Intelligent Transport Systems - Telenor

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presently being ported. (The way Telenor over
a period did approach this field, is described in
a separate paper in this issue of Telektronikk.)
We also see that the ICT applications we are
talking about take place over all kinds of networks
varying in intensity and bandwidth
demands: Low intensity communication between
the tyres and the car control system, high bandwidth
demanding bursts to catch the picture of
a person, frequent low intensity broadcasts between
vehicles in a network, steady high bandwidth
to make a hospital take over a patient
“seamlessly” from the ambulance. Dream-ware
a few years back – reality in 2002.
We can even easily see that this is a landscape of
very different products, sizes, and players: mass
products as well as the tailor-made, huge applications
as well as the tiny, consumers, SMEs,
OEMs (car manufacturers), transportation industry
and government.
Hence, dealing with ITS seems unavoidable for
ICT companies: ITS will just catch on, and the
telco networks, service platforms, and services
will be involved at some level. As datacom turns
into a general infrastructure for datacom and
mobile computing, ITS will just happen on top
of it.
The providers of the various infrastructures on
which ITS shall build, may not be aware of it
happening at all. They will simply be fit, or not
so well fit, for the various demands on infrastructure
of the various ITS applications. Hence,
ITS is just yet another area where the network
provider will have to choose whether his business
now and in the future is best served by staying
with the networks only – if so, with which of
them, or by entering the field with niche specific
competence to open markets, and hopefully,
through gaining a competitive advantage in the
understanding of the demands, become a preferred
provider of any combination of suitable
networks, suitable production platforms, or even
content.
There is no context independent or a priori
answer to such a row of options – apart from one:
As an endurable business idea, to stay with the
networks only needs a strategy for assuring that
just those networks are the preferred ones among
the many alternatives that may be present where
mobile computers stroll. In practice, such a strategy
would imply taking an active part in developing
and closely following the field of ITS, as
well as its users and initiators.
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Telektronikk 1.2003