Day by day, our lives become more digital. We use digital
technology in everything from cooking to
communications. As the world moves towards smart cities and the internet of things, demand for digital technology is increasing. More companies are bracing themselves for this opportunity and the future will see more collaborations and licensing of technology by various players in the ecosystem.
communications. As the world moves towards smart cities and the internet of things, demand for digital technology is increasing. More companies are bracing themselves for this opportunity and the future will see more collaborations and licensing of technology by various players in the ecosystem.
There
are, however, restrictions imposed by the US government that will bring
change to the supply chain for technology products. Under the
restrictions the focus is more on semi-conductor and software business.
They
essentially restrict US companies and its affiliates anywhere in the
world— especially in EU, UK, Korea, Japan — from easily re-supplying
some entities with products and software that has any US components.
This decision has a wide reaching impact on products that are in
development or even those that are already in the hands of consumers.
The
debate however is whether the restrictions are entirely due to security
reasons. An argument put forth is that vulnerability argument fades
when juxtaposed with the race for technological advancements where it
could be perceived that the restrictions seem geared instead at slowing
down the pace of technological development by countries or companies
seen as competitors. Some of these companies have proven track records
from operating in over 170 countries for over 30 years. The restrictions
seem to target the current global leader in telecommunications
infrastructure such as 5G and is now poised to become a leader in other
emerging technologies such as cloud and AI. The decision will have
adverse impacts on the technology supply chain.
Within
the next five years, 5G global territory and application dominance will
be determined. The question is whether, within this window, the United
States and its allies can mount sufficient competition to Huawei to
retain and capture enough market share to sustain the kind of long-term
and robust competitive position necessary to avoid surrendering
dominance to China.
The action taken is a departure from the best practice,
pioneered by the creators of the Internet ecosystem which by design
sought to develop an open ecosystem based around common standards. The
earlier approach would enable anyone to join the ecosystem and interact
with other parts of the ecosystem. Many African countries like Ethiopia,
Kenya and Rwanda are working towards being technology manufacturing
powerhouses. They would benefit greatly from technology sharing and the
promise which tremendous growth in the technology sector offers in those
countries especially job creation. The current restrictions will
definitely have an impact on the partnerships that they would need to
get into to facilitate their dive into technology production.
An
attempt to control who can use what technology and who can work with
which partners, instead of leaving it to the forces of supply and
demand, goes against the principles of an open ecosystem and is likely
to slow down the whole innovation ecosystem. Many other companies are
wondering if in the future they might also be affected by similar
regulations, and thus they are planning to avoid US suppliers, instead
favouring European or Asian ones.
If anything it will
lead up to the splitting of the innovation space where two or more
centers of innovations emerge with independent products that have no
intention of inter-operating with each other.
The
result is that the consumer will suffer, because their ability to
switch, mix and match products from different suppliers will disappear,
while the cost of being forced to choose and stick to one line of
products will also increase – given the monopolistic realities that will
emerge.
If
products cannot talk to each other easily, or if they end up using
different standards, or if supply chains get fractured, and there is no
trust left in the ecosystem, it will also make the internet less secure.
It
is important to ensure that trade barriers do not hamper the
advancements in technology. No country or entity has a monopoly in
knowhow and it is imperative to ensure continued collaboration for the
sake of development especially in these uncertain times where we are
plagued by the Covid-19 pandemic.
One thing this
pandemic period has proven to us is that more than ever we shall
continue to be dependent on technology for the development of what will
be the new normal. We are now working from home, trying to educate our
children from home, using internet-based solutions for our transport and
shopping. Our need for improved technology has increased exponentially
throughout the globe in the past few months since the pandemic struck.
This
is the wrong time to be creating barriers to technological development
especially where technological interdependence has previously played a
critical role in technological advancements.
We
urgently need to lower costs and to accelerate technology deployment in
Africa. We need to be able to choose whichever technologies and
companies we like to buy from or to sell to.
No comments:
Post a Comment