22 - 28 February 2001

Local executives for GSM congress

by a staff reporter

Andreas W. Gerdes, CEO and founder of iWORLD Group, and Malcolm H Ross, chief of iWORLD Group’s iDeasTank, have both been invited to participate in the 3GSM World Congress being held this week in Cannes. Hyped as the world’s GSM meeting place, the 3GSM World Congress has attrac-ted over 22,000 delegates from the world of international mobile
telephony.
Among the many other speakers contributing to this event are Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Group; Jim Healy, chairman of the GSM Association; Dr Keiji Tachikawa, president & CEO of NTT DoCoMo; and Hans Snook, CEO of Orange.
GSM Standard has been adopted by 150 countries and has won over more than 55 per cent of the total world cellular market. Bringing together leaders and professionals from the telecoms and IT industries around the globe, the GSM World Congress promises to provide the GSM community with an annual industry meeting place. Last year, the 2000 GSM Congress attracted some 6,500 senior level delegates and 15,500 attendees from 114 countries.
This year’s event, with contributions from 150 international speakers, comprises four information- packed streams (Driving Market Acceptance, Strategic Technology, The New Economics and The User Experience) as well as three plenary sessions (Redefining the GSM Business, Making the Internet Mobile and Enhancing the User Experience).
The Congress organisers have also designed a set of three separate technical sessions, respectively entitled Next Generation Networks, Terminals Development, and Advanced Service Enablers as well as an additional half-day session on GPRS Roaming & Testing. Attendees are also offered the possibility to visit the GSM World Congress Exhibition with over 400 exhibiting companies, and the Annual GSM Industry Awards, besides a number of additional specialist events.
The iWORLD Group representatives, Mr Gerdes and Mr Ross, will be participating in the first two Keynote sessions of the conference. Mr Gerdes yesterday formed part of the Industry Vision Panel, discussing the topic “Making Money with 3G Services”, during the opening Keynote session “Redefining the GSM Business”.
Fellow panellists included Rob Conway, CEO of the GSM Association; Anssi Vanjoki, executive president of Nokia Mobile phones; Michael Rahier, president – Mobile Communications, Alcatel; Adrian Nemcek, corporate vice-president and general manager of Motorola; and Bernd Eylert, chairman of UMTS Forum.
Today, Malcolm Ross will be chairing the Keynote session entitled ‘Making the Internet Mobile’. Mr Ross will be introducing talks exploring convergence not only within the GSM industry, but also from the Internet world, and looking at how the Internet players are aligning themselves to Mobile requirements as well as what the impact of IP technology on mobile is.
As innovators in mobile telephony explore and advance down various diverse routes, the 3GSM World Congress brings all the leading players in the industry together to share the technological developments that will influence the future of the industry.
The high-profile contributions of top executives from Malta-based, iWORLD Group during the pivotal sessions of the conference will ensure the island benefits from unprecedented exposure to the world’s mobile telephone, business and technology communities.