Deloitte Technology, Media and Telecom 2009 predictions event

Your loyal scribe is sitting at the annual Deloitte Technology, Media and Telecom predictions event. The attendance at the conference centre known as the MARS Discovery District is amazing. More than 1,000 people from across Canada are participating. Double that of last year. Is it that no one has anything to do at the office, or is the interest in technology that much higher than in prior years?

The only problem is that Duncan keeps looking down at me – he thinks I’m doing my RIM and ignoring his speech. I’m bloggin’ it, buddy! Here is a snapshot of what our friends John Ruffolo and Duncan Stewart see for our near term future:

Technology

– The rise of the smart grid.

– The rise of the netbook (only three people of the 500+ in the Toronto audience had one).

– Downsizing the digital attic: when digital storage is a bad thing!?

– Social networks for the enterprise: Facebook for the Fortune 500. Enterprise 2.0 is affordable and no training wheels are required.

– Government 2.0; President Obama will find a way to make the U.S. Government more interactive online than ever before.

Media

– Print in Peril; 1 in 10 North American newspapers will move online. There is more of an appetite for breaking news, but the paper version isn’t required to meet that need.

– Is going on line the answer? 10% of delivery revenue is generated through online advertising, even though online subscribers represent 10x the readership of actual physical circulation.

– Rrising stars take on megastars; Indie is the new mainstream.

– Be like Feist, smaller Acts pack the floor. How the Toronto FC Soccer Club beats out MLB.

– The dawn of Wifi radio: 14,000 radio stations in your pocket. Usage can be monitored by advertisers, and they can pay for placement in a way that is currently not possible.

– Mobile advertsing finds its meaning. 0.4% of worldwide advertising comes from mobile. Starbucks will go mobile.

Telecom

– Smart phones: how to stay clever in a downturn. Smart phone sales will still grow, just not by 50% as they did last year. Maybe 5-10%.

– It’s not dumb to pay a premium for a smart phone. Carriers get the revenue eventaully.

– Digital communications loses its message: no email Fridays? When a productivity tool undercuts productivity.

– Traffic jams on cellular networks. The mobile broadband world is an accident in slow motion. Netbooks and smartphones are chewing up bandwidth.

– No more redundant fibre optic network. Sharing the cost of fibre means more speed sooner.

Bonus

Internet Explorer is losing marketshare over the past 12 months. The browser becomes the operating system: changing of the guard? Google Chrome is having a good launch. Better living through better browsers.

Panel

The panel featured Barry Reiter from Bennet Jones, Simon Avery of the Globe and Mail, and venture capitalist Harry Gruner, a General Partner from JMI Equity in Baltimore.

Harry says that in a recession, “less happens”. You can pitch a bank on a new software application with a tremendous ROI, and although they might love the return, “they don’t want the ‘I'”. “Zero-based budgeting is bad for new things.” People make the choice to support software that “runs the bank”, rather than “improves the bank.”

Barry thinks that security will be a big issue this year. With so many corporate laptops and BlackBerrys out there, firms will need to be able to kill these devices as soon as they are lost.

Simon predicts that the National Pest will move to an online-only format by the end of the year. And is worried that some of the “Old Guard” who run the North American newspaper industry aren’t able to get ahead of the changes that are swarming around their industry. He also sees the opportunity for a new Duopoly, putting pressure on Intel/Microsoft. Qualcomm (QCOM:Q), for example, is well positioned for this; should the cellphone begin to blend into a laptop-type device. And, Research In Motion (RIM:TSX) could try to lead the way on this front?

MRM