comsoc - IEEE

COMSOC 2020 ReportIndex0 - Executive Summary....................................................................................................81 - Introduction...............................................................................................................122 - Association Scenario in 2020...................................................................................182.1 - Role of Associations and balance between on line and physical presence........202.1.1 - Critical Mass............................................................................................202.1.2 - Networking..............................................................................................212.1.3 - Economy of scale....................................................................................222.1.4 - Being part of a selected few....................................................................222.2 - Social Networks: an aggregation tool or a substitute for association?...............232.2.1 - Personal Based Relationship..................................................................242.2.2 - Information Based Relationship..............................................................242.2.3 - Gathering Based Relationship.................................................................252.3 - Association relation with the industry..................................................................252.3.1 - Academia vs Industry..............................................................................262.3.2 - Associations vs Telecom Operators........................................................272.3.3 - Standards ..............................................................................................282.4 - Association relation with policy makers andgovernment institutions.....................................................................................292.5 - Associations as cluster of freelance ...................................................................313 - Powerful Drivers Changing the world.....................................................................323.1 - Energy Crises.....................................................................................................343.2 - Food Crises........................................................................................................353.3 - Climate Change Crises ......................................................................................373.4 - Aging Society Crises ..........................................................................................383.5 - New economies gaining the upper hand ...........................................................393.6 - New emerging world areas.................................................................................414 - Communications in 2020..........................................................................................424.1 - Technologies entering the arena.........................................................................444.1.1 - Bioengineering........................................................................................454.1.2 - Nanotechnology......................................................................................464.1.3 - Sensors...................................................................................................464.1.4 - Smart Materials.......................................................................................474.1.5 - Smart Ambient.........................................................................................484.1.5.1 - Smart Buildings.........................................................................494.1.5.2 - Smart Cities...............................................................................504.2 - Viral Networks.....................................................................................................504.3 - The Data Tsunami and the Software Networks..................................................514.3.1 - Data Creation..........................................................................................524.3.2 - Data Storage...........................................................................................534.3.3 - Data Transport.........................................................................................535

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.3.4 - Data Processing......................................................................................554.3.5 - Data, Metadata, Semantics.....................................................................564.3.6 - Data visualization....................................................................................574.4 - The Terminals steerage......................................................................................584.5 - Embedded communications...............................................................................594.5.1 - Transforming Products into Services.......................................................604.5.2 - The Internet of Things.............................................................................614.5.3 - The Internet with Things..........................................................................614.5.4 - Human embedded communications........................................................624.6 - What does it mean to be a telecommunicationexpert?..............................................................................................................624.7 - Telecommunications Players..............................................................................634.7.1 - Survivors (biz as usual)...........................................................................654.7.2 - Aggressive survivors (expansion of present bizin neighboring areas)...............................................................................654.7.3 - Embedded Communications Providers...................................................664.7.4 - Data Centric Biz Networks......................................................................674.7.5 - Vertical Sectors Re-engineering through telecommunications................684.7.6 - Take over of today’s players by new ones...............................................686.8 - COMSOC University of CommunicationsEconomics........................................................................................................906.9 - COMSOC MVNO................................................................................................907 - Roadmap....................................................................................................................91ANNEX...........................................................................................................................107A - Communications Society SWOT.........................................................................107B - List of committee members.................................................................................110C - List of organizations involved .............................................................................1105 - COMSOC Mission in 2020........................................................................................705.1 - Punch line ..........................................................................................................725.2 - COMSOC constituency at 2020 .........................................................................725.2.1 - Demographic Trends...............................................................................755.2.2 - Demographic impact factors on COMSOC Mission ...............................775.3 - Segmentation of potential markets and interest ................................................775.3.1 - Critical Research and Technology Trends ..............................................785.3.2 - Research and Technology Impact on COMSOC Activities .....................795.4 - How is research going to be structured?............................................................805.5 - How is industry going to innovate, follow, catch up?..........................................805.5.1 Industry Trends..........................................................................................805.5.2 - Industry impact Factors on COMSOC Mission .......................................815.6 - The labor market and the need for continuouseducation..........................................................................................................816 - COMSOC "Products and Services" in 2020............................................................826.1 - Conferences.......................................................................................................836.1.1 - Changes required in current COMSOCConference Approach and Management.................................................846.2 - Knowledge base.................................................................................................866.3 - Lobbying Services..............................................................................................866.4 - Tutorials, Courses, Certification..........................................................................876.5 - On site education................................................................................................886.6 - Membership Qualification...................................................................................896.7 - COMSOC University for Professional Engineers................................................896 7

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report Customer access will be based on optical fiber in today’s developed countries and in (some)urban areas of some developing countries (BRIC) whilst in the other areas it will be mostlybased on wireless. Decreasing costs in localized access areas will increase the number of independentinfrastructures created by municipalities and third parties (non telecom operators); Capabilities of terminals will keep growing, including their capability of creating localnetworks and to act as bridges. This in turn will give rise to bottom-up access infrastructures. Terminals will be embedded in many objects (or putting it in another way, objects will hostcommunications capabilities). Sensors will be a significant component in network termination, and will be embedded inmany objects, sometimes being a structural part of the object itself (smart materials); theywill be programmable and most objects will have APIs included as part of the design andproduction process. Many objects will embed displays and hence many more will be using broadband (mostlywireless).COMSOC’S CHANGING CONSTITUENCYTechnology evolution, as well as market forces, will change the characteristics of COMSOCconstituency: As telecommunications spreads in latitude and becomes embedded, and hidden, the role ofthe communications expert will change. Most industries will need communications expertiseas part of their competence, particularly in terms of services based on connectivity, whilst thecore telecommunications competences, transport, protocols, switching, will see a diminishingnumber of engineers as these “legacy” technology elements will become embedded in Legolikemodules. The dividing line between communications and computing will start to fade and along with itthe distinctions between experts in communications vs experts in computers.markets and societies as their evolution pace will increase.► Balance its specificity and core value (technology) with the need to provide a broader viewand serve a broader constituency. This shall be done by establishing a network of excellencewith other professional societies, within and outside of the IEEE. The present network ofrelations with “peers” should be extended to include constituencies with different perspectivesand focus (market and human society).► Give serious consideration to the current structure of IEEE societies since there is anincreasing overlap in technology and its applications. Most notably, stronger cooperationshould be established in this decade with the Computer Society, Consumer Electronics Society,Vehicular Technology Society, and possibly others, on a path that may lead to integration ormerger. Stronger ties should be established with other IEEE societies like the Society on SocialImplication of Technology.CONCLUSIONThe report presents in detail the changing scenarios expected ten years from now, in the generalcontext (association evolution, major world crises, technology evolution) and in response identifiesa number of specific actions that should be considered and enacted to assure COMSOC’s continuedrelevance and viability.The COMSOC 2020 vision reflects the consensus of an informed group of people with many yearsof expertise and varied perspectives. Obviously, the vision’s conjectures need to be monitored andfinely tuned over time. As any forecast, it tends to get fuzzy as the horizon increases. Whilst there isstrong confidence on the technology forecast, the impact of market, economic and regulatory forcesis less certain, and this, in turn, may impact the pace of technology “adoption”.COMSOC should keep this report alive, and retune it as time goes by at least once every twoyears. Additionally, this report may be used as the basis fora presentation material to explain to alay audience both the evolutionary trends of technology and their impact on the market and humansociety.COMSOC GOALS FOR 2020To remain viable and relevant ten years from now, COMSOC should aim at achieving the followinggoals:► Launch a neutral, peer-reviewed yearly document on technology evolution and its potentialimplications on the market and on human society. A director on its Board of Governors shouldbe responsible for this goal and for positioning COMSOC as society’s ICT focal point.► Promote through its conferences and publications a view of technology within the broadercontext of market forces and human society. Conferences and publications should have specificguidelines to ensure this broad coverage.► Become the organization that policy makers will turn to, to understand technology evolutionand its implications.► Move quickly towards supporting a new generation of freelance professionals. These arelikely to progressively outnumber those having stable life time employment that was thehallmark of the last century.► Feature a flexible structure able to respond quickly, and even anticipate, the dynamics of10 11

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Reportto be periodically, every two years, updated to reflect the evolution of the overall environment and ofthe strategic directions pursued.COMSOC will keep evolving, in response to the bottom up demand from its constituency and ofthe changing overall scenario. This will be a linear evolution and it will happen without requiring anylong term perspective. It will be mostly a tactical evolution.Hence, the main objective of the group, reflected in this document, has been to think outside of thebox, outlining a disruptive strategic evolution to go beyond today’s view and to answer the question:What can and should a leading telecommunications association be like in 2020?andWhat are the actions that have to be taken to ensure that COMSOC will be leading in 2020?The strategic and tactical views have to coexist and the COMSOC leadership has to face thischallenge by instantiating the actions proposed in this document into concrete day by day operation.1 INTRODUCTIONEvolution in the COMSOC framework, since year 2000, has been amazing:• new countries entering and taking the lead in telecommunications• new forms of spontaneous associations made possible by communications networks• explosion of wireless communications surpassing fixed line communications• explosion of timely available crowd-reviewed information• new players in the communications arenaIt may be impossible to foresee precisely the evolution in the coming next ten years but theconsensus is that the changes COMSOC may be facing will be greater than the ones experienced inthe last decade.These changes are both a potential challenge and an opportunity to the growth of COMSOC andto its membership.Under Byeong G. Lee’s presidency a group was formed to look at a 2020 COMSOC scenario andto identify roadmaps and actions to be carried out in the coming years.This document is the result of that group. The ideas presented have been discussed in a numberof places and challenged by different constituencies, including academia, industry, COMSOC SisterSocieties, and reflects the common understanding of the group of the comments and critiques thathave been voiced.The document, however, is not intended to represent a unanimous consent nor to become aconsolidated reference for the coming years’ actions; it is not a “specification” but rather a startingpoint that the group offers to the COMSOC leadership with the suggestion to keep it a living documentThis document is structured into six main parts plus three annexes.Following this introduction we provide a possible scenario on what technical associations will belike in 2020, what their role can be and how their role will be executed in terms of physical presencevs virtual, on line presence. This includes a discussion on the role of Social Networks and howmuch they can be directed or to what extent they will represent a continuously shifting dynamicalaggregation of people reflecting changing interests with no specific fidelity to a specific network.Will Social Networks gravitate onto “topics” or onto “tools”? The issue is important since it shifts thefocus from being a leader in “topics” to being a leader in “aggregation”.This part is also proposing some reflections on the relations that may exist in 2020 among groups,associations and industry, to what extent will industry find a value in the existence of associations,how industry will seek participation in association and may desire to be actively involved in them.The relation among groups, associations and policy makers is also addressed, and the influence thatassociations can have on policy makers and therefore the service they can provide to industry and tothe public by creating a neutral playing field for worldwide policy discussion. This aspect is importantsince it helps in defining the boundaries of an association: shall it have only technical boundaries orshall it embed economics, social, cultural aspects?The association members are also discussed. Will they be mostly individual professionals(freelance) or will they be employees, and in this case of what type of industry/academia/institution,or companies? Will these members be associated with several associations at a time and what can bethe relation among those associations? Will we see a federation of associations, each one active in adifferent field?The third chapter takes a look at those drivers that are changing the world in terms of potential, focus,concerns, opportunities. These drivers are likely to condition the perception of values and thereforewill focus the interest of individuals, communities and policy makers. For sure, telecommunicationsand technologies in general are going to play a major role in defining the approach and responding tothese drivers.We are considering in this report:• the energy crises, where telecommunications is playing both the role of the villain and the oneof the savior. On the one hand telecommunications (and IT) is going to increase its hunger forenergy moving from less than 2% in 2010 to a 3.5% in 2020 (electricity wise the growth wouldbe from about 8% to over 15%);12 13

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report• the climate crises, with an intensification of focus on controlling the human generated causes toclimate change; again sensors and greater efficiency in production and distribution are crucial alongwith the telecommunications infrastructure supporting them;• the food crises, resulting from growing population, a shrinking of crop fields, and a betterlifestyle; sensors and sensors networks as well as efficiency in production and distribution willplay a crucial role;• the aging society crises, having impact both in the increasing cost of health care in manycountries and in a shift of demographics, is likely to impact the demand on telecommunicationsand the type of services making use of telecommunications infrastructures;• the rise of new economic areas overtaking the present leading ones, shifting the potentialdemography of COMSOC members and the focus and priorities of our Society;• the emergence of new geographical areas as major telecommunications users, like Africa,resulting in a different relevance of technologies and bringing to the potential COMSOCaudience a different type of interest.The fourth chapter focuses on the characteristics of telecommunications in 2020 since these have animpact on COMSOC both in terms of the areas to be addressed, in terms of its potential constituency,and in terms of its relation/competition with other associations. More specifically the following broadareas are considered:• technologies entering the arena of telecommunications. Specifically we are addressing theexpected evolution of bioengineering, nanotechnology, smart materials, smart buildings, smartcities and more generally awareness of objects and environments since they can become bothcomponents of telecommunications infrastructures and new users of telecommunicationsinfrastructure. More than that, they are creating a new audience for COMSOC and converselyother associations focusing on those technologies may attract our constituency to their orbit;• the emergence of viral networks as an integral part of the telecommunications infrastructuresbrings to the fore a different constituency of players that COMSOC is not considering today,like civil engineers, private citizens and this can significantly expand the potential audience butat the same time may require a different way of relation with them;• the Data Tsunami has just started; by the end of the decade the data tsunami will have changedcompletely the scenario of telecommunications with more devices creating, storing, interactingwith and analyzing data. Data communications will be both local, ambient wise and networkwise and that is bringing into the potential COMSOC arena new players and may be leveragedfor new services. The difference between computer and telecommunications network willdisappear and consideration shall be given to the existence of two different societies, like theComputer Society and the COMSOC society. This may also affect other IEEE Societies. Also,the encapsulation of data into services and the commoditization of physical networks will pushtowards software networks with new disciplines and new actors to consider;• terminals are going to take the upper hand, both in terms of market value (they already have),in terms of innovation (they already have) and in terms of being themselves an integral part ofthe network first and then a network themselves that may slowly replace (a significant part of)the network. This leads to the entrance into the COMSOC market area of a completely newaudience that today is followed by other associations. This may be the single most disruptiveissues we will be facing at the end of this decade;• embedded communications will provide broad interaction capabilities to many, if not most,objects changing the perception of telecommunications. This on the one hand will devaluethe glamour of telecommunications (it will disappear from most people’s perception) buton the other hand will increase tremendously the number of industries that have to have anunderstanding of telecommunications and telecommunications technologies. In turns, thisincreases the market span for COMSOC although that increased market speaks a differentlanguage and it is focusing on different issues. It is going to be similar to the shift we saw in the1950/60ies when telecom switch operators were replaced by lay persons with the introductionof the DDD. Many more people became telecom operators but they were completely differentfrom the previous ones;• what will it mean, hence, to be a telecommunications expert in the next decade? What will bethe kind of knowledge a telecom engineer will require and who will consider herself a telecomengineers. What subjects will Universities be offering? As telecommunications change whoshould COMSOC consider to be a telecommunications engineer?• what kind of evolution in the players in telecommunications might be expected over thisdecade? Are we going to see a concentration with fewer, bigger, players or a fragmentation?Are telecommunications employees going to increase of decrease?The fifth chapter opens the part of the document that goes to the core of the repositioning ofCOMSOC. This chapter aims at describing COMSOC in the third decade of this century by defining:• the COMSOC Mission in 2020. As telecommunications have shifted from being a technologicalenabler for the economy and the social fabric to a pervasive component in any economic andsocial domain COMSOC is repositioning itself attracting a much wider constituency andproviding a unifying glue to the many facets of the communications world;• the “Punch line” capturing in a nutshell with less than five words the essence of COMSOC;• the COMSOC Constituency at 2020 in terms of gender, scholarship, belonging to what marketsector (industry and sub sector, academia and department, institutions, freelance) , wealth andpropensity to aggregation;• the Segmentation of potential markets and interest, defining the various market segments thatwill be addressed detailing for each one what value perception is characterizing it• the evolution of the way to pursue innovation, how is research going to be structured andits partition among academia and industry, what will be the role of single individuals, how isthe flow of information likely to happen and be managed, how much research will be patentprotected and how much will be Open Innovations;• the role played by established industry, how is industry going to innovate, follow, catch up andwhat type of skill industry is seeking, and how much this skill will be sought internally and howmuch on the open market;• the structure of the labor market and the need for continuous education of professionals in thebroader area of telecommunications as identified in the previous chapter.The sixth chapter describes the kind of products and services that COMSOC has to provide to fulfillthe mission defined in the previous chapter (chapter 5). This description is given in broad terms andit is not to be seen as an exhaustive list, rather as a set of beacons to indicate directions of evolution.Specifically, the chapter addresses the following areas:• Conferences: there will be conferences held in specific locations, as it is today but thesewill be flanked by conferences based on Social Networks, possibly developed by COMSOCthemselves as an extension to today’s blogs and meeting areas. As video will become themain communications paradigm among humans, social networks will become video basedas well. Additionally, conferences may become much more focused on a specific theme,micro-conferences that will be able to attract a qualified and quantitative worthwhile audience14 15

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report2.12.1.1Vehicular Technology Society, and the IEEE Society on Social Implication ofTechnology. Sisters and Related Societies should also be involved [2.4].▪ As it will become clear in this document, the need to focus and differentiatecannot be achieved by limiting the technical horizons and fields ofapplications.Technology has to remain at the core of COMSOC but it has tobe flanked by cultural, economical and social aspects [2.5].Role of Associations 3 and balance between on line andphysical presenceAs in the past, Associations by 2020 will have the role of:• multiplying the value of the individual by creating a critical mass that can have a stronger effecton the “external world”;• ease networking among the members;• decrease the cost of access to resources thanks to economy of scale;• create a sense of belonging.The emergence of the on line world is not changing “per se” the role of associations but it is:• challenging the way this role can be played;• changing the value of the above roles in a prospective member view with implication on theassociation revenue model, and also;• changing the way to implement the role.Critical MassOn line tools are becoming more and more effective in attracting individuals to any given issue. Theon line tools have the advantage over off line methods to support a viral spreading of the informationand to provide the means for an immediate response.The cost of spreading the information, and the interactivity associated to the message“we want this, if you want it too click and become one of us”,provide an immense advantage over off line tools.Recruitment is clearly just one part of the establishment of an association in terms of critical mass.The association should be able to maintain the members and count on their continuous presence. Asit is easy to join, so it is easy to disappear. Hence, an association that cannot substantiate the actualmembership at any given time loses its credibility.Off line association can suffer from the same problem and usually membership is counted on somehard factors, such as how many paid the membership dues at a certain moment in time.This can easily be replicated on line but the problem is that as associations drift to the on line worldthey may find it difficult to have a paying membership. The dues have to be justified and they areneeded for the credibility of the declared constituency.The approach of counting the membership in terms of number of members actually interacting withthe association services (as it is done in Social Networks) may lead to significant underestimate of the3 For broader consideration on where societies of societies think professional association structure and managementmay be trending look at The Council of Engineering and Scientific Society Executives (CESSE)and the American Society of Association Executives (ASEE).2.1.2actual membership in association like COMSOC.Out of the 50,218 members as of December 2010, a minor portion has interacted on line withCOMSOC publications, blogs, events.Pure on line associations requires nevertheless some concrete ways ofdetermining the commitment of its membership and its identity.▪ COMSOC will need to impose a membership fee even as it moves to anon line only community. This has to be seen in the context of a possiblenew IEEE paradigm to include a Society membership as part of the IEEEmembership dues [2.6].▪ Some graphic representations 4 of the levels of interactions within COMSOCmembers, including interactions with information may be desirable. Someinteresting fall out on semantics can provide value to our constituency [2.7].On line presence is important in 2011 and it is going to be a given in 2020.▪ COMSOC needs to prepare to become an on line Association, that candeliver also some real world services. These flanks the mainstream on lineservices [2.8].▪ The BoG and Officers meetings progressively shall be moved on line (atleast one of them per year). The tools supporting on line meetings shouldsupport open participation of a wider constituency, with the possibility ofholding private sessions when appropriate. Beyond 2020 we can expect tohave all BoG and Officers meetings taking place on line. Travel and physicalmeetings shall be reserved to external interactions when being “face to face”is considered a token of consideration [2.9].NetworkingBy 2020 practically all networking will take place on line. This does not imply the end of “gatherings”,like conferences and workshop, but the “gathering” will no longer be the way to network.The HiTech will provide plenty of opportunities to network with the same face-to-face effectiveness.However, the HiTouch will still create the sensation of value. Hence, as an example, there is noexpectation of decrease in Conference attendance “in person” but there is an expectation of significantgrowth in Conference attendance “on line”.Since most networking will take place on line it is essential to find ways to monetize the networkingsupport.▪ By 2020 networking will be a common feature of all information. Most“Information” will be network hubs, attracting, monitoring and managing itsuse, even when the information is copied and used elsewhere.4 Graphic analyses of data as provided by the Senseable Cities Lab of the MIT may be applied to COMSOCdata.20 21

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report▪ By 2020 most information is accessed through a network. In the past datawas received by a person and a computer was used to compute that data andderive an information. Today the information is received through a computerthat preprocess the data. Tomorrow the information will be contextualizedthrough a network.▪ COMSOC needs to become “the network” delivering the information. In orderto do that it has to be aware of each individual member history, interest,motivation, skill. This will be the main reason for choosing “the” COMSOCnetworks versus other networks [2.10].▪ COMSOC needs to move into the Web 3.0 space, steadily building the specificunderstanding of its (individual) membership. This will result in higher valueperception by its (individual) constituency, increased stickiness, and also will deliverincreased value to third parties needing to identify information targets [2.11].Chapters may play an even bigger role in the next decade. As Networking based on High Techtakes the upper hand, Chapters can provide the High Touch. Moreover, networking at Chapter levelis likely to be very focused, in line with the Web 3.0 paradigm of contextualization of information.• it should be visible to the prospective audience who its members are.Taken for granted the attractiveness, the selectivity is in contradiction with the need to have a largeconstituency, particularly if revenues are dependent on a critical mass of membership.On line associations can benefit from an almost infinite grading of their membership and this canbe made visible and can make members proud. There are of course many metrics that can be used torank members.COMSOC should leverage on the on line easiness to rank membershipto exploit it to the benefit of the members and of COMSOC. The presentgrading, member, senior member and fellow, can be articulated much moreand can be segmented. COMSOC can apply criteria similar to the ones usedin the grading of papers to the fair grading of members. In turns, the gradingcan be exploited by the member as a form of certification. This ties in with theincreasing mobility of workers (in particular fostered by delocalization andremote working), the continuous professional education, the need to harvestexperience by constituencies that are far away from telecommunications andInformation Technology in general [2.13].2.1.3Economy of scaleTransaction cost by 2020 will have reached very low values in all the Information spectrum (access,analyses, generation, transfer). Hence, it is likely that Associations will be unable to leverage on thisfactor to attract and maintain membership.However, the networking aspect, aforementioned, is likely to increase the cognitive cost in dealingwith information. In other words, as information grows and it gets easier and easier to access it, it getsmore and more difficult to filter it, increasing the cognitive cost.There are, and more will be available by 2020, tools to decrease the cognitive cost of dealing withinformation leveraging on the cognitive investment of other people.COMSOC should develop, directly or through partnership, cognitivesupporting tools and integrate these into its membership offer [2.12].OPEN ISSUE: Should COMSOC be involved in other areas beyond information, like humanresource management (labor bank)? This issue stems from the fact that human resources will beprogressively valued as information agents and since COMSOC can provide certification to theseagents it can also act as a labor bank.2.2Social Networks: an aggregation tool or a substitute forassociation?There are today many Social Networks, some clustering many participants, some creating stronginteractions among participants, some acting like generators of communities.Facebook is a case in point. It has reached 700 million participants, has billions of interactionsdaily, supports an easy construction of communities related to specific topics.Additionally, it has created an open framework to let third parties develop applications (services).Therefore Facebook is both an aggregation tool and a gigantic cluster of communities sparselyconnected (a friend of mine, being part of my community can also belong to a different communitybeing friend of someone else who is NOT a friend of mine).The average community in Facebook has about 130 participants. COMSOC, in this sense is on acompletely different scale (potentially).Interpersonal communications, however, is (statistically and psychologically) constrained bythe Dunbar number (somewhere between 120 and 230). So it cannot be imagined that COMSOCmembership can have personal relationships significantly different from the one seen on Facebook.At the same time, COMSOC can rely on information based relationship.Facebook is basically a tool supporting relationship since it lacks the sense of belonging (peopleare not proud to be part of Facebook, they are part of a community supported by Facebook).2.1.4Being part of a selected fewIt is part of human nature to be appreciated and to show that one is “special”. Some Associationscreate attractiveness because they accept only a few specifically qualified members.There are two conditions for this mechanism to work:• the association has to be recognized as attractive and choosy at the same time, admitting onlya subset of applicants, and;In 2020 there will be plenty of Communities, as there are today, whoseparticipants will be able to interact more effectively one another thanks toSocial Community tools, but these will not be Association per se’.▪ COMSOC will have to adopt Social Network Tools to facilitate its members’interaction but should not use these tools as a surrogate for being anAssociation. The focus must be on the latter, with the former being a partial22 23

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Reportproducts. In part the skill will be present in house, particularly in medium bigcompanies, in part will be sough outside by acquiring off the shelf buildingblocks.▪ A larger consulting industry sector for ICT will be booming.▪ The hiring of present young generation will bring into the industry, both largeand small, a new approach to cooperative working, a greater interest forOpen Software and Open Innovation, a more intense spirit of looking outsideof the enterprise boundary to search for applicable research result.The spirit of Open Innovation and collaborative working can be strongopportunities for COMSOC to act as an intermediary for knowledge andinnovation [2.22].Big industries are likely to coordinate actions to propose de facto standards and accelerate timeto market. Small industries, particularly those in the service area, are likely to create self sufficientservices not requiring any particular standard beyond pure transportation.Big associations, like today’s GSMA, TMF (may be running under different names and pursuingdifferent topics) are likely to exist but they will serve the needs of industry, not of professionalengineers.A growing part of industry will have decreased the amount of in-house research (with the exceptionof big manufacturers and a few big players in the software area) and will depend on open innovation,mostly provided by universities.Micro innovation will be the asset of small enterprises, both in hardware and software areas.In Europe several companies will still participate in cooperative research projects, more and moretied to field experimentation. The EIT KIC initiatives should be starting to deliver concrete resultsand may change the way research is being done in Europe by mixing together Education, Researchand Business. Additionally a successful EIT would increase the relationship between institutions andindustry.▪ The above two trends are both creating stronger ties between universitiesand industry. Although a significant part of these ties will be local (domestic)there will be, particularly in the case of big companies, an interest to havestrong relations with centers of excellence worldwide.The accessibility gap facing small and medium enterprises to leverageworldwide centers of excellence can be filled by COMSOC that can makespike of excellence available to professionals in small medium enterprises[2.23].European universities will be participating to European cooperative research project focusing onbasic research and pre-competitive trials.In the Far East more governments will fund university research (in particular Japan and SouthKorea will continue the present trend, China, India and Vietnam are likely to start massive researchfunding). In the USA research funds for university are likely to continue as they are today.However, in most countries, funding will be focused more and more to excellence centers thuscreating a wider gap among various universities.▪ The number of universities is likely to grow in the developing world but isgoing to shrink in developed nations as the gap between excellence centersand the rest widens.▪ Telepresence and other communications technologies will foster remoteteaching with students and professionals alike taking courses from the bestin class.On line learning and certification will be widely adopted and accepted. Thiscan present a tremendous opportunities to association focusing on educationand innovation. Specifically, this is a great opportunity for COMSOC [2.24].There is more proximity among Education, Research, Business andInstitutions. Communications infrastructures, like GEANT in Europe, arespanning the whole spectrum rather than focusing on just one segment as inthe previous decade.Although COMSOC membership today comprises an almost equal share of academics and industry(roughly 40% each) it is seen by many as an academic oriented association.In ten years time, by playing its asset smartly, COMSOC academics roots may become a strongasset for the industry and increase the appeal to this constituency.COMSOC should benefit from this trend by leveraging its mixed constituency[2.22].2.3.2Associations vs Telecom Operators2.3.1Academia vs IndustryUniversity research will likely continue to be funded with present mechanisms, although in someareas there may be a growing funding by industry (like happens today in the USA).▪ The general decreased involvement of industry in research will make industrymore attentive to academia and will create closer ties with it.▪ The decreased funding provided by several states to university will stimulateuniversities to seek ties with industry for funding.Telecom Operators will likely be different from the ones of today. The main backbones and thenormal wireline and wireless access will be a commodity characterized by a slower rate of innovation(fiber networks are likely to dominate for many decades to come and wireless at the edges will bedominated by terminal evolution rather than network evolution) although in the beginning of the nextdecade there will be a lot of infrastructure that remains to be upgraded and deployed.The main focus will be on economy of scale, hence Operators will agree on sharing backbones andrings, and poles for the antennas (and in many case the back hauling).Operators are likely to cluster to steer the manufacturers’ offer and will make use of globalassociations to keep their influence.Their interest is likely to be less on technology and more on operation efficiency. Overall the26 27

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report2.3.3number of technical employees is decreasing and may level out to some 40% of the present value asthe infrastructure gets less labor intensive.Most Telecom Operators will have definitely closed their research centers (a trend that has emergedin this last decade) and will focus much more on market innovation with a horizon span of a fewmonths at most. At the same time most of these organizations will have created internal innovationcenters to remain abreast of evolution and its implication in their biz. These are likely to be the“replacers” of todays’ Operators research centers.▪ The deployment of fiber to substitute the copper infrastructure and themassive use of radio coverage, particularly in developing countries, willdecrease significantly the number of employees in the telecom sector.▪ In many countries Operators will be faced with the need to retrain theirengineers to take up different roles.▪ The edges of the network will see a tremendous increase of objects connected(IoT), mostly via radio link, often through local radio area networks.▪ Telecommunication access will be embedded in many products thus creatingthe need for (limited) telecommunications skill and know how in many sectors.Telecom Operators may find this as an opportunity to extend their businessbeyond pure transport and connectivity.▪ Associations of civil engineers are likely to become more and more interestedin getting some skill and know how in telecommunications.▪ By partnering with civil engineering associations COMSOC may providevalue to Telecom Operators, fostering the penetration of telecommunicationsin several sectors [2.25].▪ COMSOC can be ideally positioned to sustain the retraining of TelecomOperator personnel and the training of personnel in other sectors [2.26].▪ COMSOC should address the specific needs of the Innovation Centers ofTelecom Operators that will replace the research centers they have today.This actually creates a clearer separation of interests between the academia(addressing basic research), industry (addressing industrial -process/product research) and Telecom Operators (addressing innovation, that is theimplication of evolution on their turf) [2.27].StandardsStandards will remain essential in the foreseeable future in all system layers to insureinteroperability in communications, networking and applications. In the physical infrastructureinterconnection layer one can envision a paradigm shift in standards landscape. More devices willutilize cognitive radio functionality. Cognitive radio standards and cognitive radio functionalityin communications standards will be a common feature. Flexible platforms require qualitativelydifferent standards but quantity of standards required to deploy flexible platforms is rather high.Cognitive radio will remain a flagship standardization activity for foreseeable future. ComSoc willbe also actively involved in service and applications enabling technology standards.Increase in available processing power in devices will enable a free market of applicationsand media processing mechanisms to be implemented in loadable software and/or firmware. This2.4trend requires a plurality of standards for on-the-fly capability management and secures downloadprotocols.Going forward the trend will be towards international standards versus local. In cases whenlocal standards are necessary, localization and adoption of international standards will mostprobably be preferred. Global Standards Development Organizations (SDOs) will continueproducing a plurality of often redundant standards. For the most part the market place will pickwinners. In some technical areas that fall under local governmental policies (defense, energy) therewill be governmental and regulatory factors that will impact adoption of certain standards. In thislandscape IEEE and COMSOC will be involved in core technology globally applicable/adaptablestandards. IEEE and COMSOC standards may be redundant (more than one standard per particulartechnology) and they may be at times developed in collaboration with other Global SDOs in variouspartnerships scenarios (dual logo, joint development, adoption, etc.).Industry Associations will continue to have a role in creating a consensus as to accelerationof standards development, their adoption, and standards and product promotion and to facilitatestandards application. They often will join International SDOs along with individual companies,and their positions will represent industry groups rather than individual corporations.A significant part of COMSOC standards will be in technology areas that are not yet maturedand that are not yet ready for prime time deployment. The focus will be on scholarly standards,often on conceptual level, including reference models, frameworks, and terms and definitions fornew emerging technology areas. COMSOC Standards Activities will provide a broad range ofservices to the industry from pre-standardization activities through standards development andpost-standardization activities, e.g. maintenance of standards, compliance testing, and support ofstandards tutorials and standards–related academic curricula.In partnership with COMSOC Technical Committees COMSOC Standards Activities willfacilitate pre-standardization research projects that will be conducted by experts from industrialand academic research organizations. The mission of these activities is to identify technologygaps in various technical areas, as well as gaps in standards and to discover early standardizationopportunities.COMSOC will establish a wide range of specialized Standards Committees that will developstandards in the entire range of COMSOC’s technical scope. The goal is at least one StandardsCommittee per each COMSOC Technical Committee. IEEE and COMSOC will offer a variety ofservices in standards-related activities. One area of importance is Intellectual Property management.Intellectual property will remain a single major important factor in standards development. Thisincludes patent activities on the part of industry and academia. While IEEE and COMSOC can’tbe involved in any commercial aspects of the standardization projects we can offer support forindustry activities in this area. This support may range from providing tools for management ofintellectual property to facilitating patent pools by industry groups.Association relation with policy makers and governmentinstitutionsThe pervasive nature of technology will further create the need for engineers to cooperate withpolicy makers all around the world. Besides, the nature of services is to be accessible without regardsto countries’ boundary and a global policy is required in many instances.This is where associations may play an important role, providing a neutral understanding oftechnology and its evolution.28 29

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report▪ Technology is neutral but its application can have several impacts and affectsthe Society. Having a framework for its application is important and such aframework has to take into account technology evolution in a world withoutboundaries.▪ Data are pervasive and very difficult to protect once they are published on theweb. Issues of privacy and ownership are central to the Information Societyand their safeguard requires an understanding of technology options.▪ Technology will keep increasing the range of services that can be offered andthe accessibility to information. Part of this information is sensitive, regardingthe personal sphere or the context of the Society as a whole.▪ The borderless nature of the information will grow even more as data moveto the clouds and can be potentially accessed from everywhere.▪ The possibility to correlate data originated in different places can makeneutralization at the source useless, since in many cases identity can bereconstructed by cross referencing data.COMSOC, as an association of engineers has both the know how ontechnology (and its evolution) and on the challenges of its application. Itcan provide a neutral but invaluable support to regulators and governmentinstitutions [2.28].Historically technical associations have had very little ties with regulatory authorities who usesconsultants to get reports on specific technology of interest. This approach was sound as long astechnology options were few. In a world that already offers more than can actually be adopted a globalview is important. This view shall be unbiased as much as possible.Associations are important because their varied composition ensures a multi perspective analysesand the peer review ensures independent assessment.▪ COMSOC is not ready today to serve as an independent trusted referencepoint on technology and its implication, although it gathers a multitude ofcontributions, through papers and conferences. There is a need for astructured approach to technology implication [2.29].▪ COMSOC should insert in its goals the provisioning of a neutral, peerreviewed yearly document on technology evolution and its implications andhave a Director responsible for this goal and for positioning COMSOC as theICT reference on technology in the Society. [2.30].▪ COMSOC should participate as an independent organization to the Science,Technology and Society Forum(s), bringing any year an updated view ontechnology and its application [2.31].▪ COMSOC should establish formal relations, in addition to the present ones,with ITU and other international organizations, claiming the role of neutralagency for technology monitoring [2.32].▪ COMSOC should provide a yearly report targeted to policy makers withan education portfolio to explain technology impact. It is not a COMSOCobjective to take position on what should or should not be done but to clarifytechnology potential and implications [2.33].2.5The Information Society has just started, as more and more data are becoming available andmore and more ways of extracting meaning are found. This has profound societal implications. AnAssociation of engineers can consider itself just a shelf where data on technology are shelved or it cantake action to extract meaningful information out of those data.The evolution of data access is making these shelves less and less valuable (since the shelf isbecoming the web itself and data can be searched and retrieved from any access device). Whatremains, and gets more valuable in the coming years, is the capability to extract meaning and to peerreview the result.COMSOC can and should become the organization policy maker will turn to,to understand technology evolution and its implication [2.34].Associations as cluster of freelanceThe next decade will take for granted the ongoing transformation that has begun in these last yearswith professionals working on projects rather than for a “company”.As telecom companies (particularly Operators) becomes leaner and consultancy companies getsmore and more involved in the day to day running of telecom networks and services, contract workers(freelance) will be in high demand and conversely there will be a big offer to choose from.These freelance workers will have only themselves to prove their asset, knowledge, experience.There will no longer be the “brand” provided by a company they are working for.▪ The labor market in 2020 will see a significant shift towards contract workers(freelance) not attached to any company.▪ The half life of knowledge in the ICT domain is today estimated around 5years and by 2020 it is likely to be even shorter.▪ Freelance will need to find ways to decrease the cost of marketing themselvesand ways to stay up to date to continue to be sought after by the market.▪ Associations will take up a crucial role in supporting the education marketingand insurance of freelance. COMSOC should move quickly into this areaand become the association supporting this new generation of professionals[2.35].▪ A grading of members should be found to support their marketability, withcertification of their know how. This will become as important as theirexperience. [2.36].30 31

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Reportimportantly, these are crises where telecommunications has a direct role: Energy, Food, Climate,changing world demography.The aim here is focused on the potential impact that these can have on COMSOC marketplace, intheir relation to telecommunications players, markets, users.Crises focus the public opinion and have a great influence on the younggeneration in choosing their education path. Emphasizing the role oftelecommunications in these crises can foster telecommunications evolutionsand bring new, young, blood to the field. Additionally, putting the emphaseson telecommunications means to provide a constructive perspective to thecrises showing that there are ways to tackle or at least mitigate their impact[3.2].3POWERFULDRIVERSCHANGINGTHE WORLDGlobal challenges that have emerged over the past decades are likely to have an impact ontelecommunications and on telecommunications demand in the coming ones.Although Crises are severe challenges to the status quo (and planned evolution) in thetelecommunications domain most of the crises that humanity is facing today represents a tremendousopportunity for growth since telecommunications is a potential tool to help in their taming.Telecommunications can provide significant help in decreasing the impactof the crises and in helping in their solution. In turns, looming crises maystimulate evolution in telecommunications technology and market [3.1].In addition to the crises that have emerged there are several others, like the massive migration ofpeople across borders, the financial bankruptcy of entire Countries, the evolution towards a job-lesseconomy, the advent of unforeseen plagues and so on that may be looming ahead.In this document we are focusing on some crises that are in the top ranking of the agenda ofworldwide organizations and that, to a certain extent can also be the root to the other crises. MoreIt is clear that crises will not be solved at the technology level but require a complex interaction ofpolitical, social, economic forces.Raising the awareness of what technology can do at these levels is an important contribution tohelp more factual analyses and this is for sure a contribution that the technical constituency can andshould provide. Unfortunately, technical people in general are not prepared to offer this contribution,often they use a lingo that is difficult to understand and there is today a growing sentiment that mostof the crises are the result of the technical and scientific evolution.This is not true, at least non generally true and quite the contrary the progress and well being weenjoy today is the result of such scientific and technical evolution.Nevertheless the global perception of technology is negative, particularly when people’s attentionis focused on looming crises or on disasters resulting from human actions (usually in the past) like theradioactive leakage in the old Fukushima plant or some dams construction, environmental pollutionand so on.▪ COMSOC as a global society based on factual data, peer reviewed, has theopportunity and obligation to face concerns and explain the factual aspects. Itis not expected to take a stance but to report in an understandable languagetechnical facts. It shall not remain a circle of people talking to themselves butshould rise to the challenge of talking to the Society and to the World. Thisis possibly one of the best ways to make the COMSOC name recognizedoutside the engineering community and indirectly to stimulate the engineeringcommunity to be part of it [3.3].▪ It is important that COMSOC endeavors in creating a social awareness ofthe relevance of the communications field; activities should be built so thathuman society recognizes the value of the field of communications [3.4].▪ COMSOC should try to reach young people at undergraduate level andmotivate them to pursue the communications field by creating properactivities such as contests, challenges etc. Chapters, acting locally, areideally positioned to involve those that are traditionally outsiders of currentactivities [3.5].32 33

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report3.1Energy CrisesTechnology is a two edge sword: it increases the demand of (cheap) energy and can provide themeans to limit such an increase through more efficient use of energy.Today’s world shows a dramatic variation in energy consumption, per Country and pro capita, withthe upper limits in the Arabian Peninsula followed by USA and the lower limits in central Africa andsome Asian Countries.Moreover, projections indicate a steady rise in energy demand 7 .▪ All forms of energy present some (sometime severe) drawbacks in theirconversion and usage. Be it the increase of CO 2,the disposal of radioactivewaste, the occupation of soil, the diversion of food producing field to bio-fueland so on.▪ The global projected demand is not sustainable in the medium and long term(given the present technological capabilities): if all people we have today onEarth were using a pro-capita energy at the level of the USA average therewould be a need of 5 planet Earth to satisfy the demand.▪ The political instability of several world areas where energy resources areavailable projects a dark shadow on the future, and the attempt to controlthose areas by some countries creates further international instability.The map (http://www.worldmapper.org/images/largepng/117.png) shows the electricity consumptionin the various areas of the world. The area is drawn larger if consumption is above world average,smaller if it is lower. Electricity consumption is a good indicator of global energy consumption and itties in with the welfare in the area.The looming energy crises has several facets:▪ The energy availability differential among different areas goes hand in handwith the well being of the people, with, obviously, a better welfare in thoseareas having larger energy consumption. The obvious strive towards betterliving condition generates a push towards higher consumption.▪ Based on present technologies there are limits to the availability of energy,in terms of economic sustainability and time. Forecasts vary significantly butoil and gas reservoir are bound to be exhausted in some decades (up to ahundred years in the most optimistic forecasts); uranium is also a relativelyscarce resource that may be exhausted in a hundred years. Renewableenergy sources are attractive but they may not be applied in any field (such asaviation) nor can be available in all areas and in a continuous way. Moreovertheir cost is higher, today, than fossil fuel.7 http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/highlights.html3.2Telecommunications is a significant user of energy for running its infrastructure and the demand forenergy grows as more telecommunications equipment is deployed and particularly more data centers.Additionally, the devices making use of telecommunications present a further demand of energyestimated at four times the ones required by the telecommunications infrastructures. Technology andcareful design can limit the increase of the energy demand in telecommunications.Furthermore, telecommunications may:• help in decreasing the need of energy,• create a better awareness on consumption thus steering towards energy savvy behavior,• provide alternative means to energy consuming processes (like transportation)▪ COMSOC can increase the focus on energy in its various forms in its technicalcommittee and contribute to create awareness on how telecommunicationsare related to the Energy Crises [3.6].▪ COMSOC can stimulate confrontation on energy consumption intelecommunications infrastructures and connected devices [3.7].▪ COMSOC can promote conferences and sharing of experiences onsmart cities, transportation and other areas where the application oftelecommunications services may decrease energy consumption [3.8].Food CrisesClose to 1 billion people are suffering from hunger in 2011. This figure is bound to increase inthis decade 8 both because of the increase in population (affecting mostly undeveloped or developingareas) and because of the shrinking of arable land.There are many factors leading to an aggravation of the food crises:▪ Climate change is expected to impact significantly the “map” of arableland and its yield 9 . The increase in temperature will create flooding indensely populated and cultivated areas (South East Asia) and will increasedesertification in other areas (Sub Sahara region). At the same time theincrease in temperature will increase the yields of many areas and will make8 http://www.worldbank.org/foodcrisis/9 http://www.grida.no/publications/rr/food-crisis/page/3567.aspx34 35

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report3.4Aging Society CrisesLife expectancy has been growing steadily in 88% of the countries in these last 10 years.This is an amazing achievement, and it results from the concurrent contribution of better nutrition,safer water and better health care.The economics in aging goes from the extreme of wealthy people that havethe money to adopt technology and use it to the one of having to spare thecent having lost the income deriving from work.▪ COMSOC has the opportunity of caring to the interest of elderly engineersand leverage on their “voluntarism” to make a dent into the aging crises[3.11].▪ COMSOC can promote dissemination of knowledge on applied sensorsnetworks, bio-engineering and genomics for those parts related tocommunications [3.12].3.5New economies gaining the upper handThe map shows the life expectancy at birth, http://www.worldmapper.org/display.php?selected=255The size of the various countries is proportional to the total of years of life expectancy of itspopulation. The size is equal to the Country area if the life expectancy matches the average (67 years).It is bigger if the life expectancy is longer (the highest is in Japan with 81.6 months), it is lower if thelife expectancy is shorter (the lowest is Zambia with 32.8 year).An aging society is a different society form the one we used to have. This aging society is becomingreality with the baby boomer now entering retirement age and having a 20+ life expectancy ahead.Along with it, the aging society brings:▪ sustainability problems at society level (how to pay for retirement, how to payfor an increased health care bill);▪ problems at the personal level (new kinds of age related illness, differentneeds and consumption patterns).Clearly the aging crises is not something one wants to solve by stopping (or worse reversing)aging. It is therefore quite different in nature from the other two crises presented before.What is needed are ways to solve, reduce the problems aging is producing.In terms of sustainability technology can help in decreasing the cost of the care bill; technology canalso provide answers to fight/relieve age related illness.In addition, communications, tele-presence, simpler-natural interfaces can help alleviate some ofthe problems faced by the elderly population.The BRIC countries have surfaced to the main stage of the world economy in the last decade. Theywill continue to remain within the main world economies in this and in the next decade. A few morecountries will emerge in the pool of largest world economies, Vietnam being one of them and possibleIndonesia. In the longer term, other countries may join the top ones, like Nigeria. These latter will notcompete, anyhow, in the top five, as it will be the case for China and India.As wealth is more and more related to the mobilization of intelligence and mind capital, thoseCountries having more “brains” and being capable of leveraging those brains, first by preparing themwith top education and then having them functioning at full capacity by providing ultra-broadbandconnectivity infrastructures will be able to become world leaders.Low income Countries are today suffering from over-population, poor services, low gradeinfrastructure and usually high birth rate that compound their challenges. Once a virtuous developmentprocess is in place the number of people become an advantage.Top Notch Education applied to a huge mass of individuals is the single mostimportant factor in the transformation of a Country to leverage the InformationSociety. COMSOC can contribute in this area by helping bridge through itnetwork world areas [3.13].China and India are likely to become among the top five economies in the world. The investmentin education and in infrastructures make them also the largest market. Volume is crucial in fosteringinnovation and these countries are likely to be the most innovative ones in the next decade, notnecessarily because they will be developing innovation “in house”, although it will often be the case,but because they will be the largest marketplace where innovation will take hold.Some frictions may be expected as a rebalance in leadership takes place. Some of it will be positivesince those countries that are leading today will focus more on remaining leaders increasing theinnovation pace.▪ The overall world wealth is going to increase worldwide, much faster in someareas than in others.▪ More education in scientific disciplines and more jobs will be created resultingin a wider potential audience for COMSOC.38 39

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC has the opportunity to become a leader in countries like China andCOMSOC should look at the manufacturing industry evolution, with all itsIndia that will be at the economic forefront in the next decade [3.14].aspects of robotization, outsourcing, off shoring... and the many relationsexisting with telecommunications infrastructures [3.18].China and India, although are likely to raise at the top of world economy, are likely to remain quitedifferent and will face different problems with respect to those countries that are today at the top ofthe economic ladder.3.6New emerging world areas▪ China in 2011 is expected to consume as much energy as the United States.However, their pro-capita consumption is 1/5 of the one in the United Statesand by factoring in that a good portion of manufacturing in China is dedicatedto export the usage of pro-capita energy for the local people’s advantage iseven lower.▪ Although the economic value of China and India will place these twocountries at the top of world economies, the pro-capita revenue will be muchlower than the other world leading economies. Hence, their priorities will bedifferent. India, in particular, has less control on population growth and islikely to suffer much more from the food crises. The low pro-capita incomedoes not support massive import, not even for food.▪ The effort in the development of communications infrastructures will be verystrong in both China and India. Given the very dense population it wouldmake sense to expect a strong deployment of fixed lines, fibre loop. It ishowever unlikely to happen, at least in this decade and the focus is likely toremain on wireless infrastructure, particularly outside of wealthy district insome urban areas.▪ Wireless access will dominate both India and China and their huge market islikely to foster innovation in dense wireless access.▪ COMSOC may need to specialize part of its offer to these audiences. Whatmay fit the US audience is unlikely to fit a Chinese one [3.15].▪ COMSOC should promote low cost educational events to large mass ofpeople using local experts [3.16].▪ COMSOC should promote events to boost innovation among people such ascontest, awards etc. To advance the state of the art COMSOC should promoteevents to foster digital inclusion and decrease social and technologicalimbalance, especially in developing countries. This can be achieved bymaking local members aware that they should use their knowledge to solvelocal economical, social and educational problems [3.17].China has become the world manufacturer and it is important to notice that thereasons that led to this are now getting weaker and will probably fade awayby the end of this decade (low wages, low cost of production as consequenceof lower standards of safety and disregard for the environment). China israpidly deploying countermeasures to ensure that their manufacturing edgecan continue as those factors decrease in importance. A point in case isFoxconn that has recently announced a plan to “hire” 1 million robots in theirplants by 2014. Another point in case is Alibaba that has created a giganticintermediation market for reaching Chinese manufacturers.The acceleration in adoption of wireless technology has been a worldwide phenomenon but theplaces where it was most surprising and generated most awe was in developing and under-developedcountries.Some of these countries have also started a significant economic evolution (or revolution) movingfrom a basically agricultural economy to an industrial economy, living the changes of the industryrevolution of the XVIII and XIX century but at an accelerated pace and using new technologies.The South-East Asia is a point in case. Other areas in Africa are likely to follow, possibly in thesecond part of this decade and may become emerging economies by 2020. The whole of Latin America(except Brazil that has already made or is well ahead in the transition) is another emerging area.As a whole they are a constituency that can represent a market of 1 billion people that can begrouped in three areas▪ South East Asia, with close to 450 million people▪ Latin America, with 460 million people▪ Central and South Africa, with 350 million peopleThese three areas are significantly different in terms of issues they are facing, of political situations,mix of cultures and natural resources. It remains to be seen if they will actually consolidate or if theywill go through different aggregation (China may become the attraction point for Vietnam, possiblyThailand and Singapore whilst Indonesia may team up with Malaysia) or if they will fail to find acommon interest (Central and South Africa may be the most difficult aggregation).Because of their differences each area may see a different kind of evolution although all of themare likely to use very similar network architectures and serve most of their communications needsvia wireless access (in residential market, with the notable exception of Singapore that will have acomplete fiber infrastructure also at the access level).In terms of becoming an important player in telecommunications probably only Vietnam and Brazilwill succeed in having a local industry supported both by the local market and by a strong export.The overall situation can evolve quite differently depending on factors that are difficult to foreseeon a ten years horizon.▪ The areas identified are surely important in terms of population and somemay become important in terms of industry. Due to the difficulty in forecastingCOMSOC may adopt a tactical stance, monitoring the evolution and enteringwith specific initiatives, possibly through local societies, as the situation maysuggest [3.19].▪ COMSOC should promote programs to eliminate the economical exclusionof low income members such as those in Latin America and Africa. The lowmembership uptake in this region is also due to this lower income [3.20].40 41

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 ReportBy 2020 we therefore forecast:4COMMUNICATIONSIN 2020Communications today are based on very complex and capital intensive infrastructures. Althoughthe pace of technology evolution has accelerated the introduction of innovation in telecommunications,looking at telecom infrastructures from a distance the overall change in a 10 years period is limited. In2010 we have technologies we did not have in the year 2000, such as the very first LTE infrastructures,MIMO antennas, some 40 and 160 Gbps optical links, Terarouters etc, but in percentage, most of2010 network technologies date back to the last century.Counterbalancing this substantial inertia in evolution we have seen in the last decade:• a significant expansion of infrastructures, particularly in developing countries and in 2010 mostnew equipment was purchased and deployed in those countries;• a shift from wireline to wireless communications and this went hand in hand with the growthof customers that have now moved massively to wireless terminals in a ratio of 2:1;• a growth of Internet based services that has pushed customers in developed countries to theadoption of broadband access and this has created a growing market for ADSL first and fibre inthe last miles more recently. The broadband access in developing countries is marginal becauseof economics, both market and network wise and because of the latter is starting through theuse of wireless broadband;• a growth in information created, mostly by individuals, consumed and available that hasreached a pace of increment close to the one predicted by Moore for the transistor, and that hasin turn created an increase in traffic that exceeds the Moore’s law;• an explosion in service availability to create, access, use data and information that in turns hasushered in.▪ The backbone and access infrastructure network-side will be based in fibre,both in developed and developing countries;▪ The access customer side will be based on optical fibre in today’s developedcountries and in (some) urban areas of some developing countries (BRIC)whilst in the other areas will be mostly based on wireless;▪ The decreasing cost in localized access areas will increase the number ofindependent infrastructures created by municipality and third parties (nonTelecom Operators);▪ The capabilities of terminals will keep growing including their capability ofcreating local networks and to act as bridges. This in turns will give rise tobottom up access infrastructures;▪ Terminals will be embedded in many objects (or putting it in another way,objects will embed communications capability);▪ Sensors will be a significant component in network termination, and will beembedded in many objects, sometimes being a structural part of the objectitself (smart materials); they will be programmable and there are going tobe APIs associated to most objects as part of the design and productionprocess.▪ Many objects will embed displays hence many more will be using broadband(mostly wireless BB).▪ As telecommunications spread in latitude and becomes embedded, hencebasically hidden, the role of telecommunications expert will change. Mostindustry will need to have telecommunications as part of their competence,particularly in terms of services based on connectivity, whilst the coretelecommunications competences, transport, protocols, switching, will see adiminishing audience of engineers as they will become embedded in Legolikecomponents.▪ The dividing line between telecommunications and computing will start tofade and along with it the characterization of expert in telecommunicationsvs expert in computation.42 43

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.1◙ Ad Hoc& Sensor Networks +++◙ Cognitive Networks +◙ Communications & Information Security +◙ Communications Quality and Reliability -◙ Communications Software --◙ Communications Switching & Routing --◙ Communications Systems Integration &Modeling -◙ Communication Theory -◙ Computer Communications ++◙ Data Storage =◙ e-Health =◙ High-Speed Networking -◙ Information Infrastructure & Networking +◙ Internet =◙ Multimedia Communications =◙ Network Operations & Management =◙ Optical Networking =◙ Power Line Communications -Figure 4.0 Expected evolution of COMSOC TCs by 2020 (grading --- to +++: new TCs in red)Notice that these “Expectations” are based on current charter and the forecasted shift in technologyevolution and impact. It should not be interpreted as a success or otherwise of the present TC.In the following specific details are provided.Technologies entering the arena◙ Radio Communications -◙ Satellite & Space Communications -◙ Signal Processing & CommunicationsElectronics -◙ Tactical Communications & Operations -◙ Transmission, Access, & Optical Systems +◙ Wireless Communications +++◙ Social Communications◙ Massive Distributed SystemsCommunications◙ Data Centric Networks, Data Management,Semantics◙ Autonomic Networks, Viral Networks,Parasitic Communications◙ Identification and Authentication, includingbiometrics◙ Energy control and Green Communications◙ Smart Ambients◙ Bio CommunicationsToday’s telecommunications infrastructures are based on technologies contributing to the optical,wireless, processing (both hardware and software, including switching and signal processing) andstorage (including distributed storage like clouds). These will continue to have a major role in 2020.Additionally, however, we can expect a growing importance of bioengineering, nanotechnology,sensors and smart materials and more generally of smart environment, as small as a single object andas large as a smart building and a smart city.It is to be noted that there is a third revolution in the making asking for amore comprehensive consideration of many technologies and approaches inscience, rather than segmented approaches that focus on specific domain.▪ This is a challenge that COMSOC will have to face, balancing specializationand in depth analyses with overall coverage. This latter is technology nonspecificand application domain specific and contrasts with the presentCOMSOC that by large is technology specific and domain non-specific [4.1].▪ COMSOC will need to promote the training of new professionals to act asagent of multidisciplinary field [4.2].▪ COMSOC needs to pay attention to the number of multi-disciplinary areas in4.1.1which telecommunications has a role and include them in its technical scope[4.3].▪ COMSOC should consider a revisitation of its Technical Committees, clearlyidentifying those that are looking at basic telecom/computation componentsand those that leverage on those components (applications areas). They willprobably appeal to different constituencies and may be run in different ways.TCs shall become attraction points generating interest and membershipgrowth, can be sponsored directly by industry [4.4].BioengineeringBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have widespread use of bio interfaces, enabling the connection of electronicsto bio, in areas like vision prosthetics, muscle activation, brain interactions,delivery of drugs, monitoring of chemical, motion and electrical parameters.▪ Have a significant understanding of biological networks and the working ofthe brain.▪ Have applications of the physics of living systems in business ecosystemsdynamics, reflecting allowable symmetry-breaking processes (related tophase-transitions).Communications will be embedded in many devices that will either be in contact with the skin orembedded in the body. General requirements will be on low energy consumption/dissipation, energyscavenging, low/medium bit rate, flexibility in parameters detection.The skin is likely to be used as conductor to connect various sensors and actuators to acommunications hub.▪ Research and technology evolution for skin and low consumption devicecommunications will be a major research theme (BAN – Body Area Networks).A close cooperation with biochemists, physiologists, medical doctors, smartfabric and electronic engineers is essential [4.5].▪ Application of the understanding of neuron networks to communicationsnetworks: actually neuron networks are considered to be the most effectivestructural basis for coexistence of informational processing (both segregationand integration) and communications. Analogies between neuron networksand future communications networks will allow applying some principlesbehind brain functioning for development, management and control of saidnetworks [4.6].▪ Usage of body (including DNA) characteristics for secure identification incommunications services [4.7].44 45

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.1.2NanotechnologyBy 2020 it is expected to:4.1.3▪ Have become a ubiquitous component of several materials, giving them“smart properties” like surface sensitivity, conductivity, display, storage andprocessing.▪ Have enabled low cost optical switching (lambda switching).▪ Have increased energy storage capacity and speed of recharging in batteries.Micro switching nodes as well and objects becoming micro network nodes at the edges of today’snetwork will create a completely new scenario and require possibly new approaches to study networks.Future telecom engineers may need chemical skills as well as an understanding of complexityscience given the sheer number of interconnected entities.The new area of micro-communications may become important [4.8].SensorsBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have grown in the ten-hundreds of billions▪ Have become “networks” on their own▪ Have become more and more flexible▪ Have become smaller and smaller, some reaching the nano scale▪ Have become embedded in objects▪ Have become an integral part of our perception of ambient, in some instancesextending our sensory networkSensors, numerically speaking, will make up for most of the users of the telecommunicationsnetwork. The traffic they generate will be quite varied, going from a few bytes once in a while to acontinuous stream of data (video sensors). In terms of capacity the video sensors will have the upperhand (video security cameras will be numbered in the billions). As wireless communications will(start to) ensure a dense bandwidth many cell phones will double up as always on video feeder.At the same time the other, and much more numerous, sensors will have the upper hand in termsof transactions. The usage of the network by humans will be relegated in between these two classesleading to an inversion of the Gaussian traffic distribution of the last century and to a (left) rise of thesloped curve of the first part of this century.In the figure we see this evolution (qualitative representation) showing on the Y axes the numberof transactions and on the X the size of the transaction.In the last century the traffic was mostly voice calls, hence the Gaussian with the top at the average3 minutes call; today the volume of traffic is impacted by the video , in ten years time the video willcontinue to have a great impact but along with it we will see a tremendous growth of traffic generatedby sensors with thousands of billions of short transactions.4.1.41900... 2010 2020...It is quite evident that the network architecture that was fit to support one traffic pattern is unlikelyto be fit for a completely different one.More specifically, as in the transition from the last century to the present one we have seen the riseof CDN (Content Distribution Network and Broadcast/Multicast transport paradigm) in this decadewe will see the rise of million of edge networks (sensors networks) and also of different, more energyefficient protocols (non IP).▪ A novel branch of communications will address sensors and new demand forstandards, protocols and signal processing will arise [ 4.9].▪ The variety of interconnections, many dynamically continuously changingand autonomics, will bring to the fore the study of complex systems and willconnect to biological study of nervous system [4.10].▪ Data networks will become very important to face the huge amount of datapresent in a myriad of data centers, from behemoth DC to home sized DC[4.11].Smart MaterialsBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have better production processes that along with better molecularmanipulation capability will make it possible to “design” materials accordingto their desired functionality. Among these the ability to connect and selfidentify themselves. For example new developments of meta-materials(artificially structured materials that are designed to interact with and controlelectromagnetic waves) will allow producing lighter and more energy-efficientantennas, and reducing size of storage batteries and solar cells.▪ Have new production processes: although many objects will still look liketoday, an assembly of different parts to deliver the required functionalities,some objects will deliver certain functionality through the constructionmaterial itself. More specifically, plastic electronics can be embedded in theconstruction material, and even sprayed on surface, display can be a surfacecharacteristic rather than an assembled part, the communication antennawill be the object itself and so on.▪ Have much more flexibility in terms of functionality. This will allow large scaleproduction of products that can be customized at the point of sale or even46 47

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.1.5later during their life time. Communications will play a significant role in thiscustomization.The progressive adoption of smart materials is likely to have an effect similar to the invention/adoption of the moving assembly line by Ford on October 7, 1913. It will change the way we buildproducts and will place telecommunications at the core of the design since through telecommunicationsthe product can be dressed up with functionality, can be monitored, his user can be trained, it caninteract with other objects, it can be updated and customized to the environment, to the user, to thelifetime.▪ Manufacturing is a relevant area for telecommunications, and this requires across fertilization of knowledge in which COMSOC can play an important role[4.12].▪ A crucial aspect in future manufacturing will be the robotization of plants.Foxconn has already announced a plan to deploy 1 million robots in its plantsby 2014. These will be autonomous systems and will be based on autonomiccommunications. COMSOC has to take the lead in this area [4.13].▪ As in McLuhan “the medium is the message” with smart materials “thesmart material is the communications infrastructure” and this creates a newperspective for COMSOC [4.14].Smart AmbientThe advent of smart objects, defined as objects aware of their environment and able to adapt to it,leads to the creation of a smart ambient that can exist because of a ubiquitous connectivity fabric.Most of this connectivity fabric is created by the objects populating the ambient.A smart ambient is an ambient that is aware of its constituent parts, understand their specificfunctionalities and can manipulate them to create a harmonious ensemble fitting the person(s) that isat that particular moment in it.▪ There will be as many smart ambient as there are ambient. Smart buildings,smart hospitals, smart school, smart malls, smart factories and so on.Additionally there will be smart aggregation of smart ambient, like smartcities, smart multimodal traffic hubs, smart Countries and so on.▪ Smart ambient will not just be a clustering of smart components. Theirsmartness is an add on onto those smart component (and less smart ones).That requires a modeling of the components and the ability of understandingand manipulating it.Communications within a smart ambient and among smart ambient resulting from aggregation iscrucial and has a variety of requirements. These are met by the use of many technologies, from theones related to smart materials to the manipulation of data, to self management and autonomics.It is the mixture of all of these that creates those emerging properties that characterize a smartambient.▪ COMSOC needs to address behavior of complex systems [4.15].4.1.5.1▪ Need to address emerging behavior theory, semantics interpretation of datafor context creation, mixing data and communications [4.16].▪ Need to take an ecosystem view, including the areas of regulation, perception,economics, conflict of interest [4.17].To clarify these issues we present two points in case: smart buildings and smart cities. COMSOCshould be prepared to focus on many more, implementing the shiftfrom a Society “technology focused” to a Society “focusing on the applicationsof communications related technology”. This is “au pair” with the focus shiftof major Telecom Operators.Smart BuildingsBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have new buildings completely “wired” (in sense of ubiquitous pervasivecommunications, both wired and wireless) and controlled as a single livingentity.▪ Have old buildings in the process of “retrofitting” to become “smart buildings”.This is likely to take place under the pressure to decrease energy consumptionand to use locally produced energy.▪ Have products that start to make use of the smart ambient provided by thesmart buildings and integrating their functionality in the ones provided bythe building (e.g. make use of sound and displays provided by the walls,use power through induction, hook up on the local area network, relay onauthentication provided by the building, accept guidelines and directive fromthe ambient…).Smart buildings will be network (and often very complex networks) in themselves requiring specificnetworking expertise, operation and management, and interaction with a variety of users, humans aswell as objects (and sensors). They will be communications providers to a variety of terminals, somebeing a stable part of the building, many being “in transit”.They will support mirroring functions, authentication, visibility segmentation, data storage,conditional access and so on. To all effect they will be a communications network formed by manycommunications networks.Their complexity may vary, going from a private villa to a skyscraper, but they will have incommon many issues, like the management of different constituencies having different interfaces andfunctionalities.▪ COMSOC needs to support these networks of networks and their associatedconstituencies, from civil engineers, to installers, to consumer electronics[4.18].▪ COMSOC needs to enter the area of data mining, analyses, management atthe different levels entailed by an aggregation provided by a smart building.There may be a specific Technical Committee dedicated to this area [4.19].48 49

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.1.5.2▪ The communications fabric and the data management provide thecommon ground for all constituencies involved. COMSOC can promote theestablishment of a common knowledge in this area and prepare courses onthis common fabric [4.20].Smart CitiesBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have municipalities deployed sensors and monitoring systems to capture thevarious city’s parameters, from transportation to energy, garbage disposal tologistics, schooling to elderly care.▪ Have complete broadband coverage of major urban centers and manysmaller centers.▪ Have enforced rules on data exposure and management, includingregulations on the presence of sensors to detect certain data (pollution, CO 2emissions, …)aggregates in even larger networks to create Viral Networks that are notcharacterized by any ownership domain.▪ The commoditization of the big networks will support the evolution towardsvirtual networks at the edges since there will be very little economic incentivefrom a Network Operator point of view to cover the last meter and the lastinch. These will be covered by new players as an extension of their products(in the consumer electronics, vehicular industry and health care areapredominantly).▪ Many terminals will be able to create a surrounding network and this willconnect with overlapping networks effectively providing coverage over largeareas.▪ Future viral networks will be pervasive and this makes the design and controlhighly complex. These new challenges are at the intersection between nonlineardynamics and statistical thermodynamics, a place which is under thespot even today for gaining more detailed insight into neural-mechanisticevents and processes of the brain. For example this will bring to thedevelopment of network and service architectures capable of generatingfeedback loops connecting multi levels of self-organization.4.2There is today a growing interest to apply technology to create a more efficient, safer and pleasingcity ambient. This will increase significantly in this decade and there will be a significant numberof cities at different degrees of smartness. They will be based on a pervasive communicationsinfrastructure, significantly extending today’s infrastructure, and will integrate many technologiesand monitor/control processes. Included in this are the aspect of Smart Transportation, Smart cars andso on that are to be considered in conjunction with other IEEE Societies, like the Vehicular Society.There is a large audience that COMSOC can target in this area, numbered in the millions.▪ COMSOC needs to be part of this evolution, setting up specific conferences,attracting a new audience, becoming part of the “conceptual design”. Thismakes sense since telecommunications and local area communications isthe first enabler [4.22].▪ The Smart City requires an “Engineer Vision” as an enabler. This visionneeds to be made viable through Social and Economical considerations butsince technology provides the only solid stepping stone COMSOC can bethe ideal reference point [4.23].Viral Networks▪ Internet as a Network of Networks will further grow and most of this growthwill occur at the edges whilst the “inner networks”, covering large areasand across the globe, will tend to decrease in number (owners’ number).The networks at the edges will be created by a variety of entities and willnumber in the billions. Most of them will be BAN (Body Area Networks), PAN(Personal Area Networks), AAN (Ambient Area Networks), VAN (VehicularArea Networks) and Sensors Networks.▪ These will aggregate into larger local area networks that spontaneously4.3This evolution will bring within COMSOC audience new professionals, like civil engineers,medical doctors, shop designers, but also private citizens and this can significantly expand COMSOCpotential audience but at the same time may require a different way to relate with them.Need to address different constituencies and to talk to them in terms ofapplication domain rather than technology domain. Terminals are crucialin this area. See also 4.4. A different approach to standardization may berequired [4.24].The Data Tsunami and the Software NetworksThe data carried by the telecommunications networks have steadily increased over time but in thelast 20 years their growth has become exponential due to the advent of multimedia communications.The growth has been tackled and supported thanks to optical fibers network that scaled of 3-4 orderof magnitude the network capacity and through new architectures (Content Delivery Networks).This growth is going to continue in this decade, and the following ones with an expectation of 100fold growth from 2010 to 2020 to reach 10+ ZettaBytes (compare to the 100 Exabytes estimated in2010).The network capacity will continue to scale and support this flow. New architectures for CDN willbe required, and will affect particularly the network edges taking advantage of distributed storage andstorage capacity in the home, in the terminals and at the edges.The data tsunami will change significantly the way society, enterprises andindividuals perceive, produce and interact. The seamless support providedby the network infrastructure will make these data always available as if theywere local, shifting the focus from the communications to the interplay withand among data.50 51

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.3.1This can shift the audience interest towards data and data centric networksfurther contributing to fade the boundaries between COMSOC and theComputer Society. It does not diminishes the importance of networks andrelated technical issues but makes these servant of the others [4.25].Data CreationBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have plenty of devices that will make data creation an integral part of theiroperation▪ Have localization has a ubiquitous function providing a tagging thatcomplement time stamping of any data created.▪ See a wide variety of data, from simple, once in a while message requiring afew bytes, to continuous streams of HD video.▪ Have Research Centers creating staggering amount of data, be it in physicsor in bioscience.▪ There will be more data created than storage capacity to store them (crosspoint in 2013)As more and more electronics permeates objects and more and more sensors are deployed theamount of data generated will keep growing. Object that in 2011 are already generating data, likevehicles, will generate even more in ten years time and will likely transmit them.People will actively use data creation as part of their everyday life (recording a lesson in a class,a meeting, an excursion…) exploiting the easiness provided by terminals. Additionally, people willcreate data indirectly, e.g. by wearing sensors for health monitoring.Security cameras will be ubiquitous creating a huge flow of data, some restricted to a local area,some dispatched far away.Data will not just “be created”. They are likely to be contextualized, adding time stamp, location,identity of the entity that has generated them, aggregated with other data and possibly may beencapsulated into a service governing the access to the data.A data, once created, can be accessed in a variety of ways and this broadens the meaning ofcommunications.▪ Data are an integral part of communications and COMSOC will have toconsider the evolution of data creation as a core business [4.26].▪ Processing and abstraction (see Metadata 4.3.5) are needed to solve theproblem of insufficient storage and consumption capacity. This will createa host of functionalities to digest data that will shift the value perception ofthe end user. COMSOC will need to ride the wave as the basic value ofinformation collapse [4.27].4.3.24.3.3Data StorageBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have increased 50 times the capacity, both in mass market and in enterprisedomain▪ Have decreased 100 times the cost per bit▪ Have created a storage capacity at the edges of the telecommunicationsnetwork that far exceed the one of any data center▪ Have provided TB in handheld devices▪ Be packaged with processing and communications gateways on a singlechip.▪ Be available on thin film, created through printed electronics resulting in verylow cost and therefore being applied as electronic labels to any package.The continuous decrease in price of storage and its increased capacity (although not matching thedata creation volume) creates huge storage at the edges of the network, in the home, in the “hand”.New communications paradigms will be developed to exploit this new architecture with data no morecentralized but clustered.Likewise, new storage architectures, beyond today’s cloud, will be in place and research in thisdomain will be intense. Communications plays a crucial role in these new architectures.▪ Data Centric Networks will be an important area for COMSOC [4.28].▪ Themes related to availability of storage, accessibility, security will play amajor role in telecommunications and shall be addressed by COMSOC[4.29].▪ Data storage architectures, like Cloud Storage, have to be addressed [4.30].Data TransportBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Be achieved through fiber at multi Tbps▪ Be achieved through wireless at Gbps▪ Be achieved by proximity▪ Be achieved through state change (updates of Data Clusters)▪ Be achieved through the cloud▪ Be achieved through skin▪ Be achieved through electrical, plumbing, lightning and other means▪ Be achieved through optical pills (optical storage sent over wheels)Data transport will increase 100 times over this decade. The international and domestic backboneswill see an expansion of the optical fiber and the adoption of 100 – 1000 Gbps links based on DWDM.Optics will continue to be a major area for research and industry.At the access level two main evolutions will continue: fiber deployment and wireless coverage.52 53

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 ReportBoth are expected to see significant efforts in research and in industry. 1 Gbps both on fibre and oncell will be common in 2020.In public wireless area the main effort will be towards dense coverage to support multi Mbps tomany customers. Major changes can be expected in the wireless domain fueled by the multiplicationof micro-cells. WiFi areas created by the terminals, sharing of network access bandwidth, verticalroaming, use of unlicensed spectrum, use of dynamically allocated spectrum (SDR). As incandescentlightning will be replaced by LED lightning these latter will be used s downlink communications inthe 100 Mbps range.A significant part of this evolution is fostered by the terminal evolution (see 4.4). These are alsogoing to play a role in new communications architectures with flow of data from one terminal toanother (one vehicle to another, one object to another) with the possible role of bridge to createdynamic local area networks.Given the massive storage capacity of terminals they will also be able to capture data by proximityand relay them to other terminals, once in range. This paradigm may find application in developingcountries, in rural areas, as well as in urban spaces, as an example by capturing bulk data in front ofa shop and using them once home, or in vehicular communications where the passing of a vehiclethrough a gate (a toll station, a recharging station…) can result in an update of its data base.The global data architecture will overlay the physical communications pipes. Large data centersas well as smaller and focused ones (up to a terminal data base size) may be linked one another andkept in synch. Hence, any new data may result in a global change of state at the Data Layer. Thisarchitecture makes data local and steer the network evolution towards a data centric architecture.A part of it may be taken by the cloud. This goes beyond a layered and diffused data hosting. It canbecome a data processing and it can also become the bridge between object as atoms and objects asweb presence, upon which services may be constructed.A role in data communications may also be taken by human to object communications through theusage of the skin. A host of medical appliances (and sensors) may use the skin as a conductor. Specificprotocols may be required.Electric metering and sensors of various kinds may take advantage of other physical conductors,like electric wires, plumbing, pavement, textiles, wall paper and paintings. Different protocols mayalso be required and these special networks will need to be bridged to the main networks.Finally, data storage support may become so dense, able to store multi TB in tiny optical grain, thata portion of the data communications may take place by physically moving these storage support, asit is the case today with the delivery of music, movies through CDs and DVDs.This is an area that has not been considered as part of the “telecommunications” domain, althoughit entails massive communication. It is not likely to be killed by the broadband pipes and it should beconsidered as a part of the telecommunications because of the interactions with the general data layer.Future data transport is likely to consist of several different architectures and physical means andthere is the challenge to have this operated seamlessly and effectively.▪ Data Centric Networks have to become a major area for COMSOC (seeaction 4.28)▪ Alternative Data communications technologies will become “locally” importantand a presence of COMSOC in these areas can greatly benefit an expandedmembership [4.31].▪ Data encapsulation in services creates different paradigms for their transport(Web 3.0 and beyond). It is an area overlapping with the Computer Societythat can be either seen as transparent to communications “dumb pipes” or4.3.4central to communications since the communications aspects are an integralpart of the data encapsulation characteristics. COMSOC should work for andsupport this latter [4.32].Data ProcessingBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have increased 100 fold the performance, using multi-core, multi parallelsystems.▪ Be based on new widespread distributed, clustered processing architecture(processing cloud).▪ Be performed in a variety of objects, as tiny as sensors and tags and as bigas supercomputers clusters.▪ Have seen the flanking of alternative processing paradigm, namely molecularand quantum computing. Whilst it can be reasonably predicted that molecularcomputing will be used in specific niches (like genomics) it is difficult to makeany prediction about quantum computing. If it pans out, issues like newcryptographic systems will have to be addressed.The cost of processing will continue to decrease in this decade, at the same rate it did in the lastfour decades. The processing capacity for mass market will reach a plateau since it exceeds demand,probably in this first part of the decade. Some mass market processing needs, however, will continueto put pressure on processing performances, such as the chips for the rendering of video signals. Asvideo will move in this decade to the 4k standard higher performances will be required for signalprocessing in television sets, in video cameras and related devices.Increasing performance will be seen, coupled with lower energy demand, in handheld equipmentand sensors. This latter will change some processing architecture (processing is cheaper thantransmission in terms of energy bill). Particularly, sensor networks are likely to exploit local sensorsprocessing capability for decreasing the number of data transmitted.Also, signal processing in terminals may become much more demanding, particularly towards theend of the decade once the terminal can be asked to employ more sophisticated signal analyses toincrease spectrum efficiency. In turns, this will lead to a change in the communications protocols andarchitectures (see 4.4).The massive distributed processing where the “cloud” becomes a giant computer brings to the foreissues of latency and this in turn may push towards optical networks architectures not requiring anelectronic signal manipulation (passive optical add drop).▪ Data Processing and communications impact architectures and COMSOCshould be involved in this [4.33].▪ The processing at the network edges displaces the intelligence and affectsthe current network architecture. It can result, as some are claiming, in atransparent network or in a diffused network control. This latter may bethe case once we consider the network as spanning beyond the presentboundaries to include the networks at the edges. The problem in thisexpansion, of course, is the ownership domain that does not span across54 55

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.4▪ The evolution of display technologies will impact the demand of bandwidthand will steer towards new communications architectures. This will haveto be considered by COMSOC. Many display producers will embedcommunications capability in their products hence becoming a potentialaudience for COMSOC (it has already started) [4.40].▪ Education products produced by COMSOC should ride this wave. Visual andInteractivity are the characteristics of any future education program [4.41].▪ Having visual and interactive displays all around creates a different sort ofenvironment, COMSOC should partner with the IEEE Society on the Socialimplication of Technology to investigate this area [4.42].The Terminals steerageThe market of terminals is already bigger, in economic terms than the market of network equipment.Additionally, the life time of terminals is generally shorter than the one of network equipment. Theresult of these two factors is that:in this last decade the evolution of the network has been influenced by theterminals. In this coming decade the evolution of the network will be steeredby terminals.The tipping point was the explosion of the cell phones, it has passed 4 billions at the end of 2010and it is forecasted to approach 9 billions by 2020. Even more important in 2010 over 1.6 billion cellphones were sold and the forecast is for over 4 billions sold in 2020. The life time of a cell phonevaries greatly in different countries from as low as 6 month to 4 years.In addition to cell phones we are starting to see the uptake of really portable screens, like the tablets.In this decade we are going to see a multiplication of devices that interconnect with the network onone side and to a human on the other.in total there may be over 20 billion devices that interface human beings withthe network in 2020There will be even more devices connected through the network (IoT, Internet of things) in additionto sensors, already discussed in 4.1.3.The strong innovation cycle of terminals will continue throughout this decade and by 2020 it isexpected terminals will:▪ Embed large storage capacity.▪ Have a processing capacity in line or exceeding the need.▪ Be able to connect to a variety of access points (adapting coding, frequencyand signaling as required).▪ Be able to create their own local network and share it with other terminals.▪ Be able to single signals out of noise through cooperative processing withother terminals in the area thus overtaking the Shannon thresholds.4.5Furthermore, we are just now starting to see a drift of cell phone terminals into the IT area andviceversa tablet (IT area) morphing into cell phones. Additionally, televisions are likely to becomeboth devices to surf the Internet and to support (video) communications.By 2020 the scenario should be clearer, becoming either:▪ Telecom rooted terminals will have taken the upper hand, supportingprocessing local and in the cloud, replacing IT rooted terminals (they willprovide authentication via SIM card).▪ IT rooted terminals will have replaced cell phones (they will provideauthentication through biometrics or soft SIM). They will support bothprocessing and communications “a la IT”, using both edge and centralizedclouds.▪ Terminals will be mere windows on the Web. They will have lost both thetelco and the IT root.Terminals are, therefore, steering the innovation in this decade and by 2020 they will be also anintegral part of any communication network.▪ Terminals, their evolution and their capability have to be at the core of theCOMSOC business and all involved in terminals design are part of theCOMSOC audience [4.43].▪ Today COMSOC is only marginally involved in CE, Consumer Electronics; by2020 CE has to be an integral part of COMSOC [4.44].▪ Terminals based networking is a new area that can be specifically addressedby a COMSOC Technical Committee [4.45].▪ Independently of the drift of terminals their evolution is going to fall underthe interest of at least three Societies: Communications, Computer andConsumer Electronics. COMSOC should work with the other Societies inthis area that is strategic for its implications on the network architectures,for the involvement of manufacturers and for capturing the attention of wideraudiences [4.46].Embedded communicationsSince 2005, communications have gone unnoticed inside some objects, think about Kindle, adevice that has embedded connectivity although few users may perceive it.In 2020 many objects will embed communications to deliver their functions and in perspectiveembedded communications will be taken for granted by the industry and the public. On the one handthis is supported by new (indirect) biz models, on the other hand this means communications willbecome part of the offer of several industries.Communications is an integral part of many kinds of products. It supportssome of the functions provided by the product but it is not perceived by theuser as an independent function.58 59

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.5.1The embedding of communications capability in products morph them into services. In turns thisis going to impact the way enterprises position themselves into the value chains, will require differentexpertise, including telecommunications ones, and will stimulate further use of telecommunications.At the same time, objects with embedded communications will be able to autonomouslycommunicate one another, giving rise to the Internet of Things.The Internet of Things will represent the main sector of telecommunications interms of users, exceeding 100 billion objects directly or indirectly connectedto the Internet by 2020.The embedding of communications capabilities will make it possible to reach those objects as ifthey were servers thus enabling new internet services on physical objects.The Internet with Things will represent a new way to perceive the world,opening up a host of new services and new biz opportunities.The embedding of communications capability will start to happen also in living things, includinghuman beings.Transforming Products into ServicesBy 2020 many products are expected to:▪ Deliver functions by connecting to networked providers (servers, cloud, otherproducts).▪ Change their functionality by updating their software.▪ Provide customer support via an embedded link to CRM systems.▪ Be monitored and maintained from a remote location.▪ Support a variety of service providers and related biz models.▪ Cooperate with the environment to deliver add on functionalities.Basically every market segment will take advantage of these capabilities, from car manufacturingto consumer electronics, from airliners (and airlines) to drugs companies, from agricultural productsto furniture.▪ The embedding of communications in products opens up a large audience toCOMSOC. This requires much more attention to vertical markets and to theengineering of the “embedding” [4.47].▪ The interface aspects are becoming very important as objects becomeconnected and hence can provide a wider variety of functions. COMSOCshall support this area as well [4.48].4.5.24.5.3The Internet of ThingsBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have a staggering number of objects, things, connected to the Internet.There are different estimate from as low as 50 billions to a trillion.▪ Have sensors having the lion’s share in terms of numbers.▪ Have most of communications consisting of tiny transactions, less than a KBa day.▪ Have each individual thing addressable through its IPv6 address code.Given the wide variety of communications needs required by the Internet of Things it may beexpected that specific research and new technologies will be developed, including alternative protocolsfor very low power interconnection with certain sensors in the environment where powering is notavailable.However, most of the development in this area will have begun well before 2020 so it is expectedthat by that time it will be “biz as usual”.COMSOC will have to continue to be active in this area [4.49].The Internet with ThingsBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Be possible to reach a wide variety of physical things via Internet and to useInternet to get services and information about physical things.▪ Have many products design to offer APIs that will make it possible to connectinformation and services to them, through the network (interpreted in thebroad sense defined in 4.3.3).Whilst the Internet of Things (IoT) foresee billion of things potentially communicating withone another, the Internet with Things (IwT) foresee a growing number (in the hundreds of millionsinitially, to become hundreds of billion) of object that will become accessible to human beingsthrough the Internet. The IwT shares several technologies and architectures with the IoT although the“communications interface” should be adapted to meet human needs and the form factor of the objectmatters since the object is “visible” and its physical characteristics are a selling point, as important asits functionality. In the IoT the functionalities exposed are the ones designed by the producer of the“T”; in the IwT a significant number of functionalities will be mashed up by third parties.In addition, the IoT will be produced by enterprises having a specific know how in telecommunicationswhilst the IwT will be produced by a variety (eventually all) of enterprises with very little specifictelecommunications knowledge.With the IwT COMSOC expands significantly its potential audience, since itcan involve engineers (and designers, marketers…) working in a variety ofindustries [4.50].60 61

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.5.44.6Human embedded communicationsBy 2020 it is expected to:▪ Have proactive and personalized medicine become common, both requiringcommunications between the body and monitoring centers.▪ Have many drugs being offered as a service, rather than as a product, andhence including monitoring and remote assistance.▪ Have identity captured directly from the individual body, using a variety oftechnologies, including embedded chips.▪ Have BAN and PAN providing the required connectivity at body level and theinterconnection with LAN.Significant investment is expected in this decade on connecting the body to the Internet, in responseto evolution in the genome understanding and the increase in personalization of the cure. Also, aspectslike security will stimulate the search for secure identification.The development of disciplines like emotional computing are further pushing in a direct, implicitcommunications with humans detecting some physical parameters like temperature, sweat, heart rateand so on.▪ COMSOC shall include this kind of communications among the ones it isaddressing [4.51].▪ Partnership with medical and biology Societies may become important in thenext decade. Ethical issues may be better considered jointly [4.52].What does it mean to be a telecommunicationexpert?Having seen the breath of communications applications in the next decade and the fact that manyindustries will see communications as a core competence in their market offering, COMSOC has toconsider what will it mean to be a telecommunications expert in the next decade?Two major changes are underway:▪ Telecommunications is becoming much more than the connecting pipesand the way to operate them. It is shifting towards a connectivity frameworkwhere data centers and terminals are as important as the pipes (if not more).The basic knowledge required to understand these new areas come from thecomputer world. New disciplines, like the one of complex systems, semantics,autonomics are going to be central to the future telecommunicationsexpertise.▪ Most industries will require communications competences in their ranks.Since communications will become an integral part of their products, thiscompetence is unlikely to be outsourced. On the other hand, the variety ofindustries is likely to require a variety of competences.The first change leads to a shift in what have been considered to be the COMSOC knowledge4.7boundaries. The second one brings into the COMSOC domain a new audience with new needs andexpectation.As in the last decade most engineering curricula included economic studies, so in the next decademost production oriented curricula (engineering, economics, computer science,..) will includetelecommunications studies.Telecommunications engineers will continue to require today’s competences (evolved, obviously)in the creation, operation, maintenance and expansion of the network. There will be a stronger interestthan today to extend these competences in application areas; symmetrically, professionals operatingin application areas will require to have some sort of telecommunications competence.COMSOC should cater both to the needs of communications specialists and tothe ones of professionals that need an understanding of telecommunicationsas an ancillary knowledge to their profession [4.53].The pace of evolution is likely to continue at the same speed of today, which means that theknowledge life time will continue to shrink. Engineers will need to periodically refresh their knowhow to remain up to date, researchers are likely to require a constant update of their knowledge.The faster life cycle of knowledge threatens the value delivered by COMSOC. Alternative, moreeffective ways to access knowledge and to remain abreast of discovery and innovation can dry upresearchers’ interest in COMSOC.At the same time, the wider audience of professionals interested in telecommunications has alonger life cycle of knowledge since the need is to keep abreast with the possible application oftelecommunications in the market, and this evolves at a lower speed than basic knowledge.Clearly, these professionals will turn their attention to the best source available so engaging theformer (the researchers’ audience) is crucial to serve the latter.▪ COMSOC shall endeavor to remain the point of reference to all researchersin the telecommunications field and at the same time expand its audience toprofessionals in other market areas. To engage researchers COMSOC shouldgreatly improve its timeliness, as described in 6. To serve the professionalsin other market areas COMSOC should contextualize telecommunicationsknowledge to their fields of interest, and learn to speak their language.Possibly, this may require to partner with other associations that are alreadyserving those professional needs [4.54].▪ A restructuring of TCs may be instrumental in serving the variety ofconstituencies and what is known as the convergent communicationsindustry [4.55].Telecommunications PlayersThe present major source of revenues for Telecom Operators is going to shrink as• voice services are carried out on IP,• flat rate is generalized and slowly include the wireless connectivity,• services will mostly be provided by Over The Top players and the competition will heat up,• new technology provides for even better infrastructures capacity, plenty of alternatives, cheapertransport, thus stimulating competition on transport and access.62 63

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 ReportNew players are going to have a major role in the provisioning of a composite connecting fabric.▪ Telecom Operators in 2020 will be significantly different from the ones wehave in 2010. They will be bigger in terms of traffic carried, leaner in terms ofpersonnel, they will provide multinational coverage and there will be fewer ofthem as result of market consolidation.▪ The communications fabric will be taken for granted by the mass market andit will be made up of several networks at the edges.▪ A new industry, loosely tied to Telecom Operators, will have emerged, takingcare of data management (which includes data availability at the point of use,hence data transport where required) and of embedded connectivity.▪ The wireless infrastructure, and biz, will not be able in this decade to supplantthe wire-line infrastructure, although this may become possible in thefollowing decades. The number of services being provided by the wirelessinfrastructure, however, may cannibalize a good portion of the ones beingprovided by the wire-line one.▪ It is yet to be seen if there will be a major crunch with the collapse of thewireless and wire-line infrastructure into a single biz or if the two will remainseparate. The regulatory framework may play a significant role leading to acrunch or a divergence. A crunch will accelerate the flattening of the networkand may keep new players at bay. On the other hand a separation may leadto a stronger consolidation in the wire line and the entrance of new players inthe wireless, particularly with the advent of soft SIMs.On a global scale, it may be expected that by 2020:▪ The number of Telecom Operators will be significantly reduced, with a fewmain players and a variety of local ones.▪ The cost of technology and infrastructures required to delivertelecommunications service will decrease both in OPEX and CAPEX. Thedecrease in OPEX is largely driven by stronger automation, decrease inequipment (larger integration), shift to wireless drops and optical loops. Thedecrease in CAPEX is driven by the Moore’s law and by the saturation of themarket.▪ The number of employees in the telecommunications sector proper (today’sTelecom Operators and Manufacturers) is going to shrink by a factor of 30%+ in this decade.▪ New players will be offering services leveraging the telecommunicationsfabric, based on biz model that assume connectivity as available and free.▪ Several parts of the edge infrastructure will be provided by independentplayers, with a good portion being provided as part of the general infrastructure(smart cities, connected malls, house with a tail).Although some trends, as the ones listed, are visible, the big game of repositioning of 2010 TelecomPlayers is still far from being clear. What is clear is that the present source of revenues for today’sTelecom Operators will continue to shrink, but it is not clear if new revenues streams that TelecomOperators can tap will be sufficient to balance the loss or even be able to start a new expansion such4.7.14.7.2as the one enjoyed with the advent of the wireless revolution.There are three main areas of growth:• embedded communications• data centric networks• vertical sectors re-engineering.Along with these there are a number of possible players evolution. The jury is still out; however,it may be important to consider the different scenarios from a COMSOC perspectives, being awarethat the future may very likely see a mixture of them.Survivors (biz as usual)By 2020 it is expected that:▪ Some Countries will maintain their national Telecom Operator for strategicreasons. These Operators will be heavily regulated and protected providingthe essential country wide telecommunications fabric.▪ Some Countries will separate the basic wire-line infrastructure keeping it asa strategic Country asset upon which other players can deliver services in acompetitive scenario.▪ Some Telecom Operators will survive through a large footprint, spanningseveral Countries. Throughout this decade many markets (in developingCountries) will keep expanding and will be able to sustain growth. M&A willcharacterize this decade with several consolidations on the horizon. Noticethat these consolidations are mostly pursued to acquire new markets in areaswhere markets are still growing, much less to create economy of scale thatis already mostly achieved in all developed countries with mature markets.▪ All survivors will be leaner than today (with possible exception for thoseplaying the game in a protected environment), with considerable decreaseof professional engineers both because of more efficient networks and ofoutsourcing to manufacturers of significant portion of the network operation.COMSOC may expect to have a strong foot hold in these areas and to serve these Operators nicelywith the present slate of services. However, given the shrinking in size of these players they willrepresent a shrinking audience for COMSOC (still a large one, however).Aggressive survivors (expansion of present biz in neighboringareas)By 2020 it is expected that:▪ Some Telecom Operators will enter successfully into new biz, likeentertainment (television, events,…), content distribution (music, movies,books,…)64 65

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.7.3▪ Some Telecom Operators will be able to capture a good share of advertisement,particularly in the mobile sector, activating mash ups through profiling▪ Both of the above will not compensate for the loss of revenues from today’soffering but will surely help in surviving.▪ The expansion in these neighboring biz is not going to balance the lossof professionals that will follow a trend similar to 4.7.1. There will be newprofessionals with a skill that goes beyond pure telecommunications, asdiscussed in 4.6.It is likely that these aggressive survivors will be found among those operating in today’s maturemarkets. The “aggression” is played against established players and contrasting new players (likeGoogle in the case of advertisement).It is unlikely to occur in developing markets where the focus is on the provisioning of high marginbasic telecommunications infrastructures and services (with possible exception of India and in thesecond part of this decade of Brazil).COMSOC needs to expand its coverage to include the new areas thatare being addressed by these Telecom Operators and the manufacturersproviding the supporting equipment [4.56].Embedded Communications ProvidersBy 2020 it is expected that:▪ Given the large presence of products with embedded communications someTelecom Operators will specialize in this area. These Operators will be“invisible” to the mass market and will have a B2B business model.▪ Some Operators will create specific divisions to serve this market (includingIoT and IwT).▪ Margins are likely to be razor thin thus pushing towards a separation of thisbiz from the other (classic telecommunications biz) and at the same time itwill force these players to have a global, worldwide footprint.These Operators will make use of very efficient networks requiring very little workforce. They mayeven outsource the network operation to manufacturers.There may be some opportunities in the management of sensors networks, management of smartbuildings, smart environment and smart cities. This can require a local foot hold and dedicatedresources.COMSOC has to consider this as a new audience in terms of needs andcreate specific services for them [4.57].4.7.4Data Centric Biz NetworksBy 2020 it is expected that:▪ Data will be perceived as the crucial sector in communications. They willbe addressed both by computer rooted players and by telecommunicationsplayers.▪ Revenues streams related to data will exceed the ones related to connectivityboth at the biz and mass market level.▪ Today’s cloud services will expand dramatically to include data services,spanning data management, abstraction, correlation, authentication,disclosure, encapsulation, identity, monitoring, leverage. The Cloud willembed biz processes from manufacturing to customer care.▪ Web 3.0 will be the new paradigm for communications, completely maskingthe connectivity aspects from the perception of the user. Contrary to theembedded communications (that is also masking the connectivity aspects)Web 3.0 is about connectivity, not physical one but among different datasets, more specifically, the user data set, the object data set and the servicedata set.▪ The present Apps Store will be taken over by this evolution of Data CentricNetworks and clearly the big players of today in the Apps Store area aregoing to be major contestants in this new domain.▪ There may be space both for global and local players, with local onesleveraging on the local Information Society (Smart cities, eGovernment,Health care, transportation, education…).▪ The number of professionals involved in this area is likely to exceed today’sworkforce in telecommunications, particularly in the service area, that is likelyto be very fragmented.Because of the value involved many players will try to take the upper hand. In this area there maybe both global and local (Country-wise) players. The variety of biz relations and biz models is likelyto be significant. The margins that may be expected can vary greatly from sector to sector but ingeneral they will compare to the ones enjoyed today in the telecommunications biz and might be evengreater in some areas.The technologies and skill involved are different from the ones required today in telecommunications.▪ This is a most crucial area for COMSOC to be in and to attract an audience.[4.58].▪ It is at the boundary between the Computer Society and COMSOC. Thepresent technology domain of COMSOC is not able to tackle this area,neither is the one of the Computer Society. The reason is that there is a lotof information technology as well as a lot of telecommunications technology[4.59].66 67

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report4.7.5Vertical Sectors Re-engineering through telecommunicationsBy 2020 it is expected that:▪ The Information Society will be in full swing. This is taking place leading toa significant re-engineering of complete market sectors (and may actuallyhappen sector-wise) like education, logistics, transportation, health care,finance and banking, production,…▪ Some Telecom Operators will be steering this evolution, often in partnershipwith major industry association, with the Government, with territory institutions.▪ The Telecom value proposition will be in the support to new value chains(and ecosystems).This is a major area of change, since it will involve all our life domains and change the industry andthe society at large. It will not take place all of a sudden and it will see different degrees of penetrationin various areas.Because of the big changes involved it will affect both industry and academia. There are already inEurope some attempts to steer the innovation, as an example through the EIT initiative.▪ A significant increase in potential COMSOC audience derives from thisimplementation of the Information Society. COMSOC should become a mainplayer in this area [4.60].▪ The type of skill involved is very large and may be better tackled throughpartnership with other Societies [4.61].▪ There are a lot of trials and experimentation based lessons that will need tobe captured and shared. This may require a different sort of repository fromthe one existing today, based on papers production [4.62].▪ There are significant social issues to be considered. Technology is but anenabler and its application goes beyond the technical feasibility. This requiresCOMSOC to adopt a more comprehensive approach and vision [4.63].their assets. Google already has the largest transcontinental infrastructurein terms of capacity. As the shift towards data centric networks progresseslarge data centers owned by some of these players may play a big role in thetelecommunications scenario.▪ The workforce employed by these new players is of one to two orders ofmagnitude smaller than the one involved in telecommunications today. Theirskill and education, the knowledge required is also significantly different.The change in the scenario that may result from the taking over of the telecommunications sectorby these players is so radical that one may question if a “COMSOC like” organization still has a role.Today there are basically no audience in COMSOC related to these players and it seems difficultto attract them.It is unlikely, at least for the next two decades, to see such a shift happening on a global scale andthroughout all the spectrum of telecommunications.It is much more likely to see these new players having an increased role in telecommunicationsby 2020 attracting in their orbit more service and terminals developers rather than replacing existinginfrastructure providers.It may be very difficult for COMSOC to reposition itself to attract the newaudience provided by these new players. It may also be pointless, giventhe small number of their constituency. Their evolution, however, has to beclosely monitored since this will be a hot topic for the present COMSOCaudience and the extended one described in this document [4.64].4.7.6Take over of today’s players by new onesBy 2020 it is expected that:▪ Some of today’s players may see their market shrunk to such a point thatthey will be forced out of biz.▪ VoIP will be widespread and a (small) number of service provider will provideparasitic services on today’s infrastructure. This will definitely kill the voicerevenues.▪ New players, new to the telecommunications arena, like Amazon, Apple,Google Facebook and several others that will appear in the next years, maytake over significant portions of today’s telecommunications biz, either bycontrolling user data or the terminal.▪ New players may flank the present telecommunications infrastructure withtheir own resources, diverting significant portion of traffic and services on68 69

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Reportmission, the dramatic changes that have already happened in the global ecosystem, and even more, theones that we envision would happen in the next decade, outlined in Chapters 3 and 4, will profoundlyredefine our understanding of COMSOC Mission 2020.The major social/economic/demographic trends happening in the world are already having a bigimpact on COMSOC. For example, a large proportion of our papers come from Asia and one canexpect that trend to continue as Asia continues to increase its share of, and probably come to dominate,the world economy.We see how in a different way 10-15 year kids tend to communicate from what even 20-25 yearolds have done at their age. Facebook, Twitter, texting, gaming etc. are spreading :• can COMSOC adapt faster and better than it has been doing?• how can COMSOC use a single communications paradigm when its audiencehas at least three different paradigms?5COMSOCMISSIONIN 2020Academia, Industry, Government and Public – this is the “global eco-system” where the COMSOClives, plans its activities, provides its products and services, defines its mission, and ultimately seesitself as serving the humanity. This global ecosystem is inhabited by other professional societies,sometimes in competition with COMSOC, sometimes in parallel existence, and sometimes incooperation with us.The convergence and globalization of the eco-system impacts COMSOC in every aspect of itsexistence. As we are visioning COMSOC in 2020 we need to see how COMSOC should cope withthese megatrends of convergence and globalization, what functions it should perform, what missionit should carry, and how it should redefine and revitalize itself in order to be a strong, valuable andvital player in the future evolution of this converged and global ecosystem.As a starting point to analyse COMSOC Mission 2020, let’s look at the current, 2011, COMSOCMission. As stated in the COMSOC website:(a) Advancement of science, technology and applications in communications and relateddisciplines;(b) Fostering presentation and exchange of information among its members and the technicalcommunity throughout the world, and(c) Maintaining the highest standard of professionalism and technical competency.While the given mission statement is stressing important and valid components of COMSOCProfound changes are happening in overall information culture worldwide, even in remote areas ofour Globe. An important continuing trend is the exchange and dissemination of information on the weband through mobile devices. Different new two- and three-party business models are opening accessto communication and content. Different models of packaging of information are made available fordelivery to different kinds of devices. Live documents, continuous real-time updates, communityreviews, Wikipedia models are changing the ways how data, information and knowledge are created.It is imperative that COMSOC should remain on top on all of the developments in digital informationculture in all of its diversity of creating and exchanging of documents, music, images, videos, etc.Another trend is consolidation of content, media processing, and communications industries, forcingus to redefine COMSOC's scope and structures with all the attendant problems of cultural change andconflicts with other societies.▪ More and more information is being produced in video format. By 2015 Ciscoforesee a million minutes worth of video being consumed every second onthe Internet.▪ Textbook are transitioning towards a fruition from the web with a forecastof over 40% being read through tablets by 2015. By 2025 education will becompletely different in terms of access to textbook.By 2020 we can expect to have most of information residing in clouds fromwhere it can be accessed in a streaming modality. This is likely to change theway DRM is being enforced.IEEE COMSOC needs to think how to make its content available, and themodel of ownership and protection [5.1]This section of the report of COMSOC Vision 2020 is devoted to the COMSOC Mission 2020.We will analyze the different components of COMSOC Mission 2020 concerning its role in servingthe academia, industry, government and public. We will review different technological, economical,industrial, marketing and social driving forces that shape the global ecosystem, and how all of thisdetermines the factors of redefinition and revitalization of COMSOC. Finally, we present of our70 71

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report5.1vision of COMSOC Mission 2020, and how COMSOC Mission 2010 is transferred to the Mission2020.Punch lineCOMSOC: Connecting Engineers for a Connected EarthCommunity Mission▪ Provide invaluable service to our members▪ Become asset to global communications community▪ Advance and strengthen Global COMSOC –globalization of COMSOC frommembership to managementHumanitarian Mission▪ Inspires people in all countries with the courage to cultivate freedom▪ Assist people in underdeveloped or developing countries to find competitiveways of economic development▪ Enable creative minds to create new values for human society and enhancingthe quality of life▪ Serves world and humanity▪ Embrace global culture and valuesTechnical Mission▪ Stimulate academic research in ICT and related sciences▪ Stimulate and document technical advancement▪ Inspire engineers’ devotion to technical progressIndustry Mission▪ Bringing COMSOC closer to Industry▪ Multi-dimensional COMSOC-industry linkage▪ Multi-dimensional Industry-COMSOC-Academia collaboration space▪ Support industry as it develops systems and deploys networks▪ Facilitates the availability of affordable services to all people in all nationsconferences typically cater more to academics than those in industry, whereas certification andtraining is targeted more towards in industry and government sectors.Defining the estimated universe of potential members or communications related subject matterexperts can be a challenge. Based on published data, there have been about 800,000 EE BS degreesgranted in the US in past 40 years. Less than half of them attained Master’s degree or Ph.D. level.Historically about 14% enter communications-centric employment, resulting in about 110,000individuals with undergraduate degree and about 50,000 individuals holding an EE Master's degreeor higher in the US. With 20,000 members in the US, COMSOC member demographics imply thatCOMSOC has captured about 25% of the potential US market holding Master's degrees or higher.Of those earning a Bachelor's Degree, data would suggest that COMSOC has captured about 10%of the potential US universe. The potential member universe could include other disciplines suchas physics, mathematics, computer science, and business management but all EE graduates do notpursues careers in EE fields. Data sources for the international higher education area and employmentmarkets are unreliable and inconsistent; it is not possible to estimate realistically the global memberuniverse although someone may estimate the size at double the US.The US Department of Labor maintains employment data for the telecom industry for all employees(including non-degreed employees). Employment in the traditional telecommunications industryhas declined by 35% since reaching highs of more than 1.4 million in 2000; there have been otherareas of employment growth. While telecom employers have been shedding traditional full-timeemployees, technical consulting and scientific research employment have increased by 50% in thelast decade. The result is that the US membership market is not as apparent or easily accessible asit once was. Communications specialists can be found in a much broader array of companies andworking scenarios. Figure 1, drawn based on the US Bureau of Labor statistics charts, represents thisshift graphically.Other Telecom Telecom Industry Wired Telecom Wireless Telecom150011255.2COMSOC constituency at 2020For the purpose of this document, the COMSOC constituency is defined as people who partake ofCOMSOC products and services. These people include COMSOC members, conference attendees,publications users (print and online plus both subscribers and individual article downloaders), endusersof education products, and certification and training customers. As COMSOC looks at howto meet the needs of its constituency in 2020 it will need to understand how the demographics ofthe markets for all (current and future) COMSOC products and services will evolve in the next tenyears. It should be noted that implications for customers of one type of products and service may becompletely different than the implications for another type of products and services. For example,75037501999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009Figure 1 - US employment trends72 73

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 ReportWhile those employment trends shown are for the United States, research has found that similarshifts are also occurring globally. Additionally, this trend is expected to continue as we move towards2020. One factor driving this trend is that communications technology is used more and more in otherproducts and services (that did not traditionally utilize communications), therefore opportunitiesfor management and consulting will continue to increase. As most current COMSOC membershave advanced educations; postgraduate degrees in EE, physics, mathematics, computer sciences,business or related fields. Looking towards 2020, we do not expect this to change. However, as“communications” continues to become embedded and more aspects of our lives (i.e., more itemsand services will rely on communications technologies) the number of communications users willcontinue to grow. While most of these users are not targets for many of COMSOC’s core productsand services, there will be an opportunity to reach out to this demographic and offer them productsand services of value (e.g., basic communication technology tutorials, user guides to technology).Another trend in the COMSOC constituency is that more COMSOC members are outside of NorthAmerica (as shown in Figure 2). This trend should continue towards 2020, especially as current 3 rdworld countries continue to evolve and modernize their infrastructure.Wireless build up in 3 rd word countriesWhile this change in the makeup of COMSOC members will continue, we do not expect NorthAmerica to lose members, but rather, the growth in members in regions outside of North Americawill be much higher than that in North America. As COMSOC looks to 2020 and beyond, it willhave to continue to serve members in North America and other industrial nations around the world inaddition to addressing the needs of members in these emerging nations. In countries where COMSOCmembership is currently strong, COMSOC can continue to provide existing member products andservice (in addition to new offerings), but in emerging countries, members and customers of otherCOMSOC products and services will have different needs (e.g., tutorials and training on more basiccommunications technologies as opposed to conferences on theoretical aspects of communications).Another shift in COMSOC constituency that has been slowly occurring over the past ten years is55.7% 55.9% 53.8% 52.2% 51.2%47.6%44.3% 44.1%46.2% 47.8% 48.8% 52.4%55.5% 56.9% 56.9% 57.7% 59.1%44.5% 43.1% 43.1% 42.3% 40.9%5.2.1the number of women members. In 2001, only 6% of COMSOC members were women, whereas in2010, the percentage of women COMSOC members had increased to 10%.[Katie]This is a relatively large increase percentage-wise, but still far behind our goal of membership thatis 50% women. There are several efforts within the IEEE and other institutions to increase the roleof women in Electrical Engineering, e.g.• IEEE Women in Engineering 11• Nerd Girls 12• Anita Borg Institute 13• WEPAN 14These organizations are quite effective at recruiting and retaining women engineers, but theyare not specifically geared to communications engineers. In 2009, the Women in CommunicationsEngineering (WICE) ad hoc committee was formed to recognize, foster and increase the role ofwomen in COMSOC. A more diverse COMSOC ensures a healthier society in terms of membershipand outlook on the world. To increase the diversity of our membership, we need a two-fold approach:retain current members and encourage young women to pursue a career in communications. Retainingmembership deals with issues such as work-life balance, career burnout and negative stereotypes.Increasing the number of women members requires more of an outreach and education effort.COMSOC will be looking at several possible avenues for this. One example of this is developingcommunications based experiments/modules available to both high school and college educators.These would be beneficial to the membership as a whole, but activities that feature women instructors/role models and activities that deal with social relevance would be a way to encourage youngerwomen to enter the communications area.The percentage of COMSOC members and overall constituency that are employed by academicinstitutions has increased over the last decade. While the breakdown in members between academicsand industry may not change much over the next ten years, if COMSOC is successful in targeting newproducts and services at industry (and government), then the percentage of COMSOC customers (i.e.,all users of COMSOC products and services) that are employed by industry and government mayincrease. However, that is a trend that is hard to predict.Demographic TrendsAs of May 2011 the Earth population has exceeded 6.9 billion people, according to the US CensusBureau International DB (http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/worldpopinfo.php) and it is expected toreach 8 billion by the middle of the next decade, probably reaching 7.65 billion in 2020.2000 2001 2002 20032004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010Regions 1-6 Regions 7-10Figure 2 - COMSOC Membership11 http://www.ieee.org/membership_services/membership/women/index.html12 http://www.nerdgirls.org/Nerd_Girls_Site_Selection_Page.html13 http://anitaborg.org/14 http://www.wepan.org/74 75

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report5.2.2Demographic impact factors on COMSOC MissionChina in 2011 will graduate over 800,000 engineers, that is 4 times as muchas in the North America and this gap is just going to increase in this decade.COMSOC will have a much greater percentage of members - and leadership- from colleagues in China, Korea, Japan and other Asian-Pacific countries.Will a shift of its headquarters from New York to Beijing, along with IEEE,leaving a satellite office in New York City with a skeleton staff (maybe only 1or 2 people) make sense? [5.2].Not only physical dimensions of the demographic trends play role, but we have also to take accountthe qualitative factors. The future COMSOC might exercise with a federated architecture combiningseveral quite independent large organizations with their own headquarters. The federation itself couldbe a virtual organization. Within the next decade Africa and Middle East might get organized intoseparate regions.We may need to think more seriously about publication in Chinese. We willalso have an increasing number of non-North Americans and of women inour leadership structure [5.3].According to the UN estimate in 2020 there will be (in brackets the numberof COMSOC Members today):5.3Segmentation of potential markets and interest2010 2020Asia 4,596 Million 4,000 Million 9,500Africa 1,276 Million 1,000 Million 600Europe 733 Million 733 Million 12,200Latin America 646 Million 589 Million 3,000North America 383 Million 352 Million 22,500Oceania 40 Million 35 Million 1,300World Total: 6,672 MillionA recent study prepared by the GEANT 2020 Expert Group, within the European Commission,emphasized a trend towards 2020 where:“… a direct consequence of the knowledge and learning and a framework of Open Innovation&Lifelong learning spread through Society is the growth of micro research centers. Schools, museums,small industries will all to different extent do and practice research”.▪ The decentralization of research may actually be enabled by a centralizationof resources (e.g. the cloud). This leads to the need for a strong, high capacityconnectivity network making it possible to achieve economy of scale, andthe physical connectivity will be supplemented by a logical connectivity atsemantic level, bringing together researchers and knowledge.▪ Globalization will enable and engage 'expertise groups' clustered in differentregions of the world. Developing countries will assume an increasing rolein the management and operation of societal activities, with distributedmanagement centers. Participating groups will form to provide continuityand coordination and in shaping the Society to ensure that forward thinkingand innovation stays as the key driver.▪ COMSOC may provide the supporting fabric for the distributed researchcatering the need to connect “minds” [5.4].▪ COMSOC organization shall ensure effective participation of all constituencies,independently of their geographical location. Moving COMSOC operation tothe cyberspace is an enabling factor to this transition [5.5].76 77

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report5.3.1 Critical Research and Technology Trends5.3.2 Research and Technology Impact on COMSOC ActivitiesWhile a detailed analysis of ICT research and engineering developments is discussed elsewhere inthis report (Section 4), in this section we will touch several critical trends of these developments thatare important for us to envision the COMSOC Mission in 2020.Research and technology development have always been a major driving force for innovationin ICT. We see that the impact of ICT research and technology will be even greater during the nextdecade. Below are listed some critical trends that affect COMSOC association with ICT and whatrole COMSOC may play in this association:1) Critical research trends that affect ICT• fundamental research on physics of computing and communication• research on broadband and mobile communication• research on principals of new devices, sensors, and networks• ICT-oriented social sciences, human factors, cultural anthropology• Semantic content processing, high-level information fusion, smart eco-systems and smartsocieties• Adaptive, self-organized networks, services, and ICT processes• Cross-disciplinary research on socio-economic, legal, security and humanitarian aspects ofICT2) Critical ICT technology trends that affect ICT• Digital Convergence• Universal open service platforms• Content-driven communication• On-line and mobile services• Advertisement-mediated business models• Distribution and cloud computing• green communications• smart grid communications• machine-to-machine communications• application-enabled networks3) The role of COMSOC• mediation of ICT research and technology/industry in ICT and COMSOC activities• facilitating ICT knowledge eco-system: research, innovation, technology, standardization,education, social responsibility• engagement of academic research institutions and industry in COMSOC activities• educational role• Fostering creation of ICT infrastructures for enabling open e-Science and e-Technologyenvironments• ICT “humanitarian missionary” role making ICT benefits known to society, mostly inunderdeveloped and developing countries, and facilitating the spread of ICT servicesworld-wide.As it is listed above we see that along with traditional “hard” communications related research,we see the increasing importance of “soft” communications research that ultimately should lead usto knowledge/content driven smart societies. This “soft” communications research includes scientificdisciplines of communications sociology and social sciences, human factors, cultural anthropology,law, and artificial intelligence.Recent study prepared by the GEANT 2020 Expert Group within the European Commissionemphasized a distributed research trend towards 2020, where:“ … a direct consequence of spreading knowledge and learning and a framework of OpenInnovation & Lifelong Learning through society is the growth of small research centers, includingthose in schools, museums, and small industries that all to different extent do and practice research”.In general, a distributed research environments can be implemented based on infrastructure,platform and software services, e.g. based on IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS, respectively, provided by CloudComputing. This leads to the need for fixed as well mobile high capacity broadband connectivity, andlogical connectivity at semantic level, bringing together researchers and knowledge. COMSOC mayprovide the supporting fabric for the distributed research catering the need to connect “minds”.In the technology advancement side we see that communications will be "invisible" to its users, butinstant and always on. There will be a seamless integration and operation of multiple technologies.Not only will transportation, e.g., autos on highways, be safer and have better "flow control" usingsensors and other advanced technologies, but there will also be integration into local, regional,national and global systems. Communications on airplanes, trains, ships, etc., will be ubiquitous(e.g., individuals will stay seamlessly connected no matter where they are). Consumer and industrialdevices will autonomously communicate with each other and "the cloud." Patient monitoring - andcontrol - will be an every day occurrence, reducing the cost of health care and increasing the averagelife expectancy, while being less labor intensive. We will see significant advancement of ICT inearth observation “system of systems” that play significant role in developing international globalearthquake, tsunami and other natural disaster warning systems.On another technology development area, the content-oriented communications are becoming theprevailing mode of communications, including online and mobile content, where the focus will beon semantic content. In other words, the quality of ICT will be measured not by bandwidth or lostpackets, but the success of achieving business goals.It is widely recognized that ICTs are increasingly important for economic and social development.Indeed, today the Internet is considered as a general-purpose technology and access to broadband isregarded as a basic infrastructure, in the same way as electricity and roads. In some countries, suchas Estonia, Finland and France, access to the Internet is a fundamental human right for their citizens(World Telecommunication/ ICT Development Report 2010, ITU, Geneva, Switzerland, 2010).The social networking of today (e.g., Twitter) will evolve into a "Borg-like" infrastructure. Peoplewill hardly ever speak directly to each other (e.g., voice phone calls), but rather autonomouslycommunicate via a standardized social networking interface that may be implanted at birth. Whilemaking communications "too easy" and "invisible" could be used to serve humanity, it will havesignificant potential for abuse by governments, companies and others (much like atomic energy).More controls will be needed to avoid abuse. COMSOC could play a role in defining standards forsocial networking and will need to work more closely with other IEEE entities (e.g., Society on SocialImplications of Technology) to address abuse, security and other potential issues once the "genie isout of the bottle" and we have "invisible" communications.78 79

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report5.45.55.5.1In the business side of communication services we see that two processes - fierce competitionof individual operators, vendors, application developers and service providers in convergedcommunications arena will be balanced by introduction of new innovative cost-effective and scalablemulti-party business models and eco-clusters. COMSOC should support eco-clusters in theseemerging technologies, create new TCs and initiate new standard activities addressing the need ofconverged communications.How is research going to be structured?Despite of the proliferation of micro research center, the state of the art will continue to be majorlyinfluenced by traditional research centers such as Universities and large industry research labs. Thesetraditional centers may provide new type of research services for third parties. COMSOC can play amajor rule connecting minds as well as research service providers and customers.How is industry going to innovate, follow, catch up?Industry TrendsDigital Convergence is the priming of underlying digital technology components and features suchas voice, texts, video, pictures, broadcasts, presentation, streaming media, global connectivity andpersonalized services; the combination of all of these features and abilities from multiple electronicsystems into a simplified, converged and computer-mediated communication system to enableindividuals interact, play, communicate, collaborate and share information in many new and differentways.Convergence of communication, Internet, broadcasting and entertainmentTransformation• From feature phones to smart devices• From operator centric operation to user centric operation• From data and voice services to content services• From provider-controlled content business to open-market content business• From individual company-level competition to eco-cluster-level competitionEco-Cluster-Based Digital Conversion in ICT IndustryEco-cluster –diverse groups of collaborating telecom, Internet, hardware, software, applications,content, broadcasting, entertainment, and advertisement companies that share common businessinterest for serving the living, working, educational and entertainment needs of people.Sample companies in the eco-cluster• Telecom Operators• Internet Service providers• Hardware vendors (computers, devices, networks, platforms)• Software an applications developers• Content providers• Broadcasting5.5.25.6• Music industry• Movie industry• Print Media• AdvertisersIndustry impact Factors on COMSOC MissionAddressing the Needs of Eco-Cluster Companiesa) Accommodate and provide services to the eco-cluster companiesb) How to expand the scope and operation of COMSOCc) Develop new programs, products and services targeted to eco-clustersd) COMSOC should renovate itself to conform to the new wave of communications convergenceand eco-clusteringe) Develop effective strategy for publicizing COMSOC to the converged communicationsindustry; specific focus to the new-comers in the eco-clusters (i.e. non-conventionalcommunications companies)f) Refocus of existing industry related programsAdvances in communications and information technologies will enable a tighter integration oflocal, regional and global financial, market and business transactions, thus speeding developmentof new countries on the world playing field, and improving the economic condition of those in ruralareas.COMSOC will continue to serve as a framework for interactions among professionals who areresponsible for conceiving, implementing and using the technology advances that will be essential tothe new economies. It will have increased focus on financial and government enterprises, which willbe major users of the new communications and information technologies.On economic factors, it is reasonable to consider that in addition to the traditional role that ICTplays in integration of diverse business processes. ICT pretty much redefines the business processesthemselves making them lean, less energy consuming and self-organized (adaptive). Too large extentthis will be predicated by massive use of factory built-in sensors (sensor networks).The labor market and the need for continuouseducationProfessionals will need a broad as well as deep view of the field.Deep view of fundamentals of the field will continue to be provided by Universities. The need forcommunications in other fields will be brought by industry and market which jointly with Universitiescan establish new areas of penetration for communications. This scenario brings the need for a highlydiversity offer of continuous education courses ad training which will be majorly delivered on-line.However, as history shows nothing will replace the need for face to face Education [NELSON].80 81

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 ReportBecause of these trends COMSOC needs to rethink its portfolio of services[6.1].What follows is a list of products that COMSOC should consider to offer in the next decade. Mostof them are already part of the COMSOC portfolio but the way they are created and delivered may bedifferent ten years from now.6.1ConferencesConferences will remain an important offer and source of revenues for COMSOC. The selectionof appealing locations will continue to be a major factor in attracting a large audience on site. Thetarget audience, however, should move from the one on site to the one attending from remote. Toolsto support remote participation should be sought.Some keynoters and some panels should be organized through telepresence.This should not be seen, only, as a way to attract key characters without having them to travel allthe way to the conference venue, rather as a way to delocalize the conference.6COMSOC“PRODUCTSAND SERVICES”IN 2020The profile of our potential member base will dramatically expand, as it did when web basedapplications appeared and the proliferation of new applications continues to grow. The skills needed toaddress these applications will go well beyond traditional engineering, and COMSOC will be workingwith many disciplines outside communications to build the new networks and applications. That willcreate interest in professionals who are not today within the expected profile of a communicationsengineer.▪ COMSOC will have a much larger potential member base, and there is aneed to be able to define the criteria for the member boundaries.▪ New skills will be required in order to be able to develop applications togetherwith these people and to understand the requirements that these applicationswill place on the network.▪ New technical committees will arise to define the applications and new rolesmay be required in designing, building and maintaining these new areas.A keynote for a Conference in Florence can be given from New York, another fromTokyo, a third from Seychelles. In New York the talk will be given from the Renaissanceon Times Square from one of its meeting rooms, where an attendance will be present tofollow the keynote live and the conference from remote. The one in Tokyo will be givenfrom NTT Labs and followed by a tour of some of its labs, through remote videocastand in person by the people who met at that site. It will be an opportunity for NTT toadvertise their labs and for its researchers to get in contact with a worldwide audience.Fujitsu and Hitachi will be sponsoring the telepresence mashing up on the labs visitstheir products information.The keynote from the Seychelles will be part of a parallel workshop taking place there,whose program embeds connections to follow talks given in Florence and to be furtherdiscussed in the workshop.COMSOC should put in place a telepresence system to host delocalizedconferences and organize the program around this system [6.2].COMSOC has a living roadmap of technology evolution, of applications, of markets and industry,and all conferences are tied in to the roadmap. They are the result of the expected evolution interestand result in an update of the roadmap.▪ Conferences and workshops have to provide a statement of the consensusreached through the presentations and discussion. They have to engageparticipants whose name should be attached to the results of the conference.[6.3].▪ The real driver to attend a Conference is to be an active participants and tohave one’s voice recorded in the outcome of the Conference. Attending aConference is the way to fulfill one’s agenda and pursue one’s goal. Passiveattendance can be achieved through remote participation [6.4].▪ There should be an overall view of all Conferences being planned. All together82 83

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Reportthey form the quilt of innovation. This provides a rational for selecting topicsand for harmonization of the overall calendar. It provides a clear reference tochoose to participate, to sponsor. 6.5].The delocalization of Conferences also serve the need to “co-locate” a Conference in a venue thatis technologically (or market) attractive. The Conference planning cycle is too long to achieve thisgoal, so the main Conference site, that has been decided 5 years in advance, can be supplemented by afew other locations where the real action in the technical framework of the conference is taking place,e.g. deployment of 5G networks. Researchers will have the opportunity of joining at the main venue(a nice touristic spot), or at any other locations where the real action is taking place. These are likelyto be sponsored by the industry involved in the deployment and although information will flow fromthese places to the main venue via telepresence, those attending on site will have the possibility of anhands on experience on the trials.Conferences are a place to increase one’s understanding, know how, and extend one’s relations. Allof this should be quantified and recorded in each participant profile for later use by the participant.▪ COMSOC should provide on site social networking tools to foster, and record,relationship and knowledge transfer [6.6].▪ Being a COMSOC members should make a difference. This is where socialnetworking tools can help. Only COMSOC members have a COMSOC profilethat can be automatically update with relation and information pointers forlater use. Part of these profiles are COMSOC certified and can be exchanged[6.7].Conferences are providing answers and generating new questions. The former shall be recordedand can be used in a variety of ways. The latter should be handed over to upcoming conferences foranalyses and answers.Conferences have to become part of the COMSOC roadmap, one tied to thenext generating an involvement of local and remote participants. They needto be perceived as a common work in progress where every one is expectedto contribute [6.8].Workshops are a special kind of conferences, much more focused, whose attendance (remote aswell as on site) is considered as a step forward in increasing one’s professional value. This increaseshall be certified.COMSOC Workshops should get a certification of value by some universities,so that students attending that workshop can get “grades or points” that arerecognized by their university for their curricula [6.9].important contributors to the support of COMSOC as an organization with a professional, paid,centrally-located staff function. However, the traditional, academically-focused, hotel or conferencecenter placed, face to face meeting model that COMSOC has mostly followed is being challenged bya variety of factors.Within COMSOC, the VP of Conferences has five people reporting to him/her, each responsiblefor some aspect of our conference activities. These areas are Conference Operations, ConferenceDevelopment, Conference Publications, GLOBECOM/ICC Management and Strategy (GIMS),and GLOBECOM/ICC Technical Content (GITC). We will structure this section by each of thesefunctional areas.Conference Operations:• Improved automation of processes including sponsorship, registration, etc.• Integration with IEEE Membership database and other IEEE systems, when appropriateConference Development• Virtual Conferences• Industry events• “Instant” conferencesConference Publications• More automation of manuscript handling• Rapid publication• Continued improvement of plagiarism detectionGIMSGIMS is responsible for the management of our two flagship conferences, GLOBECOM and theInternational Conference on Communications (ICC). Our goal for 2020 is for these two conferencesto remain key venues for interaction among our members, the premier destination for the disseminationof research and practice results, and a key financial contributor to COMSOC’s continued viability.Some key goals for GIMS 2020 are:1) Adding reliable additional legs of revenue such as patronage and exhibits to the currentreliance on registration fees2) Making our flagship conferences attractive venues for industry-oriented content and industryparticipants.3) Increasing the prestige and selectivity of current conferences4) Adding remote access and virtual conference technology to enable new forms of GC/ICCparticipation.5) Continuing to update and enhance the GIMS handbood and decision matrix to improveconference venue selection and day to day management6.1.1Changes required in current COMSOC Conference Approachand ManagementConferences have traditionally been one of the principal value added services that COMSOCprovides to its members. In addition, conference revenues and surpluses have been one of the mostGITC▪ Industry Content▪ Hot topic symposia84 85

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report6.2 Knowledge base6.4Tutorials, Courses, Certification6.3Although information can be expected to become even more accessible in ten years time COMSOCcan still be considered as the reference point for technical information. The 3 million technical papersthat have been downloaded through IEL in 2010, are likely to decrease as the core of technical viewersis likely to decrease worldwide but the overall number of papers can increase provided COMSOCenters into the areas of technology application.▪ COMSOC Knowledge base should expand in coverage, to include theapplication of telecommunications technologies in all market segment. [6.10].▪ Semantic tools shall be provided to let a wider constituency to access theknowledge base. This can be the actual value proposition provided byCOMSOC that differentiate COMSOC Knowledge Base from any other.COMSOC members, because of the profiling features provided along withtheir membership, can have a much more refined semantic search anddelivery of knowledge, which in turns provide appeal and stickiness [6.11].The quality of COMSOC publication is a crucial factor in ensuring the quality of the KnowledgeBase. The present impact factor of COMSOC publications (5 Journals ranking in the top 10) is atestimony to the relevance of this knowledge base although in ten years time a different metric maybe in place. The problem with the present metric is its validity within a closed group of researcherswhilst in the future there is a need to measure the impact of the know how onto the application areas.Whilst researchers consider writing papers as part of their job and curricular activity, engineers inapplication fields are not interested in writing papers, rather in presenting results.This is why it is important to bring these two constituencies together although they speak differentlanguages and communicate in different forms. COMSOC Conferences are the natural place to createthis bridge and have to “document” it populating the Knowledge Data base with this information.Lobbying ServicesVarious constituencies voice their needs and expectations to many regulatory bodies around theworld. As technology keeps progressing more and more choices become available and it gets moreand more difficult to make one’s case given that each potential approach has its own supporters.Technology knowledge half-life is today estimated in 5 years and this figureis going to approach 4 years by 2020. A significant part of today COMSOCaudience and an even greater part of 2020 audience will require access tocontinuous education.The crucial selling proposition is to tailor the education offer to the real necessity of each individual.A global organization like COMSOC can achieve a sufficient market size making it possible to createcourses and targeting them to specific needs.Although the demographics points towards a growth of professional to the expense of stableemployees it can make sense to cover both constituencies, the second by creating courses meeting theneeds of the industry, the first addressing the need of professionals.▪ An up to date portfolio of courses shall be maintained by COMSOC, notnecessarily all developed in-house. An evaluation of the potential audienceis required in selecting the courses to be offered and the means to createthem [6.13].▪ Partnership with some university may be appropriate to create and delivercourses [6.14].▪ Partnership with some Sister Societies may be useful to share courses andtransfer intellectual property. Some Sister Societies having a specific interestin education of their membership should be involved in the construction andup keeping of the courses portfolio [6.15].▪ COMSOC members should have a preferential access to courses and thepossibility to establish a life long curricula update. As continuous educationbecomes a must for some professionals COMSOC should leverage this as apoint for membership value and stickiness [6.16].▪ COMSOC should endeavor to have its certifications recognized byUniversities and Industry. This ties in with point 6.7 on COMSOC University[6.17].▪ COMSOC should develop courses targeted to specific industries or industryassociations and should require these industry to become CorporateMembers [6.18].COMSOC by managing the technology roadmaps, and substantiating themwith publications and Conferences presentation can be the place to mine formaking one’s case.COMSOC should provide yearly white papers in different areas, representingthe consensus of researchers on specific technology, that can be used offthe shelf as an objective base for lobbying [6.12].Courses and tutorials should address the variety of aspects related to communications and shoulddifferentiate from the ones being offered by Universities and education organizations by leveraging on:• The breath of COMSOC visibility provided by the continuous flow of technical paperssubmitted.• The variety of talks given at its conferences.• The number of volunteers that can provided direct practical experiences.Tutorials, associated to Conferences, can become an important education means and should beframed in an overall education program. Differently from today, tutorials should not follow a “requestfor tutorial presentation” but follow an education plan that obviously should leverage on the themesaddressed by the conference.86 87

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report6.5Tutorial attendance should be certified in the profile of the member and should become part of alifelong education program. There should be an option to take an on line exam on the tutorial topicsthus acquiring a certification of proficiency in the area.As telecommunications becomes more and more pervasive entering into a variety of sectors(embedded communications) , there will be a growing need to support education to constituencies inthese sectors, with courses tailored to their application area, speaking their lingo.▪ COMSOC should include in its education offer, in partnership with othereducation organizations, themes that provides an understanding oftelecommunications technology, systems, evolution and applications invarious sectors [6.19].▪ COMSOC can support other education and training organizations active indifferent sectors by providing specific modules in their courses. This has thebenefit of exposing COMSOC value to a broader audience [6.20].On site educationEducation can be delivered on site to both professionals and companies.▪ Chapters represent the ideal vehicle for hosting an education event targetedto professionals in a certain area and should be involved in its organization,that is:- analyzing the local needs and present an education request to COMSOC- tailoring the content and presentation to the needs of the local community- involving local leaders to generate interest and focus the content- ensuring an evaluation and a follow up [6.21].▪ COMSOC should develop a program for on site education to be providedto companies that are Corporate members. The program for these on siteeducation is discussed with the company and becomes a part of its corporatemembership.The program can be based on a mixture of on line and on site education, witha general outline like:- discussion on company needs and their fulfillment through a COMSOCled education program- overall plan, identification of recipient target, identification of coursesand delivery methods, scheduling- on site education program kick off, explaining tools, methods and firstmodule- on line courses as required- on site closure of the program, evaluation and further steps planningDLTs can become part of the On-site education program. Conferences may also flank the educationprogram with special access to trainees and focused tutorials [6.22].6.66.7An additional education initiative can be targeted to training the trainers. Thiscan be done in association with a local education organization (includinguniversities) to complement their education offer with COMSOC courses andaccess to knowledge data base [6.23].Membership QualificationCOMSOC (and IEEE) have changed over the years the criteria for membership coming to acceptas members basically anyone who pays the membership fee.This is clearly providing a potential large audience that eventually benefits the whole membership.This policy shall be pursued also beyond 2020.At the same time it would be beneficial to ensure that COMSOC membership can be valued as adistinguished achievements. This can be ensured through a ranking of membership that extends thepresent one (senior member – fellow).Members can be graded based on their technical, professional proficiency as certified by a metricsthat can take into account:• papers accepted• talks given (invited)• courses attended• initiatives led• lectures given in the COMSOC framework• relations established (weighted)An ad hoc group shall take responsibility for defining the metrics and thevertical/horizontal structure of its application [6.24].Part of the grading can be updated automatically, part will require the evaluation by a committee,upon presentation of the required proof of qualification by the member.The grading will be made public and members can use it as a reference. Also, access to COMSOCmembership by third parties can be filtered by grading.COMSOC University for Professional EngineersThe establishment of a strong education program can be leveraged to create a COMSOC Universityfor Professional Engineers.On line learning will be common by 2020 and COMSOC can exploit this in its offering. Apartnership with a few universities, strategically located in various parts of the world, can strengthenthis offer. Partner Universities can provide some on site education and certification. COMSOC cantailor some part of the education to the specific needs of professionals, also taking into account theirprofile.COMSOC should partner with a group of Universities around the world toestablish a University for professional engineers [6.25].88 89

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report6.8COMSOC University of CommunicationsEconomicsTelecommunications will become pervasive, embedded in most ambient and products. This willchange significantly the way products will evolve and their economics.Practical understanding of the impact of telecommunication embedding on the economics in manymarket sectors will be very important. Telecommunications and processing will be more and moreoverlapping within a product.▪ COMSOC should enter into this area bridging the technical aspects with theeconomic aspects [6.26].▪ COMSOC and the Computer Society needs to team up in this area to provideeducation support [6.27].▪ Given the worldwide impact of embedded communications there is a needand an opportunity to become leader in this area by establishing a Universityof Communications Economics, along the lines indicated before [6.28].6.9As noted in 6.7, education by 2020 will benefit from distributed teaching, from worldwide accessto information and services and universities will need to reinvent themselves. The time is right toenter into this area that will position COMSOC as the point of reference for advanced education,riding the wave of social networks of professionals.COMSOC MVNO7 ROADMAPThe set up of communications tools for the offering of its products can be further exploited, andconsolidated, by becoming a Virtual Operator.The global span of COMSOC (IEEE) can set the bases for establishing a worldwide Mobile VirtualNetwork operated by COMSOC.This network can provide the services required by COMSOC conferences, education programs andby its members.It should also connect all Chapters offering telepresence services around the world.A partnership with companies like CISCO and with the Computer Society may be important.This can be fostered by COMSOC although it probably needs to be implemented at IEEE level.An ad hoc group should be created to provide a first blueprint to create anIEEE operated MVNO, examining the opportunities and cost/revenues [6.29].In the previous Chapters many action items have been proposed. Clearly it would be unfeasible toimplement all of them at the same time. Besides, they have been listed in a 2020 framework and someof them would not be appropriate if implemented now.Evolution is going to be gradual, and in step with the market and culture of the overall society.Being too early may be as bad as being too late since it may mean not responding to current marketneeds.In the following we provide a roadmap for implementation; each action is tagged with a number,whose first part refers to the chapter and the second is the sequence order in that chapter. If youare reading this document in its electronic form you can move to where the action item is listed byclicking on the number.Some actions are continuous in nature, that is they need to be acted upon repeatedly. Most of themare listed under year 2012, since they need to be started as soon as possible and continue through thisdecade. They are marked with the sequence.Other actions cannot be started before a certain time but can also be initiated later. In this case thestarting date “to the market” extends over a few years and the exact date shall depend on the positionthat COMSOC leadership will deem appropriate. Implementation towards the early timeframe meansthat there is a conscious decision to anticipate (slightly) the market demand, to steer, in a way, themarket acting as leader. Implementation towards the late timeframe means a position of wait, seeand catch up. This is not necessarily bad, as long as it is the result of a planning decision. The latestsuggested timeframe is indicated by the year following the sign. As an example, if an action islisted under the 2014 year and the text closes with 2017 it means that such action is proposed to90 91

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Reportbe executed between 2014 and 2017: 2014-2017 is the “window of opportunity”, missing it wouldmean to be too late.Some actions may require negotiation with IEEE and with other IEEE Societies.The Roadmap is structured into five areas:• Membership• Services• Topics• Organization and tools• Relationship with the worldSome actions may be at the border of two or more areas and the criteria of prevalence has beenadopted to allocate the action, rather than duplicating it.As for the other parts of the report, COMSOC leadership needs to revise the roadmap at least everytwo years and make conscious decision on the action plan.Membership► COMSOC should try to reach young people at undergraduate level andmotivate them to pursue the communications field by creating properactivities such as contests, challenges etc. Chapters, acting locally, areideally positioned to involve those that are traditionally outsiders of currentactivities [3.5].► COMSOC shall endeavor to remain the point of reference to all researchersin the telecommunications field and at the same time expand its audienceto professionals in other market areas. To engage researchers COMSOCshould greatly improve its timeliness. To serve the professionals inother market areas COMSOC should contextualize telecommunicationsknowledge to their fields of interest, and learn to speak their language.Possibly, this may require to partner with other associations that are alreadyserving those professional needs [4.54].2012Services► Because of the continuously changing environment COMSOC needs torethink its portfolio of services [6.1].► An up to date portfolio of courses shall be maintained by COMSOC, notnecessarily all developed in-house. An evaluation of the potential audienceis required in selecting the courses to be offered and the means to createthem [6.13].► Education products produced by COMSOC should ride the wave ofenhanced visual display. Visual and Interactivity are the characteristics ofany future education program [4.41].Topics► COMSOC can stimulate confrontation on energy consumption intelecommunications infrastructures and connected devices [3.7].► The need to focus and differentiate cannot be achieved by limiting thetechnical horizons and fields of applications.Technology has to remain atthe core of COMSOC but it has to be flanked by cultural, economical andsocial aspects [2.5].► Terminals, their evolution and their capability have to be at the core of theCOMSOC business and all involved in terminals design are part of theCOMSOC audience [4.43].► COMSOC will have to continue to be active in the Internet of Things [4.49].► COMSOC can promote conferences and sharing of experiences on smart cities,transportation and other areas where the application of telecommunicationsservices may decrease energy consumption 2014 [3.8].► Data storage architectures, like Cloud Storage, have to be addressed 2014 [4.30].► Research and technology evolution for skin and low consumption devicecommunications will be a major research theme (BAN – Body Area92 93

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report2012Networks). A close cooperation with biochemists, physiologists, medicaldoctors, smart fabric and electronic engineers is essential 2015 [4.5].► COMSOC needs to support the networks of networks characterizing SmartBuildings and their associated constituencies, from civil engineers, toinstallers, to consumer electronics 2015 [4.18].► COMSOC needs to be part of the evolution of Smart Cities, setting upspecific conferences, attracting a new audience, becoming part of the“conceptual design”. This makes sense since telecommunications andlocal area communications is the first enabler 2015 [4.22].► The Smart City requires an “Engineer Vision” as an enabler. This visionneeds to be made viable through Social and Economical considerationsbut since technology provides the only solid stepping stone COMSOC canbe the ideal reference point 2015 [4.23].► Data are an integral part of communications and COMSOC will have toconsider the evolution of data creation as a core business 2015 [4.26].► Data Centric Networks will be an important area for COMSOC 2015[4.28].► Sensors networks cannot be considered separating the aspects ofcommunications from the ones of processing. A unified view is required 2015 [4.35].► The cloud is going to be distributed over the network, over the edgenetworks, over the terminals (in many cases indistinguishable from edgenetworks) and over objects. Its processing is coupled with its inner andexternal communications capabilities (especially when latency is an issue)and shall be an important area in COMSOC 2015 [4.36].► Themes related to availability of storage, accessibility, security will play amajor role in telecommunications and shall be addressed by COMSOC 2017 [4.29].Organization and Tools► COMSOC needs to develop mechanisms of clustering around hot topicsin a fast, dynamic, way and be as quick in closing the topic once it is nolonger a hot one [2.1].► COMSOC will have to adopt Social Network Tools to facilitate its members’interaction but should not use these tools as a surrogate for being anAssociation. The focus must be on the latter, with the former being a partialenabler for some of the Association activities [2.14].► Tools are important and should not be underestimated by COMSOC,since the facility of interaction can well lead to the formation of alternativecommunities outside of the COMSOC space [2.15].20122013a reconsideration of COMSOC boundaries, possibly the merging with otherassociation or, more likely, the establishment of strong, although casespecific links, with other associations [2.3].► By partnering with civil engineering associations COMSOC may providevalue to Telecom Operators, fostering the penetration of telecommunicationsin several sectors [2.25].► Partnership with some university may be appropriate to create and delivercourses [6.14].► Partnership with some Sister Societies may be useful to share coursesand transfer intellectual property. Some Sister Societies having a specificinterest in education of their membership should be involved in theconstruction and up keeping of the courses portfolio [6.15].► It is suggested to share and debate this document and its periodic revisionswith other associations, possibly within a special session in some of ourflagship conferences in a roundtable, specifically involving the IEEEComputer Society, the IEEE Consumer Electronics Society, the IEEEVehicular Technology Society, and the IEEE Society on Social Implicationof Technology. Sisters and Related Societies should also be involved 2013 [2.4].Membership► South East Asia, Latin America and Central South Africa are surely importantin terms of population and some may become important in terms of industry.Due to the difficulty in forecasting COMSOC may adopt a tactical stance,monitoring the evolution and entering with specific initiatives, possiblythrough local societies, as the situation may suggest [3.19].► COMSOC should cater both to the needs of communications specialistsand to the ones of professionals that need an understanding oftelecommunications as an ancillary knowledge to their profession [4.53].► COMSOC has to consider Embedded Communications providers as a newaudience in terms of needs and create specific services for them 2015[4.57].► With the Internet with Things COMSOC expands significantly its potentialaudience, since it can involve engineers (and designers, marketers…)working in a variety of industries. 2016 [4.50].Relationship with the world► It is important that COMSOC endeavors in creating a social awareness ofthe relevance of the communications field; activities should be built so thathuman society recognizes the value of the field of communications [3.4].► COMSOC needs to increase its “technology span” but this can only bedone in close cooperation with other associations and groups and requiresServices► COMSOC can be ideally positioned to sustain the retraining of TelecomOperator personnel and the training of personnel in other sectors. [2.26].► COMSOC has the opportunity of caring to the interest of elderly engineersand leverage on their “voluntarism” to make a dent into the aging crises [3.11].94 95

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report► Conferences and workshops have to provide a statement of the consensusreached through the presentations and discussion. They have to engageparticipants whose name should be attached to the results of the conference 2014 [6.3].► On line learning and certification will be widely adopted and accepted.This can present a tremendous opportunities to association focusingon education and innovation. Specifically, this is a great opportunity forCOMSOC 2015 [2.24].► COMSOC should address the specific needs of the Innovation Centers ofTelecom Operators that will replace the research centers they have today.This actually creates a clearer separation of interests between the academia(addressing basic research), industry (addressing industrial -process/product research) and Telecom Operators (addressing innovation, that isthe implication of evolution on their turf) 2015 [2.27].► The real driver to attend a Conference is to be an active participants andto have one’s voice recorded in the outcome of the Conference. Attendinga Conference is the way to fulfill one’s agenda and pursue one’s goal.Passive attendance can be achieved through remote participation 2015[6.4].► Conferences have to become part of the COMSOC roadmap, one tied tothe next generating an involvement of local and remote participants. Theyneed to be perceived as a common work in progress where every one isexpected to contribute 2015 [6.8].► COMSOC should promote low cost educational events to large mass ofpeople using local experts 2015 [3.16].► COMSOC should promote events to boost innovation among peoplesuch as contest, awards etc. To advance the state of the art COMSOCshould promote events to foster digital inclusion and decrease social andtechnological imbalance, especially in developing countries. This canbe achieved by making local members aware that they should use theirknowledge to solve local economical, social and educational problems 2015 [3.17].2013 2013Topics► COMSOC needs to pay attention to the number of multi-disciplinary areasin which telecommunications has a role and include them in its technicalscope [4.3].► COMSOC should provide yearly white papers in different areas, representingthe consensus of researchers on specific technology, that can be used offthe shelf as an objective base for lobbying 2014 [6.12].► COMSOC should include in its flagship Conferences a track onTelecommunications applied to agriculture. There are already someConferences looking at telecommunications in developing Countries butthe emphases is most on the deployment of Infrastructures. What is alsoneeded is a focus on the application side 2015 [3.9].► COMSOC should look at the manufacturing industry evolution, with all itsaspects of robotization, outsourcing, off shoring... and the many relationsexisting with telecommunications infrastructures 2015 [3.18].► COMSOC will have to balance specialization and in depth analyses withoverall coverage. This latter is technology non-specific and applicationdomain specific and contrasts with the present COMSOC that by large istechnology specific and domain non-specific 2015 [4.1].► Data Processing and communications impact architectures and COMSOCshould be involved in this 2015 [4.33].► The evolution of display technologies will impact the demand of bandwidthand will steer towards new communications architectures. This will haveto be considered by COMSOC. Many display producers will embedcommunications capability in their products hence becoming a potentialaudience for COMSOC (it has already started) 2015 [4.40].► The interface aspects are becoming very important as objects becomeconnected and hence can provide a wider variety of functions. COMSOCshall support this area as well 2015 [4.48].► Data networks will become very important to face the huge amount of datapresent in a myriad of data centers, from behemoth Data Centers to homesized Data Centers 2016 [4.11].► A crucial aspect in future manufacturing will be the robotization of plants.Foxconn has already announced a plan to deploy 1 million robots in itsplants by 2014. These will be autonomous systems and will be based onautonomic communications. COMSOC has to take the lead in this area 2016 [4.13].► COMSOC needs to enter the area of data mining, analyses, managementat the different levels entailed by an aggregation provided by a smartbuilding. There may be a specific Technical Committee dedicated to thisarea 2016 [4.19].► The Data Management is an important part of the future business andsome Telecom Operators will be involved in that. Beyond regulatory aspectsthere are many technological aspects that COMSOC can support throughits technical groups 2016 [4.37].► The embedding of communications in products opens up a large audienceto COMSOC. This requires much more attention to vertical markets and tothe engineering of the “embedding” 2016 [4.47].► COMSOC shall include human embedded communications among theones it is addressing 2017 [4.51].Organization and Tools► Chapters are going to play a major role in distributed gatherings, mediatedby COMSOC infrastructure [2.21].► COMSOC should consider a revisitation of its Technical Committees,clearly identifying those that are looking at basic telecom/computationcomponents and those that leverage on those components (applicationsareas). They will probably appeal to different constituencies and may berun in different ways. TCs shall become attraction points generating interestand membership growth, can be sponsored directly by industry [4.4].► Set up an ad hoc group shall take responsibility for defining the metrics and96 97

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report2013the vertical/horizontal structure for grading members 2013 [6.24].► COMSOC needs to capture the shifting interest at the individual level. Thisrequires tools to seamlessly update a database of interest that can be minedto finely tune offers to the individual and to the community 2015 [2.2].► COMSOC should provide on site social networking tools to foster, andrecord, relationship and knowledge transfer 2015 [6.6].► Being a COMSOC members should make a difference. This is where socialnetworking tools can help. Only COMSOC members have a COMSOCprofile that can be automatically update with relation and informationpointers for later use. Part of these profiles are COMSOC certified and canbe exchanged 2015 [6.7].► COMSOC should make use of existing tools with minimal customization.The profile of its members can be automatically updated, based on optin, and support search. Each member owns her data and should have fullcontrol on it. At the same time COMSOC should provide certified information,whose disclosure is controlled by the member (e.g. on COMSOC issuedcertification, papers accepted, conferences attended, volunteer activities…) 2015 [2.17].► COMSOC should have Social Networking tools integrated in its participationprocesses. Setting up tools, independently of them is completely useless,as it is seen today by the injection of tools that are seldom used and just bya minority of members 2015 [2.16].► COMSOC needs to take an ecosystem view in the area of smart spaces,including the areas of regulation, perception, economics, conflict of interest 2015 [4.17].► COMSOC should insert in its goals the provisioning of a neutral, peerreviewed yearly document on technology evolution and its implications andhave a Director responsible for this goal and for positioning COMSOC asthe ICT reference on technology in the Society 2016 [2.30].► COMSOC should put in place a telepresence system to host delocalizedconferences and organize the program around this system 2016 [6.2].Relationship with the World► COMSOC should participate as an independent organization to theScience, Technology and Society Forum(s), bringing any year an updatedview on technology and its application [2.31].► COMSOC can promote dissemination of knowledge on applied sensorsnetworks, bio-engineering and genomics for those parts related tocommunications [3.12].► COMSOC, as an association of engineers has both the know how ontechnology (and its evolution) and on the challenges of its application. Itcan provide a neutral but invaluable support to regulators and governmentinstitutions 2015 [2.28].► COMSOC as a global society based on factual data, peer reviewed, hasthe opportunity and obligation to face concerns and explain the factualaspects. It is not expected to take a stance but to report in an understandablelanguage technical facts. It shall not remain a circle of people talking to20132014themselves but should rise to the challenge of talking to the Society andto the World. This is possibly one of the best ways to make the COMSOCname recognized outside the engineering community and indirectly tostimulate the engineering community to be part of it 2015 [3.3].Membership► COMSOC needs to become “the network” delivering the information. Inorder to do that it has to be aware of each individual member history,interest, motivation, skill. This will be the main reason for choosing “the”COMSOC networks versus other networks 2015 [2.10].► Crises focus the public opinion and have a great influence on the younggeneration in choosing their education path. Emphasizing the role oftelecommunications in these crises can foster telecommunicationsevolutions and bring new, young, blood to the field. Additionally, puttingthe emphases on telecommunications means to provide a constructiveperspective to the crises showing that there are ways to tackle or at leastmitigate their impact 2015 [3.2].► COMSOC will need to impose a membership fee even as it moves to anon line only community. This has to be seen in the context of a possiblenew IEEE paradigm to include a Society membership as part of the IEEEmembership dues 2016 [2.6].► COMSOC needs to move into the Web 3.0 space, steadily building thespecific understanding of its (individual) membership. This will resultin higher value perception by its (individual) constituency, increasedstickiness, and also will deliver increased value to third parties needing toidentify information targets 2016 [2.11].► COMSOC should leverage on the on line easiness to rank membershipto exploit it to the benefit of the members and of COMSOC. The presentgrading, member, senior member and fellow, can be articulated much moreand can be segmented. COMSOC can apply criteria similar to the onesused in the grading of papers to the fair grading of members. In turns, thegrading can be exploited by the member as a form of certification. Thisties in with the increasing mobility of workers (in particular fostered bydelocalization and remote working), the continuous professional education,the need to harvest experience by constituencies that are far away fromtelecommunications and Information Technology in general 2016 [2.13].► COMSOC should promote programs to eliminate the economical exclusionof low income members such as those in Latin America and Africa. The lowmembership uptake in this region is also due to this lower income 2017 [3.20].Topics► Manufacturing is a relevant area for telecommunications, and this requiresa cross fertilization of knowledge in which COMSOC can play an importantrole 2016 [4.12].98 99

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report► COMSOC needs to expand its coverage to include the new areas thatare being addressed by new Telecom Operators and the manufacturersproviding the supporting equipment 2016 [4.56].► A novel branch of communications will address sensors and new demandfor standards, protocols and signal processing will arise 2017 [ 4.9].► The communications fabric and the data management provide thecommon ground for all constituencies involved. COMSOC can promote theestablishment of a common knowledge in the area of Smart Buildings andprepare courses on this common fabric 2017 [4.20].► In the area of viral networks COMSOC needs to address differentconstituencies and to talk to them in terms of application domain rather thantechnology domain. Terminals are crucial in this area. A different approachto standardization may be required 2017 [4.24].► A significant increase in potential COMSOC audience derives from theimplementation of the Information Society. COMSOC should become amain player in this area 2018 [4.60].► There are significant social issues to be considered. Technology is butan enabler and its application goes beyond the technical feasibility. Thisrequires COMSOC to adopt a more comprehensive approach and vision 2018 [4.63].► The processing at the network edges displaces the intelligence and affectsthe current network architecture. It can result, as some are claiming, in atransparent network or in a diffused network control. This latter may be the caseonce we consider the network as spanning beyond the present boundaries toinclude the networks at the edges. The problem in this expansion, of course, isthe ownership domain that does not span across these networks. COMSOCshould talk to all these constituencies 2019 [4.34].2014 2014Services► COMSOC should develop courses targeted to specific industries or industryassociations and should require these industry to become CorporateMembers [6.18].► Associations will take up a crucial role in supporting the educationmarketing and insurance of freelance. COMSOC should move quickly intothis area and become the association supporting this new generation ofprofessionals 2015 [2.35].► COMSOC members should have a preferential access to courses and thepossibility to establish a life long curricula update. As continuous educationbecomes a must for some professionals COMSOC should leverage this asa point for membership value and stickiness 2016 [6.16].► COMSOC Workshops should get a certification of value by some universities,so that students attending that workshop can get “grades or points” that arerecognized by their university for their curricula 2016 [6.9].► COMSOC should provide a yearly report targeted to policy makers withan education portfolio to explain technology impact. It is not a COMSOCobjective to take position on what should or should not be done but toclarify technology potential and implications 2016 [2.33].► COMSOC may need to think more seriously about publication in Chinese.It will also need to consider having an increasing number of non-NorthAmericans and of women in its leadership structure 2016 [5.3].Organization and Tools► There should be an overall view of all Conferences being planned. Alltogether they form the quilt of innovation. This provides a rational forselecting topics and for harmonization of the overall calendar. It provides aclear reference to choose to participate, to sponsor 2015 [6.5].► COMSOC should benefit from the closer relationship among Eduction,Research and Business by leveraging its mixed constituency 2015 [2.22].► COMSOC is not ready today to serve as an independent trusted referencepoint on technology and its implication, although it gathers a multitudeof contributions, through papers and conferences. There is a need for astructured approach to technology implication 2015 [2.29].► Terminals based networking is a new area that can be specifically addressedby a COMSOC Technical Committee 2015 [4.45].► A restructuring of TCs may be instrumental in serving the variety ofconstituencies and what is known as the convergent communicationsindustry 2016 [4.55].► There are a lot of trials and experimentation based lessons that will needto be captured and shared. This may require a different sort of repositoryfrom the one existing today, based on papers production 2018 [4.62].Relationship with the World► COMSOC may need to specialize part of its offer to specific world audiences.What may fit the US audience is unlikely to fit a Chinese one. >>> [3.15].► COMSOC should establish formal relations, in addition to the present ones,with ITU and other international organizations, claiming the role of neutralagency for technology monitoring 2015 [2.32].► COMSOC can help in facilitating the exchange of information in the areaof climate change and promote the adoption of sensors by creating anunderstanding on their role 2015 [3.10].► Telecommunications can provide significant help in decreasing the impactof the crises and in helping in their solution. In turns, looming crises maystimulate evolution in telecommunications technology and market 2017[3.1].► COMSOC has the opportunity to become a leader in countries like Chinaand India that will be at the economic forefront in the next decade 2017[3.14].► The type of skill involved in the overall Information Society is very large andmay be better tackled through partnership with other Societies 2018[4.61].Membership► COMSOC can and should become the organization policy maker will turnto, to understand technology evolution and its implication 2018 [2.34].100 101

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report2015Topics► COMSOC needs to address behavior of complex systems 2017 [4.15].► Data Centric Network is a most crucial area for COMSOC to be in and toattract an audience 2017 [4.58].► Usage of body (including DNA) characteristics for secure identification incommunications services. 2018 [4.7].► COMSOC needs to address emerging behavior theory, semanticsinterpretation of data for context creation, mixing data and communications 2018 [4.16].► Processing and abstraction are needed to solve the problem of insufficientstorage and consumption capacity. This will create a host of functionalitiesto digest data that will shift the value perception of the end user. COMSOCwill need to ride the wave as the basic value of information collapse 2018 [4.27].► Alternative Data communications technologies will become “locally”important and a presence of COMSOC in these areas can greatly benefitan expanded membership 2018 [4.31].► Data encapsulation in services creates different paradigms for their transport(Web 3.0 and beyond). It is an area overlapping with the Computer Societythat can be either seen as transparent to communications “dumb pipes”or central to communications since the communications aspects are anintegral part of the data encapsulation characteristics. COMSOC shouldwork for and support this latter 2018 [4.32].► The dominance of data can shift the audience interest towards data anddata centric networks further contributing to fade the boundaries betweenCOMSOC and the Computer Society. It does not diminishes the importanceof networks and related technical issues but makes these servant of theothers 2019 [4.25].► Today COMSOC is only marginally involved in CE, Consumer Electronics;by 2020 CE has to be an integral part of COMSOC 2019 [4.44].2015to have all BoG and Officers meetings taking place on line. Travel andphysical meetings shall be reserved to external interactions when being“face to face” is considered a token of consideration 2016 [2.9].► Some graphic representations of the levels of interactions within COMSOCmembers, including interactions with information may be desirable. Someinteresting fall out on semantics can provide value to our constituency 2016 [2.7].► It may be very difficult for COMSOC to reposition itself to attract a completelynew audience provided by Telecom outsider. It may also be pointless, giventhe small number of their constituency. Their evolution, however, has to beclosely monitored since this will be a hot topic for the present COMSOCaudience and the extended one described in this document 2017 [4.64].► COMSOC Knowledge base should expand in coverage, to include theapplication of telecommunications technologies in all market segment 2018 [6.10].► COMSOC should develop, directly or through partnership, cognitivesupporting tools and integrate these into its membership offer 2018 [2.12].Relationship with the World► COMSOC will need to become the recognized authority for a number oftechnical information and will need to establish relations with other entitiesthat are in charge of different sets of information related to the ones certifiedby COMSOC 2017 [2.18].► COMSOC should endeavor to have its certifications recognized byUniversities and Industry 2017 [6.17].► Data Centric Networks are at the boundary between the Computer Societyand COMSOC. The present technology domain of COMSOC is notable to tackle this area, neither is the one of the Computer Society. Thereason is that there is a lot of information technology as well as a lot oftelecommunications technology 2017 [4.59].Services► The accessibility gap facing small and medium enterprises to leverageworldwide centers of excellence can be filled by COMSOC that can makespike of excellence available to professionals in small medium enterprises 2017 [2.23].► COMSOC will need to promote the training of new professionals to act asagent of multidisciplinary field 2018 [4.2].Organization and Tools► IEEE COMSOC needs to think how to make its content available, and themodel of ownership and protection. 2016 [5.1].► The BoG and Officers meetings progressively shall be moved on line (atleast one of them per year). The tools supporting on line meetings shouldsupport open participation of a wider constituency, with the possibility ofholding private sessions when appropriate. Beyond 2020 we can expect2016Services► COMSOC shall ensure that each of its members can understand theimplications of all the areas that are being addressed within COMSOC.This provides value to the individual since through COMSOC he willalways be able to understand the global picture; at the same time he hasthe possibility of bringing issues from his own specific domain to the levelwhere they can reach a large constituency. The semantics aspect is crucialin this information bridging 2017 [2.19].► Additional education initiatives can be targeted to training the trainers. Thiscan be done in association with a local education organization (includinguniversities) to complement their education offer with COMSOC coursesand access to knowledge data base 2017 [6.23].102 103

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report2016► COMSOC should develop a program for on site education to be providedto companies that are Corporate members. The program for these onsite education is discussed with the company and becomes a part of itscorporate membership.The program can be based on a mixture of on lineand on site education 2018 [6.22].Organization and Tools► Semantic tools shall be provided to let a wider constituency to access theknowledge base. This can be the actual value proposition provided byCOMSOC that differentiate COMSOC Knowledge Base from any other.COMSOC members, because of the profiling features provided along withtheir membership, can have a much more refined semantic search anddelivery of knowledge, which in turns provide appeal and stickiness 2018 [6.11].► The spirit of Open Innovation and collaborative working can be a strongopportunity to COMSOC to act as an intermediary for knowledge andinnovation 2019 [2.22].► Chapters represent the ideal vehicle for hosting an education event targetedto professionals in a certain area and should be involved in its organization 2019 [6.21].► COMSOC may provide the supporting fabric for the distributed researchcatering the need to connect “minds” 2019 [5.4].2017Services► COMSOC shall be a leader in the fading boundaries of physical and virtualgathering 2018 [2.20].► Top Notch Education applied to a huge mass of individuals is the singlemost important factor in the transformation of a Country to leverage theInformation Society. COMSOC can contribute in this area by helping bridgethrough it network world areas 2019 [3.13].► Construction of metadata can provide an intelligent layer to datacommunication, leading to new “intelligent network architectures” abovethe signaling layer 2019 [4.39].Organization and Tools► COMSOC organization shall ensure effective participation of allconstituencies, independently of their geographical location. MovingCOMSOC operation to the cyberspace is an enabling factor to this transition 2018 [5.5].► COMSOC needs to prepare to become an on line Association, that candeliver also some real world services. These flanks the mainstream on lineservices 2020[2.8].Relationship with the World► Having visual and interactive displays all around creates a different sort ofenvironment, COMSOC should partner with the IEEE Society on the Socialimplication of Technology to investigate this area 2019 [4.42].► Independently of the drift of terminals, their evolution is going to fall underthe interest of at least three Societies: Communications, Computer andConsumer Electronics. COMSOC should work with the other Societies inthis area that is strategic for its implications on the network architectures,for the involvement of manufacturers and for capturing the attention ofwider audiences 2019 [4.46].► Partnership with medical and biology Societies may become important in thenext decade. Ethical issues may be better considered jointly 2019 [4.52].2018Topics► Application of the understanding of neuron networks to communicationsnetworks: actually neuron networks are considered to be the mosteffective structural basis for coexistence of informational processing (bothsegregation and integration) and communications. Analogies betweenneuron networks and future communications networks will allow applyingsome principles behind brain functioning for development, managementand control of said networks 2020 [4.6].► The variety of interconnections, many dynamically continuously changingand autonomics, will bring to the fore the study of complex systems and willconnect to biological study of nervous system 2020 [4.10].2017Topics► The new area of micro-communications may become important forCOMSOC to promote and follow 2019 [4.8].► The availability of contextual, emotional, expectational data can drivenew ways to control communications flow and the networks may needto negotiate with those capturing the semantics of communication. It is acompletely new space that COMSOC needs to consider 2019 [4.38].Services► COMSOC should enter into the area of professional high education bridgingthe technical aspects with the economic aspects 2020 [6.26].► Given the worldwide impact of embedded communications there is aneed and an opportunity to become leader in this area by establishing aUniversity of Communications Economics 2020[6.28].Relationship with the World► COMSOC should partner with a group of Universities around the world toestablish a University for professional engineers 2020 [6.25].104 105

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report2018► COMSOC and the Computer Society needs to team up in the area ofprofessional high education 2020 [6.27].2019Topics► As in McLuhan “the medium is the message” with smart materials “thesmart material is the communications infrastructure” and this creates a newperspective for COMSOC 2020 [4.14].Organization and Tools► An ad hoc group should be created to provide a first blueprint to create anIEEE operated MVNO, examining the opportunities and cost/revenues 2020 [6.29].ANNEX2020Organization and Tools► COMSOC will have a much greater percentage of members - and leadership- from colleagues in China, Korea, Japan and other Asian-Pacific countries.Will a shift of its headquarters from New York to Beijing, along with IEEE,leaving a satellite office in New York City with a skeleton staff (maybe only1 or 2 people) make sense? [5.2].ACommunications Society SWOTThe challenges faced by COMSOC to maintain and strengthen its leadership through this decadeand in the following one are significant as are some of the actions proposed.In this annex we list what we feel are its strengths and weaknesses along with opportunities andthreats.What follows is provided as “bread for thoughts”, it is not the result of a unanimous consensus. Ithas been used as a reference in drafting the actions proposed in this document that result from:• the perceived threats,• the possibility to leverage on what are considering as COMSOC strength and contextopportunities• the addressing of today’s weaknesses.Strengths• With a membership of over 40,000 global individuals, COMSOC is the secondlargest IEEE society. Strong volunteer commitments, a dedicated staff, andexpert operational support have secured COMSOC’s global reputation ofexcellence as an organization. Excellent reputation for conferences andpublications in the scholarly arena.• COMSOC excels at producing SciTech publications, organizing technicalconferences, as well as fostering educational programs.106 107

COMSOC 2020 ReportCOMSOC 2020 Report• Viewed as a US-based organization outside the United States, it works toCOMSOC’s advantage that English is the predominant language used inadvanced SciTech publishing.• It has a global presence.• The technical peer review process where information is vetted prior topublication is a major strength; especially in this new “open access” arena.• The IEEE brand is recognized around the world as a symbol of excellence.• An Industry Advisory Board assists volunteers and staff in the developmentof products and services for the WCET certification program.• Companies use COMSOC publications as a way to sell their own productsand services through advertisements in print and online media.• Research, patent citations, communications related standards and olderpractice-oriented technical papers are other ways industry works directlywith COMSOC.Weaknesses• Historically, IEEE and COMSOC have not been viewed as agile or flexible.The multiple layers of management and resulting bureaucracies result in oneof COMSOC’s hardest to resolve weaknesses. Additionally, while COMSOCexcels in producing scholarly publications, the negative stereotypes thatfollow are hard to change for those not invested in the scholarly publicationsprocess. In general, COMSOC’s reputation beyond standards, publicationsand conferences is marginal.• Many competing industry organizations are attempting to fill some ofCOMSOC’s roles at trade shows, within trade publications, as well as withinthe realm of certification and professional development.• Presently, COMSOC has a low profile -- not a factor -- in the business end ofindustry.• Through the WCET certification program some positive industry professionaldevelopment reputation may be gained in the years to come.• COMSOC’s lack of expertise in areas of experimentation and new productdevelopment coupled with overextended staff / resources, and volunteertime pressure is possibly the most difficult weakness to overcome.• There are weaknesses in single sales support, warehousing, computing/computer report support and interoffice bureaucratic processes. Most IEEEsupport is excellent.• First year members retention is not as high as desired.• Declining US industry members.• Although COMSOC builds new and maintains existing relationships withindustry so far it has had limited value to industry that usually turns to otherfora. This is also a consequence of being a person oriented organization.• Some perceives its scope as too narrow.Opportunities• Increasing Industry patronage is a huge opportunity for COMSOC.• New partnerships with organizations and companies can help enhanceCOMSOC’s position as the “go-to” resource for the communications industry;increasing revenue and relevance of its products and services.• Create new publications &/or conferences in communications areas (suchas public service communications, Internet services, security, satellite,consumer, NGN, etc.) not currently covered is an area for future development.E-book collections. New member benefits designed for first year members.• New services geared to industry such as new educational offerings, EMSservice, real-time conference streaming, customized multi-day training,online sponsorships, problem solving events, executive roundtables, ordigital delivery of additional information are also among the opportunities tobe explored in the future.• Integrating new technology for a global marketplace: virtual meetings; realtimeaccess to conference sessions/keynotes/tutorials, ieee.tv• Increased collaboration with IEEE Operations Center departments and otherIEEE Societies• New Asian technology/education centers may lead to potential membershipgrowth and activities• Social media opportunities• Attracting non-US industry members• Recruiting non-member authors and attendees at conferences.Threats• Budget cuts due to an economy in a recession / depression hurt COMSOCbusinesses. Specifically, we may see additional declines in advertisingrevenues, subscription sales, and conference participation.• Severe subscription erosion and electronic migration to open access venues• Social media superseding traditional association communities.• Unintended consequences of Disruptive technologies108 109

COMSOC 2020 ReportBList of committee membersChair:Roberto SaraccoMembers:Vijay BhargavaVincent ChanCelia DesmondRob FishNelson FonsecaAlex GelmanShri GoyalGabe JakobsonRussell HsingMark KarolStan MoyerZhisheng NiuVince PoorParag PruthiSara Kate WilsonDoug ZuckermanSignificant contribution to this report was provided by John Pape, COMSOC, whose support isgratefully acknowledged.CList of organizations involvedAt various stages, the document was discussed with a number of people and their contributionin terms of comments and vision is acknowledged here. Although we list them in connection withthe organization they belong, their contribution was given on a personal bases. Nevertheless, beingkey people in their respective organizations their views reflect to a certain extent the views of theirorganizations.Cambridge University (Dirk Trossen)Ericsson (Ezio Zerbini)Euroscience (Peter Tindemans)FCCN (Pedro Vega)IEEE (Matthew S. Loeb)IEEE Region 8 (Jean Gabriel Remy)MIT Telecommunications Dept. (David Clark)National Technical University of Athens (Vasili Maglaris)Technische Universität Munchen (Arndt Bode)Telecom Italia Future Centre (Antonio Manzalini, Roberto Minerva, Corrado Moiso)University of Copenhagen (Dorte Olesen)University of Lisbon (Pedro Vega)University of Ljubliana (Ziga Turk)110