Month: August 2019

The first move towards the creation of a digital nation is to provide every citizen, institution, company and government with the chance of having an active participation in the digital economy and in developing digitally-driven social interactions.

According to the World Bank, globally 1.7 billion adults remain unbanked. In this sense, Her Majesty Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, Special Advocate of UNGSA, stated during the World Bank/IMF Spring Meetings that, “Digital ID systems can positively impact KYC compliance for account openings. More precisely, they help 20% of financially excluded adults in low- and middle-income countries who are unable to access financial services because they lack the required documents to prove their identity”.

Consequently, digital identities are without doubt an enabler for private remittance recipients and also for government-to-person aid, fostering easier payment reception and thus contributing towards  improved financial access.

As a result, GVG has identified one of the central issues for the creation of trusting digital nations as being precisely the ability to store data securely and locally. In order to achieve this, it becomes an essential duty to build safe National Data Centres to store critical and sensitive data for governments and citizens. These centres should be further promoted across different regions in Africa. The stronger the technology-based security means to protect them (5G or Internet of Things), the bigger the trust in the digital ecosystem.

Global Voice Group’s solutions promote trusted digital identities as the cornerstone of digital inclusion. They assist governments in their decisive role in improving and fostering financial inclusion. This commitment will certainly come up in ITU Telecom World 2019, in the context of the upcoming session on 10th September, Universal financial inclusion access through innovative FinTech and Digital Currency.

Drivers of Digital Identities

Across the globe, a series of countries, including Estonia, have pioneered the race towards the creation of digital nations. A growing number of emerging countries are also taking the lead in building more inclusive economies.

For instance, the Government of India has saved more than $9 billion from fraud elimination in its beneficiary lists across multiple programs after they leveraged their unique ID system for government-to-person payments.

In addition, as Rwanda President Paul Kagame stated recently, digital identities are the starting point of a long and valuable chain of capabilities that empower citizens in their participation within the regional and global economy. However, these digital systems can only succeed on the basis of trust. Kagame also pointed out that there is an urgent need to protect information from unauthorised access. So tools should be implemented to identify the source of data and its use, always putting user privacy first.

Moreover, the African Union (AU) has recently recognized digital identification systems as the essential means to open up new gateways for new social and economic opportunities, including education, employment, financial services, mobile communication, travel, and voting.

Trust as a precondition for Financial Inclusion

An ID4Africa survey highlighted that 60% of Africans believe their governments will introduce new identity systems in the next two years, in part to support the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and to deliver public goods and services more effectively.

However, fostering more inclusive financial systems through digital identities can only be undertaken with trust as a prerequisite. If this requirement is not met, users will not feel their data is protected and, as a result, countries will fail to promote financial inclusion, as this lack of trust will prevent many transactions from being carried out.

Does digital transformation even exist without the personal digital transformation?

I recently came across an interesting imaginary dialogue in relation to the labour market transformation. During the late-stage industrial revolution when automobiles took over the place, one said:

• You see? We don’t have to worry about that much. In the past, we had carters and carts and today we have cab drivers with automobiles. The market generates new opportunities.
• Okay, but what happened to the carters’ horses?

The trends we see today imply that the daily work-practice of the last two decades in the field of administration, process management, manual data controlling and so on will be outdated very soon, and only a few years remain for people working in these fields to adapt from the labour perspective. This is what we call digital transformation.

The question that every manager should ask from themselves is how can we not write-off the best and most loyal team members as collateral damage of the digital transformation? We can rephrase the question like this: how are we going to successfully conduct digital transformation with analog staff?

Reflecting back to the imaginary dialogue: Analog staff are the horses and digital-ready skillsets are the cars with internal combustion engines. 

We have several good examples when employees could be upgraded for digital-ready skills and find their place in the new digital economy. Just to name one remarkable example: at a big German multinational company a group of manual software testers were retrained as automated testers. Why was it worth for the management to invest in to such expensive training? 

Because otherwise they would have instantly had to realize the loss of all the experience, domain and market knowledge as the collateral damage of laying-off the manual testers. Not to mention the reality that finding even 20 good IT people today is a significant and expensive challenge considering around 600k IT experts are missing from the EU job market.

We believe that if someone is motivated enough to move out of their comfort zone, then it makes sense to invest in them to acquire digital and IT skills. All other solutions are just way too expensive from the company perspective. Of course, not everyone is ready for the personal digital transformation journey but with the right encouragement and approach, we can select the most fitting candidates, train them and make them an engine of the company’s digital transformation.

I’m looking forward to discussing this and other key topics in the panel session “Future skills for a future world” at ITU Telecom World 2019 in Budapest next month.

Electronic waste, or e-waste, is often seen as one of the telecom industry’s biggest global challenges. But what if it’s actually a huge opportunity for business and society?

Buying Green

It’s on the agenda for just about any large organisation: green procurement. Ecovadis’ research in 2017 mentioned that some 97% of all corporates, municipalities and national governments aim to buy stuff in a (more) responsible way. One year later, Accenture concluded that our industry is not doing great on ‘sustainable consumption’; delivering products and services that move away from good old ‘take-make-waste’.

One for One

Two problems? Or one opportunity? Several organisations in the telecom industry are trying out a circular service now commonly known as ‘One for One’. It is explained in this short video, and is quite straight forward: the material footprint of a new phone is offset by recycling one old ‘scrap phone’. The latter is collected in the emerging world, where electronic waste is abundant.

Companies like T-Mobile and Samsung see the service as a simple, transparent way to offer green services – or ‘circularity’ – to their customers. These customers, such as the Dutch government, are able to procure phones in a green, ‘closed loop’ way.

‘Circularity as a service’

So, how does this work? When a customer purchases a new phone, a small fee is added to the purchase price. That fee is used to pay for an ‘offset’: the collection of an end-of-life scrap phone in a developing country, such as Ghana. The scrap phone is bought through small phone repair shops or other informal channels – thus creating jobs and income, while reducing pollution. Next stop: Europe, where this ‘waste’ can be recycled and over ten – increasingly scarce – precious metals are extracted and made fit for re-use.

This service thus offers an easy, practical form of circularity – without the normal side-effect of a complicated procurement process.

Future proof industry

We can be quite proud to be part of the telecom industry. Let’s be honest; no product is more iconic than a phone, as it symbolizes innovation and advancement. But most of all, the telecom industry is really good at telling great stories. But that strength and marketing power could also be used for a green purpose; to create an appealing story of how we can all contribute to more recycling — not because you have to, or by stating it’s ones responsibility. But by proclaiming the beauty of working together to make this industry waste-free and sustainable.

That’s how we can make telecom future-proof. I look forward to discussing this more in the panel debate “Strategies to boost climate action in the ICT sector” at ITU Telecom World in Budapest this September.

Encouragingly, ICT investment across the world, and especially amongst emerging nations, remains positive and is growing fast. This investment is made in the hope and expectation that nations will benefit economically. However, it is not without risk.

Whilst internet access is the foundation of economic growth in the digital era, economic growth is not directly driven by access alone – and certainly not at the base of the pyramid. It is driven by digital PARTICIPATION. This subtle difference is the most critical factor in shaping ICT policy away from a wasteful and even detrimental one towards an economy-building one. Here is the evidence from the UK.

The UK is the 5th economy in the world. It has over 90% high speed broadband access, 77% of its consumers shop online and 84% of people have a smartphone. Looking at its digital profile at face value, one assumes that digital access equates to GDP performance. But at the base of the pyramid, it does not.

The UK is an economy disproportionately reliant on the financial sector (which accounts for around 40% of its GDP) and its service sector capabilities. At the base of the pyramid, digital access does not equate to digital participation amongst businesses in the UK. After 25 years at the forefront of the internet revolution, it has one of the most advanced internet infrastructures and one of highest digital access rates in the world.

And yet only 10% of business sell online in the UK, according to the Office of National Statistics, and only about 2% of small UK businesses have a high-performing website according to the Federation of Small Businesses.  In fact, it is estimated that every 1% increase in digital PARTICIPATION amongst SMEs in the UK has the potential to contribute £30billion to the UK economy annually.

Therein lies some important national lessons. Whilst internet access will rapidly increase economic activity in countries, it will result in a significant outflow of capital to companies and countries better equipped to sell to their citizens online unless nations directly empower their businesses to participate in global trade.

Technology has a significant role to play in accelerating development. Digital access and access to ICT infrastructure is important. But it is not enough to drive economic growth in countries. Digital access opens countries up to the world. But on its own, it turns citizens into online consumers, ideal targets for companies and nations with the know-how to capitalise on digital channels.

As new entrants to the global digital space, their businesses are less technologically mature. Many poorly-informed advisers will suggest leaving their businesses to the natural forces of the market.  This is ill-advised. Looking at the experience of the UK and other advanced economies, we estimate that left to their own devices, it will take well over 20 years for businesses and communities in emerging nations to take advantage of their nations’ internet infrastructure investment to boost grassroots economic performance, given that 99% of them are at the foot of the technology curve. And as technology accelerates humanity into the 4th industrial revolution, the digital gap between businesses in emerging nations – most of which are small businesses – and those from advanced economies will widen and, as a result, so will the trade disparity.

Emerging nations investing in ICT infrastructure should aim to compress the technology maturity curve of their small businesses and digitally disadvantaged communities and short-cut their road to selling online. In other words, they must create an alternative path to effective online presence for technology-poor businesses in their country. They should strive to put this priority on a par with their ICT investment if they are to maximise and accelerate the return on their investment. 

Few of us would argue with the need for data protection laws to safeguard consumers and individuals, but industry convergence, digitalisation and disruption from new technologies and players makes the implementation of such laws more difficult than ever. In this complex, interlinked regulatory environment, it is important not to forget how the regulations impact organisations that use IT.

I’m not speaking here about companies and consultants that provide IT services, but rather every type of company that relies on IT for their operations: whether they produce and provide food, components, energy, services… And they tell us that data protection and security are priority topics.

Beltug represents the voice of these business users in Belgium, and internationally through our connections with INTUG and euro.digital. They bring us their concerns directly – and the current regulatory situation is creating complexity and uncertainty for them. New challenges in privacy, cybersecurity and data protection are requiring regulators to reach into domains beyond their traditional competencies.

I want to highlight three elements that are complicating the landscape for business users of IT:

• Lack of international harmonisation
• Overlaps between regulators’ efforts
• Dominance

Harmonisation: many companies today operate in more than one country, and thus face multiple regulatory regimes. Even with the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), rules vary by country. But each company has the responsibility to comply with the different requirements.

Overlaps:  within one country, multiple regulators can come up with different implementations on overlapping topics. For example, in Europe, the Network and Information Security (NIS) Directive and General Data Protection Regulation both require companies to report security and data breaches, but each has different reporting forms, deadlines, and so on. There is a risk therefore that we don’t arrive at the most efficient implementation.

Dominance: for years, Beltug has been calling for healthy competition in the telecoms business market. But we are now seeing serious changes in the market, with very dominant players. This increases the risk of vendor lock-in and raises barriers to entry for smaller companies.

At the same time, technology continues to evolve faster than legislation, which stifles innovation and the adoption of promising technologies, such as blockchain. Companies face major ambiguity on essential questions: who owns what data? Who may commercialise data? And how can we ensure data is well-protected?

These are only a few examples of why it is important to consider the perspective of the companies that will have to implement data protection regulations, while the latter are being drafted. Legislation needs to protect consumers’ rights, but also support and uplift the businesses that comprise our economies. I look forward to exploring the options in the international panel on Regulating the future: safe, inclusive, connected at ITU Telecom World 2019 in Budapest.

Audio description is the use of words to convey visual images to people who do not have access to the images.  It’s a translation—from the visual to the verbal.  The visual is made verbal — and aural A-U-R-A-L, he points to his ear, and oral O-R-A-L, he points to his mouth.  Audio Description uses words that are succinct, vivid, and imaginative to convey the visual image that is not fully accessible to a segment of the population — new estimates by the American Foundation for the Blind now put that number at over 21 million Americans alone who are blind or have difficulty seeing even with correction — and not fully realized by the rest of us, as sighted folks who see but who may not observe.

Indeed, sighted viewers appreciate the descriptions as well.  On television, it’s for people who are blind or have limited vision and sighted people who want to be in the kitchen washing dishes while the show is on. 

For almost 40 years I have been working with Audio Description or AD–and since that time I have been fortunate enough to help performing arts groups, media producers, museums, schools, libraries, and other venues all around the world and on the web develop AD programs.  One of my contracts is with the American Council of the Blind to direct its Audio Description Project, where we maintain a website that is the most comprehensive repository of information about audio description in the United States and perhaps the world.  Please visit it at:  www.acb.org/adp.

In almost 70 countries, audio description can be found to varying degrees on television, with movies, in performing arts venues and in museums.  Now, in 2019, almost every feature film released in the United States includes an audio description track accessible via headsets distributed at movie theaters.  About a dozen countries now mandate audio description with broadcast television to a limited extent; the additional soundtrack is accessed via a secondary audio channel that was a part of the analog transmission of television and is now available in countries that have adopted digital transmission.  And increasingly, streaming video or videos posted on websites include an audio description soundtrack — accessed either via a separate video posted with description or via a video player that includes a toggle feature that allows consumers to turn on or off the audio description.  Often, televised commercials have an audio description track — examples of companies that are recognizing the wisdom of having its promotional material be more accessible include Microsoft, Anheuser-Busch, Activa, Enterprise Car Rental, Burger King and more.

My belief is that the future of audio description delivery in movie theaters and at home lies with the smartphone and the use of apps that “listen” to a production’s original soundtrack and sync it to a downloaded audio description track.  In the United States, the principal app that already provides this functionality is Actiview.  Not only does it provide audio description, it can also offer enhanced audio. This is not simply increased volume but also equalized sound for people who are hard-of-hearing; audio dubs/subtitles, an audible or visual translation of the movie dialogue for people who speak an alternate language; captioning of the dialogue and key sound elements; and sign language for people who are deaf.  

Let me close with an important observation:  in the United States the principal constituency for audio description has an unemployment rate of about 70%.  I am certain that with more meaningful access to our culture and its resources, people become more informed, more engaged with society and more engaging individuals — and thus, more employable.

I look forward to discussing the importance of audio description as part of the Forum session “Accessibility matters: dismantling the barriers of disability with technology” at ITU Telecom World 2019 in Budapest this September.

This year’s ITU-T Telecom World has the theme of “Better, Sooner”.  I could not think of a better theme to have a discussion around as our next generation of telecommunications technologies, 5G, begins to become a reality.  What is really exciting about 5G, and why “better, sooner” matters, is that for the first time in the history of telecommunications we are not relying on a single telecommunications technology for our next generation of communications – but a true network of networks.  The 5G network is unique in this outlook: for the first time the world agrees that for everyone everywhere to receive the communications services they need, this network will have to combine all technologies, from terrestrial to non-terrestrial, wireless or wired, to bring the network attributes that today’s users require – any time, any place, real –time, cost-effective high speed broadband communications.

Now the question is how do we, the world’s governments, service providers, equipment vendors, network operators and the like, deliver on the promise of this 5G network of networks.  First and foremost, we must design regulatory and standards regimes that are technology neutral.  Let me start by saying that technology neutrality does not necessarily require technology equality.  But what it does require is that no single technology is favored as standards and regulatory structures are developed. 

For example, when thinking about government funding to extend communications to areas which may not be economical to serve without government support, such funding efforts must be technology neutral.  Although one technology may be favored because of its ability to deliver on a performance criteria, such as latency or high-capacity, other technologies should not be excluded or biased against, because they may have certain characteristics, such as lower cost or speed to deployment, that might make them a solid alternative (or, once really examined, possibly preferred). In low density population areas, for example, fiber technologies may well have the potential to bring the highest speed, lowest latency broadband services to an area, but the cost often makes it uneconomical, even with government funding, for such services to be deployed. In such cases, a government would be able to achieve greater coverage and meet the immediate demands of rural users for broadband by using a non-terrestrial service, such as satellite, which today can provide broadband services immediately without the need for costly or time-consuming infrastructure being deployed.

Further, in the area of spectrum allocation it is critical that governments ensure that all technologies have access to the spectrum they need.  This requires a careful balancing and a recognition that sometimes spectrum decisions must be made on more than purely economic factors.  Let me explain.  Although in many countries assigning spectrum to terrestrial wireless services brings in revenue, these services rarely, even with build-out requirements, provide service to the more remote portions of a country.  This is largely because of the economics of deploying services to these areas – which is where non-terrestrial technologies, such as satellite, can be available on a cost-effective basis.  Satellite services can also provide much needed competition to underserved areas, often resulting in better services and lower prices to consumers in these areas.  Accordingly, regulators must take such considerations into account when making spectrum decisions; another form of technology neutrality.

I am happy to see that our standards bodies  recognize the importance of multiple technologies comprising our 5G networks, as groups such as 3GPP begin to include satellite in the 5G standards making process. I am hopeful that as ITU continues its exploration of future networks, it will take to heart the principle of technology neutrality to ensure that the definitions and standards underlying future networks are truly technology neutral.

I am certain that as the principle of technology neutrality is incorporated into our 5G regulatory and standards regimes, we will be able to achieve a truly connected world and meet the goals of this year’s ITU Telecom World – Better, Sooner – and I look forward to exploring this topic further in the panel discussion “5G: the state of play” in Budapest this September.

First people thought automated driving was a sprint race, now many think it’s a marathon. However, it’s turning out to be an ultra-marathon relay. No one can solve its challenges alone: the future of automation lies in collaboration.

Safety trumps accelerated deployment

Leading up to 2018 tech news was full of claims of fully self-driving fleets and widespread adoption by 2017, 2018 and later 2021. This optimism is now nowhere to be seen. A series of accidents sadly leading to fatalities served as a wakeup call to the largely unregulated automated driving industry that the approach had to change. The focus shifted from realizing autonomy as quickly as possible to making it as safe as possible in the long term.

In practice, this has resulted in OEMs and Tier1s already reorganizing their automated driving research and development teams. Car manufacturers are now looking into deploying existing technologies as advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS).  Only a select few stakeholders are still aiming to control the whole development process and deploy their own fleets, the wider industry meanwhile, is increasingly open to collaboration.

Collaboration feeds standardization

The reason behind this is simple: collaboration is the key to survival. Automated driving is immensely complex and resource intensive. No one will be able to solve every problem alone. However, the approach to the development of these systems has to change to make collaboration viable. Software solutions must increasingly move towards hardware agnostic modular designs to facilitate deployment, while industry standards are needed to enable knowledge and data exchange.

Understanding the inner workings of Artificial Intelligence-based networks used for object detection serves as a good example of the challenges ahead. As opposed to classic algorithms, Artificial Intelligence-based networks are largely shaped by training data and behave in a nonlinear way. This can lead to results not necessarily understood by the network designer or the end users. The automotive industry, however, has low tolerance for uncertainty in how accurately automated cars can detect and classify objects in their way. To move forward with the widespread deployment of automotive AI, the industry will need to agree on a framework to provide methods and tools for the assessment of these networks.

Standardization will either be achieved through cooperation and self-regulation or forced upon the industry by regulator and governments. An example of such would be enforcing compulsory “self-driving tests” for automated vehicles. The grounding of Boeing 737 Max 8s globally following the tragic events of recent months is an example of how drastically regulators can limit new technologies if their respective industries fail to regulate and standardize themselves. Naturally, the automated driving sector must strive to avoid such difficulties and work towards making the testing and deployment of automated driving as safe as possible.

Add in decreasing investor momentum in the automated driving industry, the slowing global economy and the shrinking automotive market, and the need for building meaningful collaborations and working towards trusted industry standards becomes increasingly evident. I look forward to discussing automotive industry collaboration to establish an AI framework at the forum session on “AI for ALL? Building on a global ecosystem to boost societal and economic potentials” at ITU Telecom World 2019 in Budapest this September.

INPUT Program is pleased to announce its dedicated day at ITU Telecom World 2019 on September 11, bringing together change-makers and stakeholders from innovation and startup ecosystems from around the world.

INPUT Program is a high-priority government project financed by the EU, which was established in 2016 by the Hungarian Government with contributions from the EU Regional Development Fund. The Program aims to create and nurture internationally competitive Hungarian tech startups, and to facilitate the growth and transformation of the Hungarian startup ecosystem by encouraging entrepreneurs and helping them building sustainable ventures. The Program is supported by PwC Hungary, leveraging the company’s business development and technology expertise, as well as their global network.

For the second time after its success in 2015, the host country of the ICT sector’s premier conference and exhibition is Hungary. On this particular occasion, INPUT Program is taking this unique opportunity to include a one-day long program series at the Hungarian National Pavilion and in the high-level Forum summit.

The program starts with a roundtable discussion on the topic of innovative ideas in the traditional corporate environment moderated by the Communication Lead of Artificial Intelligence Coalition of Hungary, Levente Hörömpöli- Tóth, with participation of strong players from the ICT sector’s corporates and innovative startup ecosystem, such as Vodafone and Semmelweis University Technology Transfer Unit.

The first nationwide INPUT Startup Competition will provide an opportunity for the conference attendees to follow the exciting final event, where 5 teams will pitch their innovative solution, idea or technology to a professional international jury and audience.  The jury members are influential figures from the government, corporate executives and innovation sector stakeholders from all over the world, including Thore Vestby, the successful serial entrepreneur from Ichi Fund, China, or Brad Mix, Senior Director of Innovation Prince Edward Island, Canada.

As an excellent platform for reflecting the newest trends and initiating discussion on the core issues of the ICT sectors by public, private and research sectors experts, INPUT Program’s Forum session enables its international partners to share their high-level opinions in a panel discussion on the subject of ”Innovating together: Connecting Ecosystems”.  The discussion will be moderated by Ron Sege, the CEO of Silicon Valley Leadership Group, while attendees will be able to learn more about the topic from panel members including Glendowlyn L.Tahmes from Indonesian CTNext, Surina Shukri, CEO of Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation, and Robert Orr from Natural Products Canada. Further speakers such as Marta Arsovska Tomovska, Former Minister for Information Society and Public Administration in the Macedonian Government, and Mary Alcantara from MKB FintechLAB, will share their porfessional experiences with their fellow panel members.

At the  closing ceremony of the dedicated INPUT day at ITU Telecom World 2019, the first INPUT Startup Competition winner teams will be announced, and it will provide  an opportunity for the participants to interact in a more informal way and explore future cooperations possibilities.

Don’t miss this unique opportunity — join the dedicated INPUT Program day at ITU Telecom World 2019 in Budapest this September!