Living in Peru : your everyday companion

As the figure demonstrates, the activities contained in the value chain go from the production of content to use by the user, and make it clear that despite technological development, the steps have not changed much over time. It is important to emphasize that the first convergence was achieved at the stage of the production of content by enabling the conditioning component to convert it into digital content. This “digitalization” of content has led for several years the appearance of technologies that allow the user to have this format. Let’s remember, for example, that the evolution of music audio to the current digital format with the derivations that many of us enjoy in our mp3 players.

Nonetheless, this specialization brought results in all types of content and technology: voice, audio, data, video, among others. We were watching and consuming an endless number of devices that finally required new furniture in our house for their storage and use: television sets, radios, recorders, video recorders, computers, telephones, photo cameras, video reproducers, fax, among others. If we could see how all of them can today be perfectly replaced by a cellular telephone with a “qwerty” keyboard, perhaps we would intuitively understand what convergence means as well as the benefits that it generates. This effect, without a doubt, has been harnessed with the development of the Internet, which permits connecting the devices and offering multi-format content and applications by means of an IP protocol, such as telephone or video on IP.

Analyzing the subject from the perspective of the user, the telecommunications companies compete for similar niches of market and to create “virtual” voice, data and video products. At heart they are converging to similar formats, and in the future it will be very difficult to distinguish the differences - more and more semantic than technical - among the services offered, for example: to listen to music from a digital satellite radio and to listen to music by Internet provided by a VSAT station. In addition to these matters, the significant advance in wireless technologies allows passing over the limitation of the need for flat spaces, increasing the possibilities of communication while avoiding the limitations that geography imposes on a country like ours.

Nevertheless, the implications of these changes in regulatory matters are not simple, although our country has already advanced significantly in its normative platform. In general, legislation favors technical development, facilitating the entrance of new actors, looking for the opening of new markets, the harmonization of the dominant and minority positions, and promoting administrative efficiency. Also outstanding are the efforts of the MTC to extend the coverage of telecommunication services to rural zones, taking telephone and Internet to the interior of the country. The Internet in these cases can be an important platform to leverage convergence in these cities and towns, given the dispersion of the demand and the low pressure for product innovation and services in these zones.

Finally, the profound social and economic changes that convergence brings to society must be emphasized. Greater access to information and content in a convergent manner permits different decisions to be made by the user, who now can consolidate data and communicate from a single point. Business activity and the development of institutions that are directly related to content and applications will have to transform their business models and value proposals in order to survive and operate sustainably. Thus for example, most educational institutions have incorporated virtual or on-line education into their course and program offerings in order to meet the needs of a demanding consumer and influenced by the new trends and the window of opportunities that exist thanks to progress in telecommunications.