Technology evolution in ICT: biz challenges and opportunities

Roberto Saracco

Telecom Italia

Abstract

The future of Telecommunications will depend on a variety of factors: social, economics, regulatory and technology evolution. It is close to impossible to foresee what it will be in 10-20 years time. However it is useful to try to understand at least from the technological evolution point of view  what forces will come into play.

The presentation considers the interplay of technology evolution and business challenges as new paradigm are changing the value chains in the areas of: Transformation of Products into Services, The Disappearance of the Computer, Ubiquitous Seamless Connectivity, Changing traffic patterns, Unlimited Bandwidth, Disposable Products, Autonomous Systems, From Content to Packaging and The emergence of virtual infrastructures

An introduction to these topics can be found in the paper I wrote for the Communications Magazine, published in December 2003.

Biography
 

Roberto SARACCO graduated in Computer Science has a University degree in Mathematics and a doctorate in Elementary Particles Physics. In 1996-97 he chaired the Visionary Group on Super Intelligent Networks to steer the cooperative research at EU level beyond year 2000 and he is currently part of the Visionary Book Project of the EU. In 1999 and 2000 he proposed and carried out a World Bank project in the InfoDev framework to foster entrepreneurship in Latin America countries. In 1994 he started the Marketing & Communications area in CSELT to contribute to the dissemination of innovation.  In 2001 he was appointed director of the Future Centre, a research organization part of Telecom Italia Lab charged to develop scenarios to evaluate the economic impact of technology and innovation. In 2001 he became director of the Future Centre, a research centre focussing on the economic impact of innovations in the telecommunications area. Since November 2002 he took responsibility also for the Strategy area of TILAB. Currently he is responsible for Scientific Communications in TILAB, the research division of Telecom Italia.
He is responsible in the FISTERA project, http://fistera.jrc.es , for forecasting technology trajectories in the next fifteen years in the information and communications technology area to steer research funding at EU level. He is a member of the Council of Advisors, http://www.thecouncils.com/ .
He has published over 100 papers in Journals and Magazines, six books – among the “The disappearance of Telecommunications” published in the USA- and several articles in the scientific section of daily newspapers.  He has been giving speeches and keynotes at many international conferences. At several stages in his career he taught at Universities in Italy and abroad on the subject of Telecommunications and lately on the New Economy.