IBM: Fast broadband to rake in $1 trillion for Australia by 2050
- 14 June, 2012 15:24
- Comments 4
The availability of faster broadband in Australia has the potential to generate $1 trillion in revenue for the country by 2050, according to a report from IT vendor, IBM.
The A Snapshot of Australia’s Digital Future to 2050 report written by IBISWorld and commissioned by IBM, highlights Australia’s natural resources boom will pass in the next 30 years, making room for a “developed resources” economy.
The country will be known for exporting services such as tourism and business services with super-fast broadband will playing a crucial role.
IBISWorld classifies super-fast broadband as connections with download speeds of 100Mbps and above.
In forming in the base of our digital future, such high-speed broadband will boost productivity growth to 1.7 per cent and bring in more than $1 trillion by 2050, according to the report.
To put these figures into perspective, Australia’s productivity growth is currently at 0.6 per cent and brings in just $131 billion in revenue.
The report analysed the impact of broadband on 509 industries and found 10 per cent of them would not function without the “new utility” that is high-speed broadband. Around 17 per cent will use it to drive changes in their business and 70 per cent will reap productivity gains from it.
“Today, even with our present ‘pony express’ form of broadband, the value of the Internet to the Australian economy rivals iron-ore exports,” IBISWorld chairman, Phil Ruthven, said in the report.
He noted the rollout of superfast broadband has been in Australia was slow compared to other countries in the Asia-Pacific region but feels the National Broadband Network (NBN) will help catch up significantly.
Key beneficiaries of fast broadband include the health, retail, and mining sectors.
But the report predicts 15 industry classes risk becoming obsolete if they fail to reinvent themselves in the new digital economy. These include newspaper publishing, printed media wholesaling, and motion picture exhibition, though collectively they’re not huge contributors to the Australia economy.
Medium-sized businesses with revenue of $1 million to $100 million have the opportunity to thrive the most in Australia’s digital future. They will be able to take advantage outsourcing innovations, which results in lower demand for capital, provided by super-fast broadband.
- Bookmark this page
- Share this article
- Got more on this story? Email ARN
- Follow ARN on twitter
- Modernizing Security for the Small and Mid-Sized Business – Recommendations for 2013 (Sponsored by McAfee)
- Smart Cloud: Move Beyond monitoring to Holistic Management of Application Performance
- Choice and Control: Considerations for Developing Enterprise Cloud Strategies
- Smart Cloud Provisioning: Low Cost and highly Scalable Entry Point into Cloud Computing
- MSP Guides for effective Endpoint Management Solutions
- Brocade’s Meyer appointed to OpenDaylight Project Committee
- Barracuda Networks raises free capacity of Copy.com to 15GB
- EXCLUSIVE: Cyan lays out Australian expansion plan
- EXCLUSIVE: Channel training integral to Intel smartphone/tablet growth
- In Pictures: She's gonna blow! 10 Star Trek technologies that are almost here
-
Barracuda Networks raises free capacity of Copy.com to 15GB
-
Barracuda Networks raises free capacity of Copy.com to 15GB
-
Barracuda Networks raises free capacity of Copy.com to 15GB
-
Barracuda Networks raises free capacity of Copy.com to 15GB
-
Google Play Music All Access not available in Australia
Get exclusive access to ARN's news, research and invitation only events. 
Comments
John
1
... and the cost of a loaf of bread in 2050 will be $190. So what is their point?
Clearly IBM should stick to the infrastructure and server space and not try and enter the world of financial modelling and accounting.
Zack
2
IBM, as a technology and services provider, is well placed to comment on the benefits of IT infrastructure to the economy, John. Better placed than certain political merchant bankers or finance lawyers anyway.
iHope
3
@John,
If indeed as you suggest, a loaf of bread will cost $190.00 in 2050, then a quick calculation suggests that even a Biodynamic Artisan loaf currently priced at $8.50 is going to rise (no pun intended) around 20 times in cost, 37 years from now.
Therefore based on your prediction, the $1 Trillion revenue value that IBM reports, (a figure surely defined by IBM in terms of the current fiscal value of $1 Trillion in today's market) may then become a figure of up to $20 Trillion adjusted, in 2050, that is if your future bread cost figure is in fact at all accurate, and can be relied upon to predict inflation and other cost increases that will occur by that future date.
When I joined the IT industry many years ago, it was IBM that sold the systems and services that permitted more efficient automated accounting practices, improving accuracy compared to manual accounting that had gone before & it was IBM that gave the World a way to engage in better financial modelling.
Any additional infrastructure and server space business is now supplemental to IBM's foundational pioneering business, a world they never left.
Also note that IBM commissioned the report, they did not write it.
I'm guessing that you also think Bill Gates invented the internet?
iHopeII
4
Zack and iHope are both on the right track however sadly we have a habit in this country of being expert 'knockers' of some great ideas ... when it comes to infrastructure and spending some money for future benefits. Clearly for those without the foresight nor a willingness to accept that something such as the NBN will be great for Australia's future, it will have to happen and be seen before it can be conceptualised. I can only hope that with a very likely change of Government next year, this great piece of infrastructure will be allowed to be completed.
Regardless of how fast wireless becomes, nothing currently known can travel faster than light and fibre optic is being recognised as the preferred option all over the world.
I would challenge the inevitable 'knockers' to pledge they would never takeup a connection to the system once it has been completed (no matter how successful) given their vehiment opposition to the roll-out. In the meantime, IBM''s study seems to validate what should be known intuitively that the NBN will be vital to the growth of productivity in this country into the future.
Without technological innovation and adoption, our GDP growth will be severely limited in comparison to our 'developing' competitors. (Malcolm Turnbull are you listening?)