INTERNATIONAL TELECOMMUNICATION UNION		

Press Day – Opening Press Conference, 2nd October 1995
Dr. Pekka Tarjanne
Secretary General, International Telecommunication Union
Today, it is my honour to welcome you to Press Day, Telecom 95.
Telecom 95 is the seventh World Telecom exhibition, organized four yearly by the ITU as a service to its members. It is the leading worldwide event in telecommunications and information technology.
And this year it is much bigger than ever before. With the newly constructed Hall 7 and Arena we have 16,000 extra square metres of exhibition space, and over 150 extra exhibitors to fill it, bringing the total to over a thousand for the first time.
As you will have seen, the theme of this year’s exhibition is “Connect!”. This reflects two principal themes running through the event:
•	the continuing convergence of the telecommunications, computing and entertainment industries, and
•	being able to provide voice, data and images in any combination, to anyone, anywhere, at any time – the true spirit of global communications.
Convergence
Let us look first at convergence. Convergence is particularly exciting – because in spite of all the talk and speculation, none of us today knows exactly what will happen even five years from now. There are some interesting parallels between today’s convergence and that of the film and radio industries in the nineteen-forties and fifties, which led to the creation of the major television networks and the massive subsequent popularity of television as a medium.
The overlap that already exists between the three increasingly interdependent industries is becoming even more evident, as mergers, coalitions and partnerships are created to allow business to be conducted across several sectors at once.
The development of sophisticated technologies such as high definition TV (HDTV) and video-on-demand has meant that the entertainment and broadcasting industry is using more and more of the technology that was once the exclusive province of telecommunications engineers. And the rapid growth of computer networks means that traditional IT providers now need to work telecommunications technologies into their latest offerings. Likewise, the major telecommunications carriers are upgrading their networks with highly sophisticated, intelligent switching equipment, designed by software engineers.
At Telecom 95 you will see many familiar companies and stands, but you will also have the opportunity of seeing many of the world’s most prominent IT companies at Telecom for the first time, including Intel, Lotus Development, Microsoft, Oracle, and Sun Microsystems. Leading vendors of PC-based videoconferencing equipment will also be exhibiting, as will key players in the broadcasting industry such as CNN and Sony Corporation.
Global Communications
And now let’s look at Global Communications. All over the exhibition you will see tangible proof of the ability of people worldwide to connect with one another. Exhibitors will show how users can access the information they need, the services they require, and, perhaps most importantly, other users – wherever they are located.
The explosion in the popularity of the Internet – has been instrumental in not just connectivity but the discussions surrounding connectivity. And increasingly on display at Telecom this year are the broadband technologies and applications that will eventually make the Global Information Infrastructure a reality. Today’s World Wide Web hardly existed four years ago, when we held Telecom 91; who knows what we will all be using in four years’ time, at Telecom 99?
Quite apart from the Internet, the past four years has also seen extraordinary growth in mobile telephony – and at Telecom 95 we will be seeing many of the advance indicators of what we can expect to see in the real world between now and the end of the century. The big participants in the consortia who will be putting up LEOs over the next few years are all here, as is every major player in the wireless league. Handheld, truly portable, satellite telephones are no longer so far away as they seemed only quite recently.
At Telecom 95 we are talking about evolution. Evolution in equipment and networks. Evolution in technology. Evolution in applications. So when I am asked “what is new at Telecom 95?” – I have to answer “almost everything.”
Also at Telecom 95
And Telecom 95 is so much more than an exhibition.
First and foremost is the Forum. This year the Forum consists of two summits: 
•	The Strategies Summit: “Breaking down barriers towards the global information society”, and 
•	The Technology Summit: “Convergence of technologies, services and applications”.
Each one promises an extremely rich selection of speakers and papers.
The Forum also includes special Internet sessions, billed under the title of internet@telecom95, which will bring in gurus such as Vint Cerf, “father of the Internet”, and James Clark, founder of Silicon Graphics and Netscape Corporation.
Joint sessions, entitled “Wireless for the 21st Century,” will celebrate the birth one hundred years ago of radiocommunications.
And, for the first time since the exhibition’s inception in 1971, a number of special initiatives this year address the human side of telecommunications. 
The Programme for Development aims to help provide access to basic telecommunications services to developing nations. Through this innovative scheme, 170 chief engineers and human resource specialists from 85 developing countries have been invited to come to Geneva to visit the exhibition, participate in the Forum and take part in a specially conceived three-day workshop.
The NIC Pilot Project brings fifteen manufacturing companies selected from Newly Industrializing Countries to Telecom 95 to promote their products and services, and to meet and exchange ideas with Telecom participants.
And the “smart house,” in Hall 7, has been built to promote ways in which telecommunications can improve the quality of life of people with disabilities and the elderly.
And last but not least, the 1995 Book Fair will be focusing on the new methods and media for distributing and disseminating information which have taken the publishing world by storm. From interactive CD-ROMs and multimedia-on-demand to the information highway and the World Wide Web, the impact of electronic publishing and remote access to information and services has opened new perspectives and new markets.
The development gap
Before I move on to the World Telecommunication Development Report, let us not forget that there is still a large telecommunications gap among the countries of the world. As new advances are made in technology we should ensure that all countries are able to benefit from them.
We all know that there will be no economic or social growth without the basic infrastructure of our information society, the telecom networks and services. Ladies and Gentlemen, let's enjoy and profit from these coming days and remember our responsibility – we're working for a better future – for the benefit of our children and the world's children.
World Telecommunication Development Report 1995
And now, it is time for us to launch the 1995 World Telecommunication Development report.
The ITU is delighted to present the second edition of its authoritative World Telecommunication Development Report. This 250-page report presents the latest available telecommunication indicators for some two hundred plus countries worldwide. As such, it should provide an invaluable reference source for journalists and others covering this event.
As the cover picture suggests, the 1995 World Telecommunication Development Report deals with the fast, high-capacity communication facilities – information infrastructures – which are being built to handle the ever increasing tide of multimedia (voice, data, image, text and video) traffic. They are being built in the expectation that a huge market will develop for tradeable electronic information. The info-communications industry is defined here to cover the telecommunications, computing and audiovisual sectors. The industry had an exceptionally good year in 1994 and generated revenues of US$ 1.43 trillion, equivalent to 5.9 per cent of the world’s global domestic product. To put it another way, for every US$ 1’000 the world earns and spends, US$ 59 is created, directly or indirectly, by the info-communications sector.
The slides which follow review the main themes of the report.
One: The Information Society
Chapter one of the report examines the proposition that information infrastructures will provide the wheels, if not the engine, for future economic growth. In 1994 the wired telephone network grew at a faster rate than at any time in the past twenty years, thanks in part to continued demand in China and the rest of the Asia-Pacific region. Almost 20 million people acquired mobile telephones. Cable television continued to expand worldwide, with particular growth in Latin America. The Internet doubled in size. Taking these four networks together, some 86 million new subscribers were added during 1994 compared with 62 million in 1993.
Two: Communications convergence
During 1994, a new term entered the communication vocabulary, the global information infrastructure or GII. But what does it mean? There are several competing definitions:
•	At one level the GII is seen as a high performance computer network which will facilitate high-speed data access and retrieval.
•	Alternatively the GII could be envisaged as a multimedia network, the primary use of which will be conveying video in conjunction with data, image, text and voice.
•	A third viewpoint sees it as a medium for interactive television, in which the intelligent television set becomes the main communication channel.
These three visions of a global information infrastructure come from different parts of the information industry: the computer industry, the telecommunications industry and the entertainment industry. But the beauty of modern technology is that a single network of networks can, theoretically, accommodate each of these different visions.
The networks of the future will be more diverse and fragmented than before. Companies will compete from the basis of different technology platforms. But they will also form new patterns of co-operation and partnership.
Three: Visions of the superhighway
The availability of infrastructures for electronically transferring and accessing information is perceived as critical for hastening the realization of economic, social and cultural benefits as well as for conferring competitive advantage. Many countries have set out principles or highlighted applications that they hope to see implemented. Others have gone further and attempted to estimate the likely cost or set target dates. But most governments around the world still have to resolve regulatory issues that define who can offer which service to whom, as well as tackling thorny issues such as privacy, security, open access and universal service. These details matter. In particular, developing countries may need to develop their own vision of the future or risk having someone else’s vision imposed on them.
Four: Corporate strategies
Of all the different players looking to develop multimedia networks, it is arguably the Public Telecommunication Operators (PTOs) which are the best placed. In 1994, the top 50 PTOs worldwide generated net profits of some US$ 35 billion. For PTOs, the attraction of multimedia is the chance to exploit their investment in digital networks and fibre-optic backbones by creating a second revenue stream from consumers. For this reason they are actively courting the entertainment sector. In the 1980s, long distance and international markets were the place for PTOs to make money, but the development of multimedia services may mean that the more attractive long-term market is the local one.
Five: Information infrastructures
New hybrid network architectures are emerging which allow telephone calls to be made over cable television networks or the Internet, or video entertainment to be carried over telephone wires. The driving force behind this is technological progress, especially in semiconductor chips and network software. This is bringing different sectors of the information industry into open competition with each other. PTOs are investing huge sums in wired networks at precisely a time when the explosive growth of wireless communications threatens to make their networks redundant. Digital compression techniques are breathing new life into the broadcast spectrum, both terrestrial and satellite, as a way of distributing multichannel entertainment. Ultimately, PTOs and cable television operators may find they have more to gain by co-operating to share the investment in cabled networks than by squabbling and letting the market disappear into thin air.
However there are a number of other areas in which policy guidance might be useful in helping to develop the multimedia market. To what extent can existing regulations on content, security, intellectual property rights, common carrier obligations or privacy be applied to multimedia or do they need to be revised? If individual governments did want to exert controls in these areas, would they be able to do so?
Six: From voice to multimedia
The truth is that no one really knows which multimedia services will prove popular and which will flop. Many different challengers are conducting market trials to define the most attractive services. The most publicized of the emerging interactive services is video-on-demand. It appears that demand would be high but not necessarily high enough to justify investment in interactive networks. Video-on-demand revenues would need to be supplemented by other services. The leading candidates appear to be interactive video games, electronic shopping and home banking. To quote from a European Union information society report, it is clear that “today technology is in search of applications”. So far, the only really innovative interactive service which has developed is the World Wide Web which is currently growing by some 50 per cent per month.
Seven: Regulating multimedia
What type of regulation does the multimedia sector require? One of the main powers which the state retains is the ability to control market entry. On almost any indicator chosen – network development, pricing of services, network usage, investment efficiency – it is possible to show that competitive market entry has benefited those countries where it is permitted. Competition is likely to bring the same benefits if applied to the development of multimedia networks and services. The multimedia sector currently resembles a cabbage patch in which many wired, weird and wonderful species are blooming between the experimental plots and field trials. In such an environment of experimentation, it is much better for regulators to allow investors to make their own mistakes. Governments can help by dismantling many of the barriers which currently prevent cross-market entry between telecommunications and cable television.
Eight: Digital babies
The global information infrastructure will not be built overnight, but over many years of steady investment and improvement. Technological change may bring about sudden shifts in what is possible, but these can only be implemented through a slow process of research and development, standards-making, trials, business planning, resource mobilization and progressive roll-out schedules. To date, access to communications facilities has been largely dictated by wealth: the wealth of a country, an organization or an individual family. But the shift from voice to multimedia networks is likely to facilitate a significant change. The ability to use the network, and the information it contains, will be almost as important as the possibility of subscribing to it. Ability to use is closely related to level of education and, more significantly, to age. 
The generation that will build the global information infrastructure may not see the benefits. Even if it is built in their lifetime, many will be unable to cope with information overload, since they will not be used to exercising choice, and will not be accustomed to interacting with electronic information applications. Our children are the ones that will really benefit from the global information infrastructure. They are the “digital babies”.
WTDR95 at Telecom 95
At the ITU, we believe in “learning by doing”. For that reason we are also launching today a multimedia version of the World Telecommunication Development Report on the World Wide Web. It will be available from any of the computer terminals in Palexpo connected to the Internet. It is intended as a complement rather than a substitute for the report and permits interactive browsing and comments. The authors of the report will also be available for questions, both immediately following this press conference and throughout the exhibition on the ITU stand.