Tag Archive for 'Ola Ahlvarsson'

Abu Dhabi Magical Media Summit by Ola Ahlvarsson Part III (feat. Eric Schmidt)

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Published
by
Mahesh Kumar
on March 18, 2010

This post is about Blog, Entrepreneurship and Inspiration

[The Abu Dhabi Chronicles continues]

Abu Dhabi Media Summit an invite-only event featuring the cream of the cream in the internet and media industry seem to have made ripples across the industry. With the top brass from NewsCorp, Google, AOL, Microsoft and other movers and shakers in the industry under one roof, it might have been silly to expect anything else actually. Our very own SIME Chairman, Ola Ahlvarsson was also around for the event this week, and inspiration seems to be an unspoken theme in all the 4 days from March 9-12, 2010. Below are some of the musings from Eric Schmidt’s keynote.

Read about Eric Schmidt here

The CEO of Google starts his keynote with a humble request to change the name of the whole event to Abu Dhabi Magical forum since the level of people, creativity and exchange of ideas are all sufficient to create magic. And to follow that metaphor I must say that Eric speech is magical and the informal discussion that follows holds the same level even though
it´s unrehearsed. Eric is not only the person in the world that sits with the most information on how the Internet really works, he can also draw mind boggling conclusions about the future, and in addition he is really funny and
accessible for anyone (well, at least anyone in the room).

The following is an attempt to relate the essence using his own words as much as I could but skipping some passages and questions. The full talk will later be available on youtube under Abu Dhabi Media forum.

“The Arab region grows more than 100% per year on the web which is exciting for a company like Google. There are some very important things that are fuelling the growth here and everywhere in the world.
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Abu Dhabi Magical Media Summit by Ola Ahlvarsson Part II (feat. Hans Vesterberg)

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Published
by
Mahesh Kumar
on March 17, 2010

This post is about Blog, Inspiration and Knowledge

[The Abu Dhabi chronicles continues]

Read the jist of Rupert Murdoch keynote from the Media Summit

Abu Dhabi Media Summit an invite-only event featuring the cream of the cream in the internet and media industry seem to have made ripples across the industry. With the top brass from NewsCorp, Google, AOL, Microsoft and other movers and shakers in the industry under one roof, it might have been silly to expect anything else actually. Our very own SIME Chairman, Ola Ahlvarsson was also around for the event this week, and inspiration seems to be an unspoken theme in all the 4 days from March 9-12, 2010. Below is his recount of the talk given by Hans Vesterberg, VD of Ericsson

Read about Bloomberg’s press release on Hans Vesterberg

The world is mind boggling and has been developing tremendously. 4,6 billion phones, half a billion  broadband users will grow to 3 billion by 2014. As a point of reference 23 billion SMS were sent during one day on Chinese New Year. In 2014 there will be 7 billion mobile subscriptions. So is there a business case? Yes for sure but we need to do changes in models, networks and in us as an industry. People are prepared to pay more than before.
What will be the impact on society? Well that is hard to articulate development in the steel industry created railroads that in turn revolutionized transportation and many industries. Oil created the car industry.. What will be created as an extension of the IT and telecommunication developments? I see an installation phase and a deployment phase. We are still in the installation phase. Our vision is that in 2020 we will have 50 billion connections to the network through machine to machine, new types of connectivity, multiple subscriptions and many other reasons for being connected.  The mobile phone is like the light bulb in early electricity.  Other types of connectivity and gadgets will be every other appliance in the electricity metaphor and the innovation will be fuelled by telecom and content.  Ericsson is in the world of content, in video on demand, with broad casters, with fifa with tv4. We can deliver content to any bearer anywhere anytime. We work with operators in IP tv. We are in 175 countries with 375 million subscribers in the networks. Our duty is to work with all parts of society. There is a strong correlation between connectivity and gdp. Between diminishing co2 emissions and developing telecom. The world triplicates, and so will telecom have to do in order to have a sustainable world. We have the business reasons and we have the societal reasons to follow our vision.

Challenges: we need to have standards in order to deploy everywhere and cheap. We need fair pricing. Everybody needs their share of the cake and users need to pay. The consumer experience needs to be equal regardless of device, location and connection. Us telecom, media and other industries must cooperate.

The consumers are there, the money is there but we need standards.

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Abu Dhabi Magical Media Summit by Ola Ahlvarsson Part I (feat. Rupert Murdoch)

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Published
by
Mahesh Kumar
on March 12, 2010

This post is about Blog, Entrepreneurship, Inspiration and Knowledge

People that not only have the power to change the media industry but, because of the power of the media industry, also to change the world in which we live in - Edward Borgerding, CEO, Abu Dhabi Media Company

Abu Dhabi Media Summit an invite-only event featuring the cream of the cream in the media industry seems to have made ripples across the industry. With the top brass from NewsCorp, Google, AOL, Microsoft et al under one roof, it might have been silly to expect anything else actually. Our very own SIME Chairman, Ola Ahlvarsson was also around for the event this week, and inspiration seems to be an unsaid theme in all the 4 days from March 9-12, 2010. Below is his recount of the keynote by Rupert

The first day of Abu Dhabi Media forum. A World Economic forum like super elite gathering of media dignitaries where people like Rupert Murdoch, Eric Schmidt, Esther Dyson are chit chatting in the corridors with the royalties of the region ( disclaimer: I don´t consider myself being one of them but am very happy to be a fly on the wall J).

abu-dhabi-summit

The opening statement by the BBC anchor

“ The people in the room are the smartest in media in the world. The media industry can change the world more than any other industry, over these days we will find out which future you will shape”.

Welcome Rupert Murdoch

Murdoch was clearly interested in the Arab region where he sees that old traditions if they are good are compatible with a sky touching modern skyline. He felt that the region has drawn from its strong past while pointing at the future….

“ There is a creative wind blowing from the dessert and it reeks of technology but it is easy to be blinded by the bling of technology and forget what is really interesting – content. What is an e-reader without good journalism or authors telling stories? Only meaningless toys. People will be drawn to creativity wherever they can find it and furthermore they will
add their own creativity. It is about unlocking creativity more than about technology. If you tell a good story people will listen. Avatar has already brought in close to 3 billion USD, it was produced to a large extent in New Zealand…

So how do you foster creativity in a region ( like the Arab world)? Well it takes money. You also have to create a market place where creativity can be funded and exit. The advertising market must be fair and transparent, copyright laws in place, international competition is essential to make the local companies and thoughts globally competitive. But it also takes individual freedom where governments must have a gentle touch if they have to interfere with creativity. The potential asset of creativity is larger than that of oil. It is also cleaner, endless, creates jobs, excites and ultimately creates a better world.”

For one, I am looking forward for tangible ways to help the media dinosaurs shift the bandwagon into the new spectrum, live in a new world where things have changed upside down. Media companies have more unsold ad inventory which they are not able to connect to good content or revenue model. People are paying less for “traditional” digital advertisements, and concepts such as behavioral
re-targeting and sharing analytics of visitors seems to be more relevant serving as a better investment for those advertising dollars. All in all, the landscape is interesting and we are looking forward for more personal recounts by Ola in the coming days.

Some coverage of the summit can be found here, here and here

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Ola Ahlvarsson: Snacks from the World Economic Forum, Dalian, September 2009

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Published
by
Mahesh Kumar
on September 29, 2009

This post is about SIME News

It’s an elite party, quite much the movers and shakers of the world. From academicians, to the political clout, the big names in Wall Street, to the entrepreneur of different kinds, the World Economic Forum (WEF) team brings the elite of the elite thought leaders under one roof.

Ola Ahlvarsson, the chairman and moderator of SIME has been a regular feature at the WEF sessions, and has been conferred the title of “Global Leader of Tomorrow” in the previous WEF session held in Davos, Switzerland. SIME Stockholm will have some participants from the organizing committee of WEF, so you can get a chance to meet and talk to them when in Stockholm.

This year, the annual WEF event was held in Dalian, China on September 10, 11 and Ola has some interesting thoughts to share from the session he took part in. Below, you can also find take home messages by Sir. Martin Sorell, CEO of WPP WorldWide and Ben Werwaayen, CEO of Alcatel – Lucent.

Ola Ahlvarsson from the World Economic Forum

OLA Veckans Affarer

View Ola’s profile

We are entering the century of Asia (as anyone who has spent time in Asia lately can confirm). The growth is fueled by optimism and an energy that comes from a generation who has a much better life than they had 10 years ago and considerably better than their parents as apposed to many of us living in the western world. But the growth comes at a price in economies where the only currency that counts is money and not life quality or respect for human rights. The Chinese and Indian poverty is a competitive advantage not only to make fake Gucci bags but increasingly to innovate and create. In the century to come military strength is not what defines hegemony but rather the ability to create. The opposite of war is not peace, it is creation.

But Asia is by no means one country and it could be argued that China and India are more similar to our societies than to each other. Or as one of the speakers said: “ “Asia” is just a term coined by the ancient Greeks to explain everyone not living in Europe, it has no meaning as a descriptive term for anything.

The good news is that the Asian century is a party that we are all invited to and international products, ideas and capital will be instrumental in sustaining the expected hyper growth, it is up each one of us if we see that as a threat or opportunity.”

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