Bulletin 100, August 97 

Editorial

INVITATION TO THE SVOR/ASRO TUTORIAL
 
Telecommunications has become a buzz word. There are numerous articles in our daily news papers about alliances of telecom companies, complaints between competitors, restructuring inside companies; new services are advertised, including access to the omnipresent internet. Also, various professional associations have discovered the attraction of the topic and invite prominent speakers on this subject to their meetings.
 
All this could tire our attention and be perceived as a fashion trend. Has your Society and Committee fallen to this trend by proposing this Tutorial? We do not think so.
 
Evidently, fundamental changes are underway, affecting the individual, the organization and our society at large, leading to what has been coined the “digital economy”. Telecommunications play a key role in these changes and the trends listed above should not blunt our attention, but make us aware of the tremendous mutations in this field.
 
Operations Research has a significant role to play here. As a matter of fact, OR has already made very important contributions to the telecommunications business, on design as well as operational issues, and conversely, telecommunications with its prominent research institutions have significantly contributed to the field of OR. In view of the challenges of technological developments, deregulation and new ways of conducting business in telecommunications, it is safe to predict that this privileged partnership  between telecommunications and OR will intensify in the future.
 
In the coming Tutorial, international experts - among them representants of prominent research institutions of telecom companies - will present a broad selection of problems and solutions contributed by OR in this field and share their experience. Not surprisingly in view of the enormous investments in billions in network infrastructure, a good part of the problems concerns multiple facets of network design and operations.
 
In line with our Tutorial concept and format, the meeting is neither a mini-conference, nor a workshop for specialists of OR in telecommunications, but is aimed at members of the OR community, in particular young members, interested in applications and work opportunities in telecommunications, as well as at professionals in telecommunications with some quantitative background interested in what OR can significantly contribute to their domain.
 
We would be happy to count you among the participants and look forward to welcoming you at he Hotel Seepark in Thun.

 
Heinz Groeflin
Heinz Schiltknecht
 
(Organizing Committee)
 
 


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