Groups and committees

The Convergence Conversation

Groups & Committees

Convergence in Asia – a million miles away or a model for the future?

In March 2006, Intellect published the report of a mission it lead to South Korea and Japan to investigate the impact of the widespread deployment and take-up of advanced broadband services is having on the market for content, applications and services in the two economies.

The April Convergence Conversation focused on this project and was led by three members of the mission team, Mike Short from O2, Stella Creasey from BBC and Antony Walker from Intellect who talked to the group about their learnings from the mission. The key conclusion seemed to be that take-up of products and services is ahead in South Korea and Japan, but not as far ahead of the UK as the team had expected. Many of the same barriers to convergence in place in the European market such as content rights negotiations and concerns over internet governance, are shaping the market in Asia too.

The group heard that key drivers of the market in both South Korea and Japan were community based and user generated content, and that the mobile platform is by far the most pervasive, particularly in Japan.

Group links

SME Resource Centre

The Convergence Conversation

Groups & Committees