OPINION
Infrastructure or die
07-11-2002
by Ralph Averbuch
With competition in Ireland's Internet access market heating up, the focus must move to infrastructure for long-term economic success.
Last Friday (01 November) was miserable. The rain was coming down in buckets over Dublin and I needed to get myself over to Esat BT's offices at Grand Canal Quay for an audience with the man putting some reality into the fantasy we often find ourselves talking about in this business.
That man was Stewart Davies, the chief executive officer of BTexact Technologies, formerly called BT Labs. So, despite the rain, it seemed like a pretty good bet that he'd have some interesting stuff to say. And that he did, with plenty of interesting tidbits about where technology is taking us. He eventually admitted to successfully testing DSL along a 1 kilometre copper wire at 24Mbps.
Yet, despite the many exciting opportunities, I was left with a distinct sense of unease. As we heard about the BT Group's varying technological trials of rural broadband delivered by satellite, wireless or local point to point networks it became apparent that arguing about next-generation Net access technologies is, perhaps, akin to wanting a 12-cylinder engine in a Mini Metro. The wheels might spin a lot faster but the car's infrastructure is likely to fall apart under the strain.
While everyone in Ireland is bleating on about the need for ubiquitous and cheap Net access for business and home users, the reality is beginning to dawn that it just represents one, very small, step towards where Ireland needs to be in just a few years' time.
As we speak, manufacturing is moving east to countries such as China, where regulation is less strict and staff costs are a fraction of those in the West. That means that Ireland, just as much as all other western economies, needs to be able to swiftly move itself into the so-called "knowledge economy."
Yet that simply isn't going to happen without active intervention by government. They need to be driving infrastructure development. It's just too important to be left to competitive forces alone.
The Esat BT's and Eircom's of this world will only roll out broadband where they can, quite justifiably, to make a profit. They are not charitable organisations or driven by larger socio-political concerns about a particular economy's relative success or failure on a global stage. So government has an imperative role in ensuring that the economy is capable of moving into the next economic gear -- one in which large swathes of employment will move away from what people can make with their hands and focus on what they can do with their heads.
So perhaps the story isn't about how expensive it is to be on-line any more. Competition will resolve that ultimately (fingers crossed). While we might all like really cheap, fixed-rate Net access, what the economy will need is broadband that reaches out to all parts of this island, allows communities and businesses to compete on a global footing and delivers government services to its citizens.
It's been bandied about on numerous occasions that Ireland wants to be at the forefront of the 'knowledge economy.' Now it's time to put up or shut up because failure to keep up in this race is not an option anyone wants to contemplate. If Ireland fails, its greatest asset -- its people -- will become part of another great brain drain.
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