications for the future: over the next 10 years the vast majority of new technology users will be under the age of 18. For this generation who are growing up with a mouse and a mobile in their hands, their aspirations, expectations and behaviours represent a radical challenge to existing technology design and business models. This generation will be disruptive not out of conscious design, but because they will not know they can’t be disruptive. They are both a huge challenge and opportunity for operators, vendors and regulators alike.

On the other hand, Asia is also marked by vast contrasts in levels of connectivity. In many less developed economies in the region, basic access to communications technologies remains elusive. This developmental imperative represents another challenge and opportunity in the region.

TRACK 3: NEW BUSINESS GENERATION
Today’s business models are under attack. Companies that hold firm to what they do today risk getting it wrong tomorrow. Colliding industries, shortened product lifecycles, content creating consumers, diverse regional economies all point to the need to build new business models that are both flexible and scalable.

Asia represents great opportunity as well as great risk. Understanding how to build the right business model that ties technology, markets and consumers together will chart the path to outstanding returns.

EXPERIENCE THE FUTURE!