Broadband (BB) communications lie at the heart of any developing information and digital society. Employing the Gompertz model in a time-series study, we analyze the factors that influence the diffusion of fixed and mobile broadband across the OECD countries that have been categorized into five groups based on the stage of innovation, between 1998 and 2015. We find that although the diffusion time is similar for both technologies, the mobile broadband diffusion’s inflection time is asymmetric over the symmetric fixed broadband. The adoption time is almost double compared to the fixed, revealing a strong preference mostly of the developed countries on fixed broadband technology. Moreover, three out of the five innovation categories, in the classification method, the early adopters, early and late majority are really close to Roger’s criteria, aligning with recent literature findings, where countries are clustered into three groups, categorized by their diffusion rates and diffusion speeds.
Although technological developments have provided momentum to extend the frontier of commercially feasible network deployments, the latest data from ITU regarding affordability of ICT services shows that the digital divide between the rich and poor is still an open issue. Therefore, an economic framework is needed to create conditions for affordable network services. In this paper, we propose a set-aside mechanism that can satisfy this need by reserving resources for targeted groups and resolving the practical problem of having greedy users that rationally compete for cheaper resources. In this mechanism, prices are tailored to users’ budget capacities. Our simulation results indicate that it is possible to increase the resource allocation for delivering services to the poorest by inducing regular users to compete among themselves.
This study applies the recently developed novel panel vector autoregression models in a generalized method of moments (GMM) estimation framework to investigate the telecommunication infrastructures-defence-growth nexus for 157 countries between 2000 and 2018. To measure the defence sector, defence spending serves as the proxy, while economic growth is measured by the real gross domestic product, and telecommunication infrastructures are measured by a composite index of telecommunication (which comprises of mobile line, fixed line, and internet access penetration) via the principal component method. The empirical results at the global level show that telecommunication infrastructures, defence spending and growth jointly cause one another, while the direction of their effects differs. The direction of the causal-effect among the three variables for the income groups also differ. Thus, there is need to promote holistic policies that will reduce defence spending necessary for the enhancement of telecommunication infrastructures and inclusive economic growth at the global level, low-, upper-middle and high-income countries. A decrease in the allocation of funds to the defence sector will encourage enhancement of telecommunication infrastructures and aggregate output to move in the same direction.
The study in this paper investigates how information technology (IT), directly and indirectly, affects capital flows to Sub-Saharan African countries. It also examines the asymmetric effects of IT on capital flows. The general method of moments methodology is employed to estimate a decomposed model of capital flows, which produced results that clearly show the correlative effect of IT is relatively more significant, compared to the effects of other explanatory variables. Furthermore, the results reveal appreciable asymmetric effects of IT on capital flows and the components, with the effects found to be uneven and dissimilar. It is also revealed that capital flows and the components reinforced themselves over time. The salutary effects of IT on capital flows, therefore, need to be sustained. In order to achieve this goal, economic policies should be fashioned to drive the deepening of IT, stable policy environment, synergy among determinants of capital flows, usage of advanced IT in financial markets, awareness of investment opportunities in a real sector, and application of IT in weak sectors. Such policies are most likely to sustain and improve upon the current trend of capital flows to Sub-Saharan Africa.
Regulation of Next Generation Access Networks (NGANs) has been one of the most debated topics throughout the European Union (EU). Now it seems to be seeking to strike a new balance, between promoting NGANs investments and, simultaneously, preserving the current level of competition. This much-sought reconciliation was attempted with the release of European Commission (EC)‘s Recommendation 2013/466/EU on consistent non-discrimination obligations and costing methodologies for the promotion of competition and the enhancement of the broadband investment environment. The Recommendation, among others, defines the use of Economic Replicability Tests (ERTs), on the basis of a Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) approach, as the proper methodological tool to determine whether the dominant firm (i.e., incumbent operator) engages in a discriminatory behavior. The aim of this paper is twofold; first to investigate the impact of long-term access pricing agreements on ERT conduct as defined in Recommendation 2013/466/EU; second, in the light of the review of the aforementioned Recommendation, to attempt a non-conventional implementation of the test. The latter manifests itself via the potential use of Real Options Theory (ROT) within the ERT formulation on top of DCF results. The main objective is to investigate whether the fixed part of the wholesale access price - if the latter is seen as a two-part tariff - can actually be included in the calculation process to the contrary of what Jaunaux and Lebourges [ 39 ] suggest.
