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Danubius Health Spa Resort Margitsziget
1138 Budapest, Margitsziget
Hungary
3 October, 2006
9.00 am to 18.00 pm
Background
Next Generation Networks (NGNs) can be defined as networks with a packet-based architecture, facilitating the provision of existing and new/emerging services through a loosely coupled, open and converged communications infrastructure. The advent of NGNs is bringing forward a series of innovative opportunities but also a greater array of challenges, touching upon competition, interconnection agreements and new business models.
The OECD Technology Foresight Forum on NGN addressed these new issues, focusing on the benefits they can bring for social and economic development and on those aspects or situations which may constitute barriers to the development of IP-enabled networks and services.
Agenda
9.00 – 9.30 Opening: Welcoming remarks and opening
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Mr. Hugo Parr, Chair of the Information, Communication and Computer Policy Committee
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Mr. János Kóka, Minister, Ministry of Economy and Transport, Hungary
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9.30 – 11.00 Session 1: NGN technologies evolution and characteristics.
Next Generation Networks is a concept used to refer to a packet-based architecture that fosters the provision of existing and new or emerging services through a loosely coupled, open and converged communications infrastructure.
In the NGN environment, a broadband managed IP network can carry voice, video and data over the same infrastructure.
NGN has been described as a development of current networks, where different technologies and functional layers – access, transport, control, and services – can be combined to provide all players with innovative opportunities, new sources of revenues and improved quality of service. At the same time, NGN is not simply about Internet Protocol, but is claimed to constitute a paradigm shift when embedded in the economy and society at large.
This session aims at identifying relevant characteristics and aspects of NGN so as to stimulate discussion on regulatory issues in the following sessions.
Questions for discussion:
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What are the characteristics of the next-generation network and what services can it provide?
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What are technological challenges in implementing NGNs?
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What benefits could it bring to operators and end-users?
11.00 – 11.30 Tea Break
11.30 – 12.30 Session 2 (Part I): The 3 C’s: Convergence – competition – consolidation?
The technological change brought by NGN and the new opportunities for innovative services and applications have an impact on the present regulatory landscape.
Regulatory practices are generally related to specific networks (e.g. PSTN, cable, etc). However, with the shift towards NGN, some traditional regulatory requirements may become obsolete and less relevant, while others should remain, albeit adapted to a new environment.
This session, divided in two parts, aims to stimulate discussion and analysis of regulatory issues surrounding the impact of NGN on competition and investment, and will pay particular attention to the implications of network convergence, new issues surrounding quality of service and the control layer, interconnection approaches, and interoperability.
Questions for discussion:
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How will the emergence of NGN alter the nature of competition?
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What balance should we seek in order to both enable competition and address competitive bottlenecks on one hand, while encouraging innovation and investment on the other?
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Do differences between the NGN and the traditional telecommunication environment require a reconsideration of ex-ante and ex-post regulation?
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How should interconnection be approached in an NGN world?
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Are there bottlenecks to the development of NGN services and applications in an NGN environment, and if so where? How can they be addressed?
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How can non-discriminatory access and quality of service be ensured in an NGN environment?
12.30 – 14.00 Lunch Break
14.00 – 15.00 Session 2 (Part II): The 3 C’s: Convergence – competition – consolidation?
This session is the continuation of the previous discussion.
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Ilkka Lakaniemi, Senior Manager, Fixed-Mobile Convergence (FMC), Nokia Networks, Finland - " Views on FMC".
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15.00 – 16.00 Session 3 NGN applications, use and impacts
NGNs will have major impacts on the creation, delivery and use of digitised goods and services, and the development trajectories for NGNs will be driven by the commercial, practical and popular uses to which they are put. Most projections suggest that NGNs will be driven by major increases in video applications, both fixed and mobile, and ever-increasing data-intensive applications.
The development of different access, cost, pricing and distribution models for digitised content of all kinds across the economy, including applications for health, education, government and personal uses as well as business uses, will be crucial in shaping NGNs.
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Chair: Richard Simpson, Director General, Electronic Commerce Branch, Industry Canada, Canada.
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Jong-Sung Hwang, Executive VP, IT Strategy Division, National Computerization Agency (NCA), Korea - " Emerging ICT and NGN".
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Questions for discussion:
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What are the major needs of users from NGNs? How will new uses drive the development of NGNs?
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What will be the new services that will justify new investment?
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What are likely new applications? Specialist? And mass-market?
16.00 – 16.30 Coffee break
16.30 – 17.30 Session 4: Security in NGN
The attributes of the Internet’s architecture that are most currently lacking are arguably those relative to security. With the growing integration of electronic communications in the information society, the Internet is increasingly a critical information infrastructure that will need to guarantee resilient and dependable availability and constitute a trustworthy environment.
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Chair: Keith Besgrove, Chief General Manager, Department of Communications, Information Technology, and the Arts (DCITA), Australia.
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Graham Ingram, General Manager, AusCERT, Australia - " NGN security".
Problematic factors for NGN:
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Connectivity to open public communication network infrastructure.
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Nomadic users and providers.
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Uncontrolled access.
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Broader playing field for cybercrime to develop.
17.30 – 18.00 Conclusions : visions of the world to come
There are different possible visions of the future of the Internet. The new IP-enabled, multi-layered, converged communication landscape is stirring significant interest among providers, as well as changing users’ expectations.
On the basis of the questions and discussions in the previous sessions, this last panel will identify which are the priority issues which should be addressed in the near future.
Chair: Hugo Parr, Chair of the Information, Communication and Computer Policy Committee
Panel: Brian Carpenter, Chair Internet Engineering Task Force; Martin Niekus, Manager Strategic Standardization EMEA, Lucent Technologies. Vice-chair, ETSI/TISPAN; Jens Arnbak, Professor, Delft University, The Netherlands; Richard Simpson, Director General, Electronic Commerce Branch, Industry Canada, Canada; Keith Besgrove, Chief General Manager, Department of Communications, Information Technology, and the Arts (DCITA), Australia.
Conclusions and closing by the chair.
For more information about this event, please contact Claudia Sarrocco: claudia.sarrocco @ oecd.org
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