Widespread high quality connectivity will be a backbone for Europe’s economic recovery
The GSMA, uniting the global and European mobile industry, welcomes the Digital Decade goals announced today by the European Commission. Our vision is to unlock the full power of connectivity so that people, industry and society thrive.
“The European mobile industry is fully committed to helping the European Commission achieve its Digital Decade goals. 5G connectivity will play a critical role for e-health, e-learning and the continent’s economic recovery. We are working with the Commission to boost European competitiveness, especially in cloud-edge computing and cybersecurity, and our industry is taking a leading role in beating the 2050 climate targets,” said Daniel Pataki, Vice President, Policy and Regulation and Head of Europe, Russia and CIS, for the GSMA, which represents more than 200 mobile network operators in the broader European region.
The mobile industry’s vision for 2021 and beyond was presented in the recent GSMA paper “Sovereignty, Resilience and Trust: Strengthening Europe’s Digital Economy after COVID-19”.
We believe that Europe can emerge from the COVID-19 crisis stronger, and connectivity will play an essential role. In the short term, digital solutions will allow people to return to work more quickly by facilitating social distancing. Longer-term, we will need to consider where investment should be targeted, recognising that economic activity might not return to pre-crisis levels for years to come.
A robust and resilient telecoms sector will play a critical role in Europe’s ability to meet its environmental commitments. Through what we call ‘the enablement effect’, increased use of smart, connected technologies across all economic sectors will make a manifest difference in greenhouse gas emissions.
We are standing at the critical point in terms of 5G rollout in Europe: the combination of EU’s long term budget and recovery package, the industrial strategy and the digital decade targets mean Europe’s digital destiny will be determined in the coming months.
The future will require us to be more resilient and more digital, and this calls for rapid and bold action. By increasing the pace of digitalisation, Europe can achieve new efficiencies linked to the new attitudes and behaviours we see taking hold across society.