UK Connectivity – Supercharging the Recovery and Growth Agenda?

How can the UK navigate a decade of inevitable turbulence that lies ahead? Many see digital as the engine powering smart places, societal uplift, industry transformation, and the growth of new sectors. This makes connectivity the ‘three dimensional network of superhighways’ that will help accelerate the journey to a vibrant economy.?

The promise of superfast 5G and fibre enabled communications is that they can enable?a connected society where the levelling up agenda has tangible impacts and the economic outlook at every level is possible. For me, the tests of tangibility are that?people’s lives have been enriched, everyday experiences have become seamless and hassle free, government services are efficient and personalised, and the business world is constantly innovating towards a better future and delivering positive outcomes in terms of people, the planet, and prosperity.?

So where are we on the journey towards this positive future vision? To explore the current state of the UK journey to superfast connectivity, I was invited as a guest of Huawei UK to attend the?Connected Britain 2021 ?conference and exhibition. The goal was highlight what stood out for me as a futurist by exploring the current state of play, understanding some of the lessons learned to date, and look at the emerging plans and possibilities across the sector. Here, in the first of three articles, I explore what stood out for me in the areas of prioritisation, UK competitiveness, and enabling future opportunities.

Prioritisation and Decision Making

• 5G networks and fibre optic backbones are central to societal advancement and economic growth
• Awareness, ambition, vision, and digital literacy are essential for positive outcomes
• Innovative investment strategies and funding approaches are key to unlocking the opportunity.?

The need for awareness at citizen, business, and government level was one of the strongest messages coming through. Whether or not we understand the enabling technologies, we all know the importance of having fast and reliable connectivity, but the strategic value is often less well understood. A fibre optic backbone and 5G networks will clearly play a central role in shaping the future of the nation – from education, healthcare, business, and individual lifestyles, through to delivery of government services, and national competitiveness.?

While we tend to have strong engagement with our devices and their brands, we generally have less of a relationship and less interest in our connectivity providers and the technologies they use – until something goes wrong. This context can have a major bearing on the prioritisation and decision making of those responsible for ensuring good connectivity for our geographic area or business. Delivering on the opportunity here requires clarity on goals, a clear vision of what success would like, and the motivation to act at speed.

Central to the connectivity vision is the tole of the operators. They discussed how they are prioritising and focusing their extensive infrastructure roll out plans. Lutz Schuler CEO of Virgin Media o2 Explained how 50% of the government goal of 85% UK gigabit connectivity would be delivered by the end of 2021. He also explained how a lack of legacy infrastructure enables accelerated 5G rollout, the shift to NetZero, tackling digital poverty, and integration of new technologies. Robert Finnegan, CEO UK & Ireland for Three highlighted that a priority is to keep rolling out 5G to connect even the smallest locations, with investment in fixed wireless and fibre being critical.

A key aspect of the decision making process is that of finding the money to fund the investment in national and local infrastructure. The operators emphasised that, when the talking stops, someone has to pay for full roll out. This in turn requires the right level of prioritization in the national policy agenda, a proactive investment environment, and supportive regulation. Together, these can help Britain move up the connectivity agenda to compete globally and attract and retain businesses that will be key to future value creation.

Competitiveness

• Connectivity is essential for future performance, competitiveness, and growth
• DCMS has a central role in driving the UK transition to 5G?
• The UK has overcome its slow start and is accelerating into a global leadership position on nationwide connectivity.

Literally every current and emerging sector, and every government service, is increasingly dependent on a core of digital solutions and connectivity. Hence it is essential for business and government to understand the link between connectivity and future business performance, growth, and economic development. In the UK, the Department for Culture, Media, and Sport (DCMS) is responsible for planning and delivery of the national communications infrastructure. Hence, it is seen as key to creating awareness and facilitating user transition to 5G. While the UK’s 5G roll out and digital deployment may have started slower than other mature economies, it was now seen to be in the best position to lead on creating a connected nation in the coming years.?

Competitiveness and performance within the sector were seen as critical in determining future survival and growth of the individual players. Ahmed Essam, CEO of Vodafone UK highlighted positive trends, with this week being the first to show similar usage patterns to 2019. However, sector revenues are now 5% below those of 10 years ago, and estimates suggest that a critical mass of 30-50% penetration is required for a viable business model. Hence a clear question arises over how many players the sector can support and what the critical levers of profitability are and will be. The sector’s economic challenges are exacerbated by the risk of over building 5G / fibre infrastructure in some high density areas, which may not deliver the desired ROI for the operators. In response, extending and deepening industry collaboration was identified as a perennial challenge to address over provision, reduce infrastructure and operating costs, and facilitate faster innovation.

Future Opportunities

• Solutions that touch every person can enhance every life
• Superfast connectivity enables sectoral transformation, new business models, and the future of work?
• 5G and fibre are the glue that allows us to unlock the potential of exponentially advancing technologies.

Looking beyond the inevitable noise and hype that accompanies such a massive investment in new technologies, 5G and fibre are seen to have the superpower to transform every sector, and offer massive potential to level up, create value, and drive development and growth across society. Howard Watson, CTO?of BT Technology Group, emphasised that, in this context, the sector needs to understand that the goal of connectivity should be a seamless user experience, irrespective of the device we are connected to.?

The core technologies have a clear role in supporting and accelerating critical nationwide shifts and post-pandemic priorities. For example, working from home and urban to rural migration seem likely to be core features of the future of business and society over the next three to five years. As such, they will likely continue driving demand for high functionality and fast mobile solutions for a distributed workforce.?

Survival and growth in every sector will almost certainly require them to envision and deliver a high connectivity future. For example, in manufacturing, every part of the value chain has been hard hit by the pandemic, the subsequent ‘pingdemic,’ rising labour costs, sustainability demands, and very efficient and aggressive new digitally centric competitors. This perfect storm is driving industrywide desire for accelerated pursuit of a Manufacturing 4.0 operating model, with an environment of smart factories, smart warehousing, and a declining ecofootprint. This in turn requires a 5G enabled digital transformation to embrace the Internet of Things (IoT), robotics, drones, autonomy, artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain technology, and real time decision making.?

Ray Williamson, Product Marketing Manager for Huawei Wireless highlighted how encouraging it was to see how UK business is accelerating its engagement with the 5G opportunity and exploring how to unlock the value and benefits. Ray shared how it was exciting to see the interest from diverse sectors in the applications and solutions we have on display here in the start up showcase. For example there was strong interest from the agricultural sector in a VR based remote robotic management solution and from the leisure sector in the HADO multiplayer ‘technosport’ gaming experience that was being demonstrated.

All of the factors discussed above have a range of implications for the players in the sector. For example, the growth of an increasingly decentralised workforce creates the opportunity for the industry to showcase 5G and its diverse use cases. A core challenge identified was that of giving customers fast, reliable, seamless access to content and services across multiple sectors - media, entertainment, news, any business information. Many innovations were highlighted that could contribute here, including standalone 5G enabling unfettered packages that unlock possibility, innovation, and growth.

Conclusion

Realising the full potential of superfast connectivity could allow us to deliver on the opportunity for societal transition and sectoral transformation. To do this will require foresight, vision, deep industry collaboration, and operators capable of stepping up to fully embrace a facilitator role for digital uplift. This also means that innovation is required in the process of getting from interest, vision, and strategy to implementation and operation of a fast and reliable connectivity infrastructure. A central focus here needs to be innovation around the speed of decision making and delivery across every part of the value chain.

I attended Connected Britain 2021 as a guest of Huawei UK to meet the leaders and innovators in emerging technologies.

Rohit Talwar is a global futurist, award-winning keynote speaker, author, and the CEO of Fast Future, working with leaders in global corporations, investment firms, NGOs, and governments. His primary expertise lies in helping clients understand and shape the emerging future. He has a particular focus on how we can advance business, society, and individual lives by harnessing the power of new thinking, innovation, and disruptive developments such as artificial intelligence, blockchain technology, and human enhancement.?He is the lead editor and co-author of the new book Aftershocks and Opportunities 2: Navigating the Next Horizon published on September 28th, 2021.