A prime European Union official says current telecom networks aren’t as much as the job of dealing with surging quantities of web information site visitors and defended a session on whether or not Massive Tech corporations ought to assist pay for upgrades

ByThe Related Press

February 27, 2023, 12:58 PM

BARCELONA, Spain — Europe’s current telecom networks aren’t as much as the job of dealing with surging quantities of web information site visitors, a prime European Union official mentioned Monday, as he defended a session on whether or not Massive Tech corporations ought to assist pay for upgrades.

The telecom business must rethink its enterprise fashions because it undergoes a “radical shift” fueled by a brand new wave of innovation equivalent to immersive, data-hungry applied sciences just like the metaverse, Thierry Breton, the European Fee’s official answerable for digital coverage, mentioned at a significant business expo in Barcelona referred to as MWC, or Cellular World Congress.

Breton’s remarks got here days after he introduced a session on whether or not digital giants ought to assist contribute to the billions wanted to construct the 27-nation bloc’s future communications infrastructure, together with next-generation 5G wi-fi and fiber-optic cable connections, to maintain up with surging demand for digital information.

“Sure, after all, we might want to discover a financing mannequin for the massive investments wanted,” Breton mentioned in a duplicate of a keynote speech on the MWC convention.

Telecommunications corporations complain they’ve needed to foot the substantial prices of constructing and working community infrastructure just for huge digital streaming platforms like Netflix and Facebook to learn from the surging shopper demand for on-line providers.

“The session has been described by many because the battle over justifiable share between Massive Telco and Massive Tech,” Breton mentioned. “A binary selection between those that present networks at present and those that feed them with the site visitors. That’s not how I see issues.”

Massive tech corporations say shoppers might endure as a result of they’d find yourself paying twice, with additional charges for his or her on-line subscriptions.

Breton denied that the session was an assault on Massive Tech or that he was siding with telecom corporations.

“I’m proposing a brand new strategy,” he later instructed reporters. Matters up for dialogue embrace how a lot funding is required and whether or not laws must be modified, he mentioned.

“We could have zero taboo. Do we have to adapt it? Do we have to talk about who ought to pay for what? That is precisely what’s the session at present,” Breton mentioned.


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