[IP] Nortel chief: U.S. needs new broadband vision
Begin forwarded message:
From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: August 23, 2005 6:27:21 PM EDT
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <dewayne-net@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Nortel chief: U.S. needs new broadband vision
Reply-To: dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[Note: Its worth taking the time to read this entire article! DLH]
Nortel chief: U.S. needs new broadband vision
Bill Owens questions whether government leaders understand technology
issues adequately
By Grant Gross, IDG News Service
August 23, 2005
<http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/08/23/HNnortelchief_1.html?
source=rss&url=http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/08/23/
HNnortelchief_1.html>
The U.S. government lacks a broad vision for broadband and wireless
technologies and is losing ground as countries like South Korea and
India push new technologies from the highest level of government, the
chief executive of Nortel Networks said Tuesday.
Bill Owens, a former U.S. Navy admiral, stopped short of advocating
an expansive new U.S. government policy while speaking at the Aspen
Summit, sponsored by the Progress and Freedom Foundation, a think
tank that advocates free-market approaches over government
regulations. But he did question whether U.S. government leaders
understand technology issues as well as their counterparts in other
countries with fast-growing broadband services.
Owens challenged broadband providers to move toward 20-megabit
connections across the U.S. in order to keep up with Internet
improvements in other countries. "I just wonder who in the United
States government is at a level where they're seeing that vision ...
where they must do something to look into the future," he said. "I
wonder if the lawmakers and the cabinet members and the senior people
in our government understand how rapidly this is happening, how
quickly the world is changing."
Owens didn't offer many concrete proposals, instead raising questions
about the U.S. focus on future technologies, although he suggested
more telecom regulation should be done at the national level, instead
of the state level.
Concerns about broadband adoption in the U.S. aren't new, with the
U.S. falling from the 13th place in 2004 to 16th this year in
broadband penetration rates, according to the International
Telecommunication Union. But Owens told his audience changes in U.S.
policy are needed urgently.
He predicted that offshore companies would begin offering voice over
Internet Protocol (VOIP) service over mobile phones to U.S. residents
for a lower price than most current wireless phone plans within a
couple of years, and current U.S. regulations could do little to stop
that service from happening.
"So on my mobile phone, I can call you anywhere around the world and
do it for US$20 a month, and use everybody's networks," he said. "I
wonder what that does to the companies who have invested billions of
dollars in infrastructure: Our wireline companies, our cable
companies, our wireless companies.
"What happens when people start to poach on that investment?" he
continued. "I believe we need to take regulatory steps to make
certain that we protect our businesses and people who have put money
into these networks so that they can get a fair return."
Asked if the U.S. should adopt a government-driven broadband build-
out similar to South Korea's, Owens said that may not work in the
U.S., where government has less authority to unilaterally move ahead
with its policies. "There are great opportunities for us here as we
look around the world and take lessons from other countries and
realize that we can be a leader of this telecom world," he said. "We
shouldn't take the lead from Korea or Japan or India; we should start
to have visions of our own."
While Owens and some panelists in a radio spectrum policy discussion
criticized the U.S. government for not doing enough to promote new
Internet technologies, Michael Gallagher director of the National
Telecommunications and Information Administration (NIST) in the U.S.
Department of Commerce (DOC), defended the work done since President
George Bush took office in 2001. The Bush administration is working
to free up radio spectrum for commercial and unlicensed uses, with an
auction of spectrum, scheduled for mid-2006, that would increase
mobile wireless spectrum by 45 percent.
[snip]
Weblog at: <http://weblog.warpspeed.com>
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