“In an economically frayed world, technical globalization is under threat.” This is the title of a few articles about the future of the tech world. While this may seem dramatic and maybe even dark, it’s partially true. And if you are one of those that find deglobalizaiton dramatic, don’t worry, this isn’t something we can expect to see overnight. But what’s ultimately important here is to recognize that it also serves as an opportunity to level out the playfield to promote local players. In this article we’re going to take a look in how this might affect the telecom field.
Globalist vs regionalist
While internet was welcomed as globalizations posterchild that rose despite physical limitations of geography. The same warm welcome has slightly diminished with market giants that adopt complete sectors. This concern lies in many factors including local economic concern such as less job opportunities and less revenue. But it also lies in changed consumer patterns. For example, in 2000, we wanted our food to be fast, cheap and to happened now. But in 2021 we see a much more eager will to spend a little more for locally and ethically produced food. What is interesting is that we might see a similar customer pattern in the tech sphere, where we want locally produced items, and are willing to spend a little extra for ethical and high-quality gear – that also supports your locals.
This deglobalization idea gained exponential momentum together with the recent pandemic where the local services we sometimes take for granted were more needed than ever. This has left many wondering if we should redraw the industrial map to support local players. Maybe an iPhone from the US will suffice, but can we really live without local healthcare? And where do we draw a line of what we want and need from global and local players?
Deglobalization in telecom
When applying this deglobalization idea to the telecom sector, I believe it’s important to note that global as well as regional efforts are complementary and don’t exclude one another. While some players are able to expand globally, telecom in itself is very much a local enigma, that needs to be local in order to operate. Telecom is built on local players and networks that together create a global phenomenon. This is probably not subject to much change with deglobalization emerging. But where this does pose a question mark is for the developers. How developers ethically produce and source the materials needed to create consumer products is something that might be subject for change in the upcoming years. Because if we’re already worried of how food is sourced to create a sustainable environment as well as economy, how can we expect this to be reflected in the tech and telecom world?
While looking at a global perspective, the company that is probably at the top of everyone’s head is Apple. Let’s be real, pretty much everyone we know owns an iPhone today. But as we commonly choose our phones based on the brand that operates globally, it makes me wonder how we will choose based on the fact that we’re more prone to promote local players and favor ethics as well as quality. With regionalization of technology emerging, it might serve as dominating power that will force competitors to focus more on how they source and supply digital aspects such as screen quality rather than brand development. This might then in turn play a part in how we choose our technology since the future might be more focused on the technical aspects.
While deglobalization might not gain enough power to boost different local phone developers in itself. It could help promote the local players that provide these vital parts of different technology such as a processor. This in turn might play a part in the offers promoted by the players we know today. The regionalist model has also seen increased interest this year with Europe’s new strategy to maintain a more even playing field. A model that aims to not only boost local players, but also secure critical materials and technology. This is also prevalent in 5G telecommunications whereas it’s subject to much more global competitiveness but won’t work unless it’s supported on a local market. Here it’s vital that we support key local players to even take part of the wonders that might come with better bandwidth. Meaning that different telecom or tech companies have to complement each other to provide technology that should be available locally and globally.
Wholesale
I thought the subject was particularly interesting because it is also reflected in our wholesale model, whereas Instead of operating as a single global company, we choose to focus on and expand with local partners. In this way we’re able to help each other grow, with our experience in delivering a new product on the market, and with their capacity and local knowledge. This model serves both the globalist and the regionalist, where we complement each other instead of excluding one another. All our partners also have unique strengths and selling points. And by partnering up we’re able to enhance those by combining our services. This helps to create integrated value propositions, that are essentially unique to each market.