In these days of glo-balization, who would have known that words such as VoIP, carrier grade, IP/MPLS, metro ethernet, virtualization, broadband, unified communication, WiMAX, EVDO and 3D networks and other tech-nical ICT vocabulary could become part of everyday’s language and culture.  If Namibians have problems with these words, then the ICT profession is the best way.  This two day summit which started on the 17th and ended on the 18th of July drew more than 500 dele-gates and international speakers, government offi-cials, heads of regulatory authorities, senior direc-tors and top management of fixed and mobile net-work operators and internet services providers from across Namibia and SADC region.
Delegates who attended this “Sharing Collective Wisdom” conference were encouraged to highlight, share and exchange the knowledge and experience of the sector.
Globalization has set the pace for countries such as Namibia to be abreast with the information edge.
Officially opening the summit, Joel Kaapanda, Minister of Information and Communication Techno-logy urged that the real capacity growing in terms of ICT skills building and implementation of intelli-gent technologies in the Namibian and African con-text can only be achieved in a combined effort be-tween decision makers.
“I believe there is a wealth of experience within the Namibian borders and we can establish Namibia as an ICT hub within SADC if there are coordinated efforts amongst the local ICT industry stakeholders.  As ICT stakeholders, it is all our responsibility to push the industry to even greater heights of achieve-ments”. he said.
Telecom Namibia is doing its best to ensure that its overall telecommunication infrastructure is modern and powerful to deliver world class services to accommodate the sustai-nable growth of the indu-stry going forward.  The full support of sectors in Namibia is an integral part of the ongoing work to find solutions for customer’s communication needs.
“The Namibia Telecom sector is ready to evaluate the telecommunication needs of its customer to deliver new solution you need to compete natio-nally, regionally and glo-bally.  The last two years have witnessed an upsurge in the development of new technologies, especially broadband technologies.  We have successfully deployed an IP/MPLS infrastructure and fast tracking the deployment of WiMAX, ADSL, Metro Ethernet and CDMA services to our customers”, explained the chairman of the Telecom Namibia, Mr Joseph Iita.
Namibia is bound to take early advantage of the new broadband technologies and services. A lot more fibre will have to go into the net-work. The future of Nami-bia with regards to ICT is exciting but it is some way off and it will take a great deal of more investment in infrastructure to deliver those more advanced servi-ces to a mass market, inclu-ding rural Namibia.
However, Telecom Nami-bia confirmed to the Nami-bian Plus that the process is particularly difficult to create and generate net-work to service major business houses and cor-porations. The real challen-ge is how to get these high-end products to residential and small business custo-mers.
Among those exhibiting at the summit were Nami-bia’s and South African telecom giants.
Cisco’s Vice President, Mr Joe Burton from USA graced the summit and presented an excellent paper entitled, “Evolving the business productivity with Unified Communi-cations”.  Mr Joe Burton is the Vice President, Chief Technology Officer, Voice Technology Group of Cisco Systems in the USA. He was accompa-nied by other Cisco Systems African senior managers. He explained that their company focuses on three areas of corporate philanthropy, providing basic human needs, access to education and respon-sible citizenship apart from their ICT activities.
“This past years, Cisco supported important com-mu-ity efforts such as the American Red Cross and the second Harvest Food Bank apart from our core ICT business.  Today Cisco ICT qualifications are the best in the world.  With more than 34 000 em-ployees worldwide, we re-main committed to crea-ting networks that are smarter with the in-built intelligent network servi-ces, faster in their ability to perform at ever increa-sing speeds and more durable, with a generational approach to an evolutionary infrastructure,” said Mr Joe Burton.
Cisco Systems was founded in 1984 by a small group of computer scientist from Stanford University.  Since its inception, Cisco engi-neers have been leaders in the development of Internet Protocol (IP)-based networ-king technologies. This tradition of IP innovation continues with industry leading products in the core areas of routing and swit-ching as well as advanced technologies in areas such as home-networking, opti-cal, storage security and wireless LAN.
In his keynote address, Joe Burton outlined Cisco’s Unified Communications Strategy for Africans region.  Burton and his team are responsible for technical strategy and advanced research for Unified Communication at Cisco.
Siemens Namibia also exhibited and presented a paper entitled “Unified Communications and Busi-ness Integration”.
Mr Billy Ruyobeza, the SADC Business Manager explained to the Namibian Plus that Siemens Enter-prise Communications are working together with Nokia networks to estab-lish Nokia Siemens Net-works (NSN) so as to combine the strengths of two world class companies.
“We are also creating a new identity, a new brand based firmly on the needs and priorities of service providers.  This is a brand that sets us apart from our competitors. The new brand is built on our core values of Pioneering, Pas-sionate and Pragmatic and the essence is our role in uniting communities,” he explained.
Many experts presented their papers and on the last day of the summit, the last hours belonged to Mr Daniel Silke of Marie Grey & Associates, spon-sored by Microsoft.  He was back to the 2008 summit by public demand.  His witty remarks to the delegates on the Tips, Trends and Predictions on Globalisation 2020 attrac-ted a large audience.  He explained that rich nations such as the USA, Britain, Germany and those belon-ging to the top of the world are in danger of becoming the “has beens” of tomor-row because of the emer-ging markets in Africa, China, India, Brazil, Russia and Mexico.
“Imagine now, emerging markets like India having a controlling stake in the Financial Times and Land Rover, all USA based giants. So the same will apply to the ICT sector.  The ICT world is now Fast, Urban, Tribal, Universal, Radical and Ethical, an acronym he developed for the “FUTURE”.
Frans Ndoroma, the Mana-ging Director of Telecom Namibia thanked their platinum sponsors.  The summit was sponsored by Cornastone, Cisco Sy-stems, DiData and Salt Essentials IT industry, Ericsson, SAAB and Grintex.
Telecom Namibia ran the ICT Summit for the second consecutive year and thus accepts the biggest chal-lenge in contributing to-wards the attainment of the country’s Vision 2030.