Major European ICT and media companies including British Telecom, Tele2 and Vivendi Universal have moved in behind the European Commission's i2010 strategy, backing efforts to create a unified regional regulatory framework and pledging to work together to maximise the opportunities of new technology for the community. Following a meeting with the EC this week to discuss how to give a spur to Europe's emerging digital economy, ten industry leaders said that they would support the basic principals of i2010, which calls for "completion of the internal market for electronic communications and media services, for a more modern and flexible legal framework for audiovisual content, for efficient and interoperable digital rights management and for strengthening investment in ICT." The strategy, unveiled by EC information society commissioner Viviane Reding last month, sets a roadmap for ensuring European Union citizens receive the full benefits of new technologies such as 3G, digital television, online music, VoIP and interactive internet services.
Commercial interest in Generative AI (GenAI) tools has reached a fever pitch, and the latest forecast from Gartner amplifies this emerging trend. Gartner predicts $644 billion in worldwide spending on GenAI in 2025, marking a dramatic 76.4 percent increase from the previous year. This surge underscores the impact GenAI will have across industries. It also requires a closer examination of the underlying dynamics of future potential. Generative AI Market Development This growth is fueled by the GenAI foundational model providers who invest billions into enhancing the size, performance, and reliability of their models. Hardware also accounts for a significant portion of this spending, with ~80 percent allocated to servers, smartphones, and PCs equipped with artificial intelligence capabilities. This highlights the critical need for computational power to support the demanding workloads of GenAI. However, Gartner also injects a dose of reality into the GenAI hype cycle. There's a dec...