Business Leaders Endorse Strong Government Role in Developing Information Super-Highway, Forrester Survey Reveals
BOSTON — September 15, 1993 — Government should loosen its regulatory reins and provide tax incentives to support the creation of an information superhighway, according to a survey of business leaders attending the 1993 Forrester Technology Management Forum here today.
While none of those surveyed believed govermment should own and operate this information superhighway, a majority endorsed regulatory relief and tax incentives, and only 12 percent believed there was no role for government to play, according to Forrester.
"This is a remarkably clear consensus that government has a positive role to play in fostering emerging technologies," said George Colony, president, Forrester Research Inc.
The Forum, entitled "The World After Client/Server: Extending the Corporation," focused on "social computing," Forrester's term for technologies like the information superhighway that will change the way businesses and ordinary consumers communicate.
Speakers at the forum represented leaders in this new wave of technological innovation, including John Sculley of Apple Computer, George Fisher of Motorola, Steve Ballmer of Microsoft, Robert Kavner of AT&T, Stephen Case of America OnLine, S. Jerrold Kaplan of GO Corp., Alain Rossmann of EO Inc., and many others.
Based on smart telephones, interactive TV, hand-held computers and other emerging technologies, social computing will extend technology to ordinary consumers and will radically alter the way companies sell, support, and distribute products and services.
Forrester Research asked 120 Forum attendees, all representing major corporate users of technology, to rate several vendors on their ability to provide and support this information highway. On a scale of one to five, AT&T was ranked most capable (4.4), followed by MCI (3.43), the RBOCs (3.28) and Sprint (3.1).
Among the other survey highlights:
o Sales people are most likely to use personal digital assistants (PDAs) like Apple Computer's Newton. Half the respondents said mid-level managers, field service and ''random individuals'' would use PDAs, and a full 45 percent believed senior executives would use them.
o Electronic mail is the most sought-after capability of PDAs and other hand-held computing devices, with scheduling, note taking, faxing and contact management also high on the list.
o Most of the companies surveyed are intensive users of on-line information services, with 63 percent using CompuServe, 56 percent using the Internet, 24 percent using MCI Mail, 20 percent using AT&T EasyLink services, 18 percent using Prodigy and 3 percent using America On-Line. Only 14 percent indicated they are using ''none''.
o Seventy percent are developing information applications that will be used directly by their customers.
''In the last six months, cable TV companies, telephone companies, computer hardware manufacturers, and software providers have been caught up in a frenzied mating dance. We believe many diverse strands of technology will converge into a new computing architecture — 'social computing' — that will move the center of computing gravity outside the walls of business and into society at large," said William Bluestein, author of a Forrester Computing Strategy Service report entitled "Defining Social Computing."
Forrester Research Inc. is devoted to helping organizations deploy emerging technologies to meet their business challenges. Since 1983, the firm has been analyzing the impacts of new computing, network and software paradigms on large companies. Forrester's research services — the Computing Strategy Service, the Software Strategy Service, and the Network Strategy Service — have a wide client base among the Global 2,000.
Forrester is headquartered at One Brattle Square, Cambridge, MA 02138, tel. (617) 497-7090.
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