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International Electronics Forum 2009 - News
Roundup
Broadband is an economic stimulant, according to Alain Dutheil,
CEO of ST-Ericsson, quoting a World
Bank finding that every ten per cent increase in broadband
penetration delivers a 1.2% increase of a country's GDP.
Dutheil was speaking on the opening day of the
International Electronics Forum 2009 (IEF2009) organized by
Future Horizons in Geneva today.
"Broadband is almost becoming a basic human need", said Dutheil.
In addition to economic benefits broadband delivers, he said: "More
responsive governments which we need, especially in Europe."
The broadband penetration across the regions illustrates this.
In North America penetration is 73.9%, in Oceania/Australia it's
60%, in Europe 50%, in Latin America and the Caribbean 30%, in the
Middle East 23.7%, in Asia 18.5%, in Africa 6.7%.
The scope for considerable increases in both economic activity
and the responsiveness of governments is shown by the average
broadband penetration across all the world's regions - 24.7%.
The method of accessing broadband is changing quickly with
people moving from fixed links to mobile. This is a good thing,
said Dutheil, "Because mobile infrastructure is easier to maintain
and upgrade."
Next year mobile broadband subscribers would overtake fixed line
broadband suppliers, he said, and by 2014 two thirds of broadband
subscribers would be mobile users.
Dutheil pointed out that the handset market declined least of
all the chip markets in the 2006 to 2009 timeframe, and said that
was: "Because handset terminals have been moving closer to
responding to basic human needs."
Dutheil, who is handing over the CEO-ship of ST-Ericsson (formed
from integrating the mobile operations of NXP, ST and Ericsson
mobile platforms) to Gilles Delfassy, formerly of Texas
Instruments, told Electronics Weekly: "The integration has
been completed. I have been spending 50% of my time on ST-Ericsson
and 50% of my time at ST (where he is COO)."