World leaders in the information and telecommunications industry are gathering in Seoul this week to attend a series of technology-related events.
Winding up its three-day run tomorrow is the Wireless Broadband World Forum at the Hotel Lotte World in southern Seoul. Hosted by Korea’s Ministry of Information and Communication, the forum has brought together industry leaders to share their expertise and vision for wireless broadband services and technology trends.
The participants include KT Corp., Samsung Electronics Co., SK Telecom and Posdata, as well as major foreign information technology firms such as Alcatel and Intel Corp.
Beginning today at the Seoul Sheraton Grand Walkerhill in eastern Seoul is the Seoul Digital Forum and World ICT Summit.
Now in its third year, the Seoul Digital Forum’s theme this year is “Being Intelligent: The Next Digital Evolution.” Past forums have focused on “digital convergence” and “ubiquitous computing.”
Experts from around the world will exchange views on global IT industries, covering a variety of topics from semiconductors and robots to digital content and games.
The two-day forum is composed of special speeches, meetings and parallel discussion sessions on more specific topics.
Participants this year include chief executive officers from prominent IT firms such as Microsoft Corp., Siemens, Samsung Electronics, NTT DoCoMo and Qualcomm.
At the opening tomorrow, Klaus Kleinfeld of Siemens, Nam Joong-soo of KT, Paul Jacobs of Qualcomm and Derek Lidow of iSuppli will all be in attendance.
Questions to be addressed include: how will the concept of “digital intelligence” evolve over the next five to 10 years and how will existing telecom services evolve to provide more sophisticated personal and healthcare services? What, if any, ill effects will there be to the new technology? And how will they be addressed?
Speakers at this session will also present their views on the enormous strides being made in digital intelligence.
Following the session, Steven Ballmer, the chief executive officer of Microsoft Corp., will give a speech about the software giant’s business plans for the Korean market.
Also scheduled for today is a session on the role of telecom and robotic services in bringing intelligence to people’s everyday lives, in the form of home networks and health services.
Friday’s first session will discuss the role of semiconductors in the future, with Saturo Ito, the chairman of Renesas Technology; Hwang Chang-gyu, the chief executive officer of Samsung Electronics, and Mr. Lidow, the chief executive officer of iSuppli, participating as main speakers.
Also on Friday, Martin Nisenholtz, the senior vice president of digital operations at the New York Times, will speak on how digital technology will affect the way news is produced and distributed in the future.
Abraham Peled, the chief executive officer of England’s NDS Group, is also penciled in to talk at that session.
Sessions will be held on both days on an array of topics, including how the future digital home will evolve from simple networking to digital living, new global mobile contents, gaming, service robots and digital vehicles.
On the sidelines of the forum, the World ICT Summit will be held on Friday, bringing together information technology ministers from 15 countries, with Information Minister Rho Jun-hyong speaking on behalf of Korea in the closed-door ministerial meeting.
The first Global Mobile Content Awards, established this year in part by the Korea Culture and Content Agency and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, will also be held as part of the Seoul Digital Forum. The awards ceremony will take place tomorrow evening.by Wohn Dong-hee