http://www.digitalwallonia.be

1. Overview of the ICT ecosystem
of Wallonia
(including a brief focus on telecom)
ir. Zaccone Carmelo
Technology Intelligence Analyst
ICT Sector Promotion (local |international)

2. Supporting digital innovation
Marshall Plan 4.0. Priority measures for the economic
redeployment of Wallonia :
• www.wallonie.be/fr/plan-marshall,
• is structured around 5 axis,
• 5th AXIS: Supporting digital innovation.
Entering the age of the fourth industrial revolution :
• Cloud, Big Data analytics, Industrial IoT, real time processing.
• Government is building a transitional digital integrated plan.
• Objective is to boost the digital economy of Wallonia :
• digital goods-producing industries,
• digital services market industries,
• enhancing the “digital culture” from business to citizen
and particularly the young generation.

3. A digital vision for Wallonia
• Launch by the Walloon Minister for the Economy and Digital
of a consultation process for the development of the 4-year
digital Regional Plan to be presented to government in the fall
2015. The process was based on 13 thematic working groups
and a crowdsourced website.
• A Digital Council has been created. It is composed of people
coming from the ICT sector or in charge of the digital
transformation in specific sectors in Wallonia (education,
health, publics services, …).
• The “Agence du Numérique” is in charge of the organization of
a open, collective and crowdsourced process that must identify
technological and political priorities for the Walloon
Government.
www.digitalwallonia.be/plandunumerique

4. Networks
Wallonia has excellent coverage in terms of broadband
networks (fixed and wireless).
• The public fiber network, managed by the Sofico. This
network is open to public & private partnerships. It covers all
major cities and areas of Wallonia.
• The Belnet network, which provides broadband coverage for
universities, colleges and publics institutions.
• The fixed and mobile networks of 4 major telecoms
operators (Proximus, Mobistar, Base and VOO). Several other
alternative operators are also active. Mobile 3G covers most
areas of Wallonia. 4G is available in the major cities.

5. Support
Wallonia has established several institutions and initiatives whose
mission is the development of ICT in all sectors of the society
(public services, businesses, citizens, ...). For example :
• the AdN whose primary goal is the development and promotion
of ICT;
• 2 Clusters (ICT & TWIST) to boost the ICT sector;
• CETIC & MULTITEL (centers of excellence in the ICT field);
• the Microsoft Innovation Center;
• the WSL (incubator for engineering sciences)
ICT companies are represented by Agoria (national federation).
Wallonia also benefits from the action of many private initiatives
(BetaGroup, Nest Up, Startups.be, LeanSquare, FeWeb, Rue du
Web, Café numérique, …). They show the dynamism of the ICT
sector.

6. Support
The support provided for the ICT sector and the ICT uses in
Wallonia is also reflected by concrete actions and initiatives :
• Professional forums on ICT (mobile, SmartCities, e-health, ...)
technologies and advanced ICT use in business (e-commerce, ...).
Most of these forums are public / private partnerships.
• Missions and presences abroad : based on calls for proposals
or technological and economic opportunities
(for example MWC or NAB).
• Clustering.
• Specific calls for proposals (Boost Up, Nest Up, Hackathon Open
Data, …).

7. Education & training
Wallonia have a wide network of institutions in charge of ICT
education and training.
• Several universities and colleges. Many offer high-level training in
ICT : networks, security, programming, multimedia, e-commerce,
web, Internet governance, ... .
• In the region of Liege and Tournai, for example, there are now
integrated "e-campus" covering all the skills needed by companies
active on the Web.
• Four training centers specialized in ICT (Technofutur TIC,
Technocité, Technifutur and Technobel). For companies, this is an
opportunity to offer ICT training or upgrade to its personnel , and
for people looking for a job, this is a chance to acquire ICT skills.

8. A smart region
Creative Wallonia is a framework program that places creativity and
innovation in the center of the Walloon project. Lots of initiatives
are related to ICT.
• CoWallonia is the name of the network of 8 coworking centers.
There is also several Smart Work Centers.
• Wallonia is one of the 2 European regions recently elected
“European Creative District”.
• The Walloon Government is also working on a specific plan to
transform 8 Walloon cities into smartcities. Futurocité is the name
of a public/private initiative to develop projects related to urban
intelligence.
Source : www.awt.be/web/cow & www.cowallonia.be & www.creativewallonia.be

9. The ICT sector
The Walloon ICT sector is composed of two main types of actors :
• small entities, particularly active in the areas of retail,
consulting, training and distribution and installation of goods
and services. Their target markets are mainly business services
(including ICT sector), the general public and retail trade;
• +/- 250 companies with high added value whose main activity
is often in the consulting and software. Their target areas are:
business services, financial services, utilities, distribution,
healthcare and industry.
Source : www.awt.be/barometre

10. The ICT sector
The Walloon ICT players are particularly aware of the
importance of innovation. 70% are involved in R&D projects
and 26% believe that innovation is essential to their survival.
The Walloon ICT sector is highly open to international,
(particularly companies with a high added value).
• 35% have at least one establishment abroad.
• 79% are exporters.
• 62% say they want to expand their export activities in two
years.

11. Walloon ICT excellence's
Broadband. Amongst the most connected countries :
• xDSL pioneer, wireless coverage (4G, WiFi) through
different Service Providers.
• Fiber Optic To The Building (FTTB) is a reality for > 1,500 SMEs,
44 fully connected business parks.
• 8 Smartcities : Urban WiFi “Digital Cities” : Liège, Mons,
Bastogne, Namur, Tournai, Ottignies/Louvain-la-Neuve,
Charleroi, Spa-Francorchamps.
Micro-Technologies, Nanotech, Mecatronic : MITECH Cluster
(Micro-Technologies for Intelligent Manufacturing & Products).
Centers of competences : technical platforms endowed with
modern facilities made available to training agencies and
companies (Technifutur, Technocité , Technofutur3, Techno.bel,
Forem Formation).

12. Wallonia, a large ICT footprint (1)
• 25% of the Walloon ICT ecosystem develops software (ERP, CRM,
Multimedia & web tools, Industrial or scientific applications, Office
suites, workflow, Networking, security, system, educational
software, e-learning tools, Supply Chain Management, e-
commerce, BI, IoT, Smartcities, M2M, Mobile apps).
• BioTech (Genomic, Proteomic, Metabolomic, Oligonucleotides
design , Database Design, Clinical research).
• E-health (Medical imagery, Clinical Study, Electronic health
records, Medical IT, Tele medicine, ePrescribing,
m-Health). 67 SMEs

13. Wallonia, a large ICT footprint (2)
• Mobile (Operating System development, Customer Relation
Management, Workforces, Advertisement, Machine-To-Machine,
Location Based Services).
• Big Data (Data Analytics, Machine
Learning, Artificial Intelligence,
Visualization Platform, Real Time
Processing).
• Immersive Technologies (Natural User Interface, Gesture
recognition, Virtual World, Industrial Process Simulation).

14. Radio transmission / Telecom - footprint (2)
• Near Field Communication,
• Radio Frequency ID,
• Ultra Narrow Band,
• Magnetic Identification,
• Optical networking

15. IPtel, Unified Communication - footprint (4)
• Voice Over IP
• Unified Communication
• Open Source (asterisk, SER, OPENsips, kamailio)
• Computer Telephony Integration (CTI)
• Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)
• IPpbx, Softswitch
• Unified Messaging
• Fixe Mobile Convergence (FMC)

16. Digital Clusters in Wallonia
INFOPOLE (ICT) TWIST (MEDIA)
The network that gathers and unites
professionals of ICT to promote business
and innovation through partnership.
The network consists of
• 148 members.
• 130 SMEs.
• 18 large companies.
Turnover +- 1.38 Billion €
The network that gathers and unites
professionals of technology
companies, universities, research
centers, distributors, producers,
professional associations of the media
industry.
The network consists of
• over 100 members (80%SMEs).
• 5 TV Channels.
• 5 universities & Research Centers.
• 2 investment funds.
• 5.000 direct jobs and 2.000 indirect
jobs
Turnover +- 1 Billion €

17. INFOPOLE spheres
Serious
Games
IoT Datacenter Transmedia Security Web

18. Cinema/TV
Animations
Broadcast
Technologies
New Media
(Internet, Mobile,
Social Media, Video
Games)
TWIST spheres
Strategic focus on :
• Digitalisation & Digital Archiving
• Motion Capture / Immersive Technologies
• Video Games / Serious Game
• Second Screen / Transmedia
• 2D and 3D imaging
Investment Funds

19. Tier 3+ Datacenter availability

20. • ir. Carmelo Zaccone | carmelo.zaccone@aei.be
• @carmelo
• 0032 475 586.782
• linkedin.com/in/zaccone
• www.digitalwallonia.be
Avenue Prince de Liège, 133 B-5100 Jambes
Tél.: 0032 (0)81 77 80 80 | info@digitalwallonia.be
www.twitter.com/digitalwallonia
www.facebook.com/digitalwallonia
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