Brussels, 07/03/2011 (Agence Europe) - At a high-level conference in Brussels on 3 March, which brought together chief executives and senior board-level representatives from new information and communication technology companies, Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes asked industry to come forward with concrete proposals to encourage private sector investment in new generation broadband networks, investment which is essential to their development. An inter-disciplinary group led by Ben Verwaayen of Alcatel-Lucent, René Obermann of Deutsche Telekom and Jean-Bernard Lévy of Vivendi was formed to develop a holistic approach, a view to confirming such proposals at a summit of chief executives in Brussels on 13 July.
During the conference on 3 March, discussion focused on two themes. Firstly, there was an assessment of the current state of play on next generation networks deployment and devising the most effective additional means to foster and accelerate such deployment. And secondly, the sustainability of the current internet ecosystems and any alternative business models were assessed. These are key themes for the digital strategy put in place by the European Commission which has set itself a target of basic broadband coverage for all EU citizens and businesses by 2013, 30 Mbps connection for all by 2020 and 100 Mbps for at least half of users by the same date. (I.L./transl.rt)