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Internet and information and communication technologies incite the
inclusion of the companies in the
global economy through the expansion of trade , increased productivity
of capital, intensifying competition
in the market, which in turn boosts
innovation, making the ICT and business mutually inseparable in the
modern economy. Their interconnectedness bears immediate benefits for households too, not only
business and technology per se. On
the other hand, creation of new jobs,
better exploitation of human resources, the production of consumer
surplus, represent immediate benefits provided to the citizens by the
digital economy itself.
The share of the ICT sector in GDP
is around 6% in the OECD countries, whereas in the developing world
this share is significantly lower. As
estimated by the World Bank, the
greatest contribution of the digital
technologies to the economic growth occurs in those cases when traditional sectors of the economy exploit
ICT to modernize their activity.
European
context
Recent studies estimate that the digitalization of products and services
can bring more than 110 billion in
annual revenues to the European
economy over the next five years.
In April 2016, the European Commission launched the first initiative
of the Digital Single Market package
related to the industry. The aim of
this initiative is to prepare Europe
for the upcoming challenges of the
digital products and services. This
will require coordinated investment
from both the private and the public
sector.
In that sense, the following areas are
of particular importance:
• “Startup Europe” aims to
strengthen the business environment for web and ICT
entrepreneurs so their ideas
and businesses can develop
without restraints
• The Future of the Internet - a
stronger, more connected Internet, which corresponds to
the needs of citizens both at
work and at home
• Data – referring to the need
to exploit the benefits of the
access to the important data,
in order to create solutions
designed for the health care
system and the challenges in
the field of transport
• Cloud computing - better
standards, more secure contracts and greater use of cloud in private and public sector are the issues that need to
be worked on in the future