Analysys Mason welcomes action to put Scotland at the forefront of the digital economy
The Scottish Government launched its much-anticipated digital strategy, outlined in a 54-page document entitled ‘Scotland’s Digital Future: A Strategy for Scotland’. Analysys Mason has welcomed the plans, which represent a positive step towards realising the nation’s digital ambitions. The plans are expected to stimulate investment in next-generation broadband infrastructure and contribute to Scotland’s economic growth.
“The Scottish Government’s has clearly set out its direction and strategy for achieving the country’s digital ambitions, including a widespread roll-out of next-generation broadband services. We now expect this announcement to inspire the industry to take action,” comments Iqbal Bedi, Senior Manager at Analysys Mason’s Edinburgh office.
“We would encourage Scottish local authorities to draw up their next-generation broadband investment plans and apply for the various types of UK and EU funding that have been made available to stimulate investment in such infrastructure,” adds Bedi.
According to Bedi, Scotland faces a significant, but not insurmountable, challenge if it wants to catch up with successful broadband initiatives across the UK, such as those in Wales, Ireland and various regions in England. Wales, in particular, has set very ambitious targets to provide 50% of premises with 100Mbit/s access speeds by 2020, in line with the EU digital strategy.
At present, superfast broadband services are set to be available to around two-thirds of the UK population by 2015 leaving one-third of the UK population without access to superfast broadband services, the so called ‘broadband gap’. However, our own analysis shows that the broadband gap will be greater than one-third of the population across Scotland based on current levels of private sector investment.
Analysys Mason believes that collaboration across the public sector, as well as private sector investment, will be required to meet the next-generation broadband objectives in Scotland.
Bedi, who was involved with the Scottish Government’s Pathfinder Evaluation Study prior to joining Analysys Mason, adds, “There is a significant onus on Scottish local authorities and other Scottish public sector organisations to consider how their network procurement plans can dovetail with next-generation broadband initiatives. In this age of austerity, it makes sense for large public sector organisations to consider the advantages of aggregating ICT procurements to maximise from economies of scale.”
Analysys Mason has direct and recent experience in helping central and local government authorities to develop their next-generation broadband strategies, business cases and funding applications.
We are advising the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) on its ‘Next Generation Broadband for Wales’ project – a landmark intervention project that aims to deliver superfast broadband to over half a million premises. We are providing WAG with a wide range of commercial, technical, procurement and ongoing programme management support.
Analysys Mason is also supporting a number of local authorities in England with their Broadband Delivery UK (BDUK) funding applications, and we are developing a number of cost models, socio-economic and cost-benefit analyses for the Broadband Stakeholder Group, BDUK, various regional development agencies and local authorities.