As was said at the outset, the Internet has changed our sense of time itself. The increasing importance of the Internet has brought about dramatic changes in the way goods and services are produced and distributed to end users. The Internet continues to play a significant role in shaping the new economy by enabling firms to communicate and conduct business on a global basis without regard for location or asset size. Investment in high technology continues to serve as an engine of strong productivity growth for the U.S. economy. Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan expects this trend to continue in the years ahead. The increasing penetration of broadband access among both business and consumer users significantly augments this trend. There are many players in the same space, and the winners will be the technologies and the companies that clearly define their products and services, know and satisfy their customers, are forward-looking and flexible, and set the pace for the industry.

In the past five years, the long-term prospective profit growth of companies engaged in the computer and telecom industry have been revised up by more than double the amount, as the profits earned by old economy-aligned industries. According to Alan Greenspan "virtually every part of our economic structure is, to a greater or lesser extent, affected by the newer innovations in computers and in telecommunications....with few exceptions, little of a truly old economy is left."

Technological innovation and, in particular, the spread of IT has revolutionized the conduct of business during the past 10 years and has resulted in large increases in productivity. The surge over the past few years in business capital spending is a direct result of the higher rates of return brought about by the application of new technologies. The pace of innovation may have temporarily slowed down, but it is expected to resume soon as companies begin to exploit the largely untapped potential for e-commerce, especially in the B2B sector, from which much of the growth is expected to come.

The demand for high-speed bandwidth continues to grow at a fast pace, driven mostly by growth in data volumes, as the Internet and related networks become more central to business operations. Today's telecom industry is undergoing a bandwidth shortage driven mostly by the continuing explosion of the Internet and data markets. The rapid growth of distributed business applications; the proliferation of private networks, e-commerce, and bandwidth-intensive applications (such as multimedia, videoconferencing, and VOD); and the continuing deregulation and privatization of the telecommunications networks throughout the world all help fuel the demand for bandwidth. Moreover, an increasing number of teleworkers are fueling the demand for second and third lines for fax and Internet dial-up. To meet this explosive demand for bandwidth and to capitalize on this growing data opportunity, many data CLECs are targeting small business, SOHOs, and teleworkers in the selected areas of the country in which they are operating.

Self-installation continues to be the holy grail of the DSL industry. Finding a way to move beyond service provider CPE channels and into the retail market is the key to a successful mass-market deployment of DSL. DSL needs to become as easy to purchase and install as an analog modem is today. Consumers need to be able to purchase a modem at an electronics store or other retail outfit and be able to install it on their PC and then immediately sign up for DSL with little or no support. If DSL providers and vendors can achieve this goal and if customer service and technical support of the service provider can follow, then a mass-market deployment will happen much sooner than expected.

Besides implementing automated provisioning and configuration systems and processes, the biggest obstacle facing the industry is the need to significantly improve the customer and technical support provided to all potential and actual subscribers. If these obstacles can be overcome, DSL will have a bright future. Without a significant improvement in customer service, the deployment of DSL to the mass market will fall far short of expectations.

Companies need to put more of an emphasis on training, customer service, and technical support if they want to retain their customers. Ordering DSL continues to remain a substantial challenge for all service providers. There should be no reason why DSL cannot be installed correctly on the first visit. The industry needs to focus on measures to strengthen customer-service initiatives, review current support processes and service levels, and map future demand for customer support. Otherwise, deployments of broadband access infrastructure will be significantly impaired.

Establishing standards and resolving spectrum compatibility concerns are critical to a successful deployment of DSL. A lack of standards leads to market fragmentation, low volumes, and high cost. Moreover, use of standards-based DSL promotes interoperability of technologies and devices, which is key to a successful rollout of DSL. Spectrum compatibility, standards, interoperability, self-installation of modems, and autoconfiguration and provisioning are the four key ingredients to a success deployment of DSL. All parties need to be working toward the same goal—true plug-and-play DSL.

Broadband access is not only about providing the pipes to carry the traffic on the Internet but also about how the traffic will be carried. The report raised numerous questions regarding partnerships, such as what role partnerships will play in this new type of Internet environment. Will sites be more responsive to consumers who come from one of their partner sites? How will the formation of partnerships around content and infrastructure affect consumer behavior, a site's responsiveness, and any additional or custom features available? These questions were posed to a panel of experts that the IEC convened and were included on the broadband access surveys that were distributed at several IEC conferences throughout the year. These were just some of the questions that we asked respondents so as to gain insight into the future of broadband access and content delivery.

In only a few short years, all Internet appliances or electronic devices will be able to access the Internet and obtain the same content as PCs. The continued evolution of Internet appliances will continue the trend of making regulatory boundaries and lines between customer equipment and network services and communications and broadcasting very murky. It will become increasingly difficult to classify particular services, industries, and providers in nice little boxes, where it will be easy to tell if a service is subject to regulation or not. With accessibility to technology no longer an issue, how and when content and content providers will change to accommodate this ubiquitous access from any type of Internet-enabled device has yet to be answered.