Authors: Anna Greta Nyström
Before the information revolution of the late 20th century, the sectors for telecommunications, IT and media were considered as deploying different technologies, producing different kinds of services and products, and studied as different academic fields. Convergence, on the other hand, refers to the growing interdependency among these industries; convergence implies that actors are dependent on each other’s resources, also those active outside traditional telecommunications industry borders. Actors in the industry are forced to re-evaluate their roles and positions as the development continues and the technological bases of companies in the sectors of telecommunications, media, broadcasting and IT increasingly start to resemble and substitute each other. Today it is possible to view TV in mobile devices, make calls over the Internet and use a mobile terminal as a camera. Technological development clearly forces actors in telecommunications to act and react. One way of coping with convergence is through business networks, which form a pool of resources and assets for its members.
A historical review of the Finnish telecommunications sector reveals that contrary to the 1980s and 1990s, actors in the field are increasingly acting as members of business networks in order to develop core competencies, business, innovative services and products etc. The study focuses on investigating dynamics within business nets as a result of convergence processes and suggests that role confusion and identity crisis are a likely result of convergence in telecommunications. The study combines historical reconstruction, sensemaking and critical event analysis in order to form an understanding of convergence processes as well as the development of the Finnish telecommunications industry. This development and sensemaking process is then compared to business network dynamics, with focus on role and position, which act as indicators of change. Mobile TV based on the DVB-H standard is used as a case study, where both convergence and business network dynamics are analysed in detail.
Key words: telecommunications, convergence, Finland, business network dynamics, role, position
Publish Year: 2008