Clearly referring to the uncertainties that engulfed the telecom sector and created suspicion among the investors, the government on Wednesday said that it is committed to bring further growth to the telecom, media and entertainment sectors.

While inaugurating Convergence India 2013, minister of state for Information and Broadcasting Manish Tewari said that the government of India sees the telecom evolution as a continuum, and it is not going to stop because of anything that has happened in this space in the past couple of years.

One important take away from this expo, as pointed out by Tewari, is that convergence is going to be a big key word for the industry over the next few years.

Convergence India is South Asia’s largest International ICT event, which addresses many facets of the rapidly evolving ICT industry.

While addressing the audience, during the opening ceremony,  Akhil Gupta, Deputy Group CEO & Managing Director, Bharti Enterprise said, “There are very few industries in a country that can enrich a billion lives, and in the Indian context, telecom is one industry which has truly enriched the lives of the common man. Today, about 90% of the population is covered by the telecom sector.”

In recent years, leading companies have been capitalizing on digital ecosystems that are expanding due to the confluence of Smac. In his presentation, Debdas Sen, Technology Consulting Leader and Eastern Region Managing Partner, PricewaterhouseCoopers India pointed out that the convergence between these four trends viz. social media, mobile, analytics and cloud computing is increasing and it will be the key highlight of the industry.

Data services are seen to be the second revolution in the telecom space after privatization of this sector. “About twenty (20) percent of telecom customers are already using data services and there is a 25-26% growth in data traffic,” added Gupta from Bharti Enterprises.

With increasing convergence and sharply changing consumer preferences, businesses are compelled to innovate. Industry data suggests that 50% of US CEOs surveyed are innovating to save money. Social media has gained momentum and user preference for the medium has shot up massively over the last couple of years. This has resulted in large amount of information being generated on this medium. This is a huge opportunity for consumer businesses, and if organizations can identify the patterns through this information, it will help the organization to serve the consumer better.

While concluding the opening ceremony, Umang Das, Director General, TAIPA thanked the Honorable Minister and attendees, and emphasized the role Convergence India expo has played over the last 20 years in spreading the importance of communications in the development of the economy.