Top > Economic Affairs > The Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) > ASEM Seminar on the Digital Opportunity > Session 2: IT Infrastructures > Interactive System of the E-Austria Initiative (Presentation)

Presentation
Interactive System of the E-Austria Initiative

Mr. Christoph Raber
Division for Innovation and Technology Policy, Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Labour, Austria

In Austria's opinion, the information society, the recently developing vision of a modern, global partnership of people, urgently needs a democratic and pragmatic start-up on political and administrative levels. One possible way is to include people by offering a cooperation platform through a transparent, interactive process that focuses on the important subjects of a national economy.

E-Austria is a next generation, universal initiative started to improve diffusion and utilization of e-applications and information society. All individual national programs were given a boost by the proclamation of an e-Europe initiative by the EC. In Austria, the follow-up was the e-Austria Initiative, which started within the first weeks of the year 2000.

The motor of the initiative is the Austrian government. The government installed an expert group with members of administration and academic institutes, the e-Austria Taskforce. The main activities are the generation of strategic levels and a control system for e-Austria, running in tandem with related initiatives in individual ministries. The e-Austria Taskforce identified four subjects for research: e-business, e-education, e-government and e-infrastructure, for which working groups were established.

Seven working groups were installed for e-business--50% of the participants were representatives of technology enterprises, with the remaining participants from academia. In these working groups no frontiers for creativity were set, and the results of deliberations presented a picture of the most recent developments in e-business and evaluation of past activities.

Since becoming a member of the European Union, Austria has acquired the possibility to join European programs in research and development. As a part of the European program "National Host" with a focus on national development of broadband communication, the Austrian platform "Austrian National Host" (ANH) was set up as a platform for broadband communication in 1997.

The ANH platform was instructed to manage projects concerning IT infrastructure, and a case study in point is that of ADSL technology. A few years ago ADSL technology entered the Austrian market. With Internet access becoming a barometer for economic development, a field trial for ADSL technology was established in the Waldviertel district of Austria, a region with a weak technology infrastructure. In the trial, 48 professional users in two small towns were given access to ADSL connections to the Internet, and this was taken up with enthusiasm. The infrastructure provider of ANH, Telekom Austria, provided two high-speed digital lines. A local Internet provider started to offer ADSL connections to subscribers, along with other multimedia products. The project ran for six months and, after the trial, commercial marketing began. The ADSL technology provided benefits to the users as the penetration of ADSL technology grew and enhanced economic development, and in addition, generated know-how that provided a knowledge base for commercial consulting.

In IT infrastructure the following are vital:

  • The continuous development of the IT infrastructure as a backbone of an information society for all.
  • Applications and content that stimulate usage; for example, the government can stimulate diffusion by using e-applications in everyday administration.
  • International cooperation in research and development in IT infrastructure is an efficient way to improve IT on the national level.
  • Broadband connections between neighboring countries; for example, an e-Austria suggestion to build a broadband communication line from Austria to Eastern European neighbors.
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