We do need in government, and I have a responsibility in my own department to try to make sure that we get the right infrastructure to support such a development here in Ireland. To make sure that we are good at this and that we actually cerate an industry here that provides us with the jobs and the growth that our society depends on. We get caught in a story of oh god, we’re woeful, we are down in the OECD league in terms of where we are on broadband connectivity and so on. I believe though that we have a chance to make a leap forward. It won’t necessarily be the same story as Japan or Korea where they have a different demography, different society and different infrastructure. But maybe we have certain skills and qualities in this country that will allow us to succeed in this new digital media and digital communication industry as it evolves.
I see various aspects to it. One of the advantages we have is that we have a lot of spectrum available to us compared to certain other countries because of a range of different circumstances. So I think wireless technology may well take off here. We can use our spectrum in a very innovative way to make Ireland an attractive location for people to test out these new technologies, these new wireless digital technologies. We are also, in that regard, home to a lot of the companies that have expertise in this area. We have a lot of foreign direct investment, with a lot of companies in Dublin, so we have certain advantages as well. We are not that removed from some of the leading thinking in those industries, as well as having already, a very creative and quite extensive network of smaller Irish companies in the digital media and in other software areas. So we have certain advantages already.
I think we are going to have to look – it’s not just going to be about infrastructure and how many megabytes you can download in houses – we have to recognise that at the moment already that 40% of houses in Ireland don’t even have a computer. So the measure of what the speed is or how many connections we have to houses isn’t the only issue. A second issue may be how many houses have a computer. And I think in looking at this change in terms of how digital technology and communications technology is going to work best, one of the issues is that ubiquity is going to bring real benefits. That where you have ubiquitous connectivity, it doesn’t have to be 100 megabytes speed connection on every occasion, but it is ease of connection, ease of use of a range of simple applications sometimes, is what is actually going to work.
So I am very interested to be here and to meet the people from FIS (Films in Schools) and looking at the educational application of new digital technology. Because that is one example that I can see where we should if we push it, be able to get ubiquitous connectivity which provides us with really useful services. Let’s look at how we really provide high quality connectivity in our schools, and flexible connectivity, wireless based systems which can be of real use in the development of services in the education area. That is something that I hope we can develop in the coming months, and in the coming years.
I’ll finish by going back to where I started in terms of entrepreneurial endeavour. It is I think through enterprise that we are going to achieve a lot of these changes - we don’t know yet what technological solutions or what process solutions or in what context they are going to work - is going to come out of incubation centres and lead to companies going out and beyond into the wider economy. There was one lecturer on mine in college that I very much regarded – John Teeling who came from an entrepreneurial background - he always said at the time and it is so true, that we need to celebrate failure. We are not good enough at celebrating failure. And it’s true because through failure, we are learning and if we have too much fear of failure, we never even try. I think we are ready as a people at the present time, we are confident as a people in our own circumstances, to be willing to give things a try, to be willing to risk failure and to see failure as an opportunity to learn, to get a second time, and try it and actually succeed. I am sure that a lot of the businesses that are coming out of here won’t be coming out as successes but that very experience is a huge learning lesson and that very sense of collective consciousness amongst ourselves that we are going to be enterprising, we are going to be willing to take risks, we are going to be willing to try something different and difficult is actually crucial. I hope that that culture and that sense is here and I’m sure it is.
Finally, I am very happy to announce two other developments and I hope that they are very successful. One being the IADT’s intention to submit a proposal under Enterprise Ireland’s current round of funding for incubation centre extension in the coming months. I wish you every success with that endeavour and I look forward to seeing a second media cube to serve the digital media sector at IADT in the not too distant future. Also to announce, in relation to FIS, their book club initiative as part of the expanding range of services that they provide and the innovative work that they do. I wish both those projects huge success, not failure.
Thank you.