Overview

Sweden's pledge and vast efforts to make information technology available to all residents is apparent when examining the diffusion of computers and the internet through segments of the population. According to a study by The Swedish Institute for Transport and Communications Analysis, in 2001 the highest rates of computer access are seen among high-income earners households whose proportion generally increases with an increase in income, young segments of the population (age 16-19 at 90%), executives (93%), and the highly educated (85%). (14) The high level of computer access is a strong indicator of the success of Sweden 's legislative efforts over the past decade to increase the level of IT accessibility, competence, and confidence.

The culture and high level of education of the overall Swedish population contributes greatly to the adoption of emerging technologies. Sweden is often used as a launching pad to test the success of new products. "On average, "time-to-takeoff" for new products takes about half the time in Scandinavian countries (4 years) as in Mediterranean countries (7.4 years)." (Marketing Science 2003 (24) )

Important Statistics

Number of Internet Service Providers: 29 (2000) (8)

Web users as a percent of the population: 6.02 million (2002)/8.9 total = 68% (7)

PC's per 1000 people: 561.2 (2001) (6)

PCs per 1000 in business: 820 (2001) (6)

*Many statistics are not available past 2001 or 2002

World Bank Rankings on ICT business and government environments in 2002 (20)

(scaled from 1 to 7: 7 is best)

Broadband internet access availability: 5.6

Local specialized IT services availability: 6.1

Competition in ISPs: 5.7

Government online services availability: 5.2

Pricing

Source: Facts about Information and Communications Technology in Sweden 2003 (6)

Internet Service Providers (ISP)

According to The CIA World Factbook(8), there are: 10,350 ISPs worldwide (2000), 7,000 in United States (2002), 29 in Sweden (2000), 3 in Finland (2002).

Licensing regulations for ISPs

Three categories

1. Individual operator licenses : must obtain government issued licenses

2. General Authorizations : some regulatory requirements which allow ISPs to operate as long as they have general authorizations

3. Open Entry: no licensing or general authorizations imposed on ISPs

USA , Sweden and other countries under the EU are in the Open Entry category. This doesn't mean that there are no regulations ISPs in these countries have to follow, rather, they are still subject to laws governing business in general, and in the United States for example, must abide by the FCC. (9)

IT Usage Patterns

Households

Computer usage at home varies depending on the age, sex and education of the user. The average use of computers when taking the majority of the population (age 9-79) is 69% with the highest rates among men at 73%, people aged 25-44 at 85%, and 82% among the highly educated (6).

Business

The rate of computer diffusion in the workplace is extremely high in Sweden with 106 computers per every 100 workers as of 2000. Some more recent figures claim that in 2002, the rate of computer diffusion was 98% for companies with over 10 employees. In addition, approximately 90% of these companies had internet access (6).

There is a fair amount of people that telework in Europe, Sweden being among the lower percentages at 10% of the employee population. For comparison, 17% of employees in Denmark, 12% in Finland, and 6% in France also telework (6).