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Strategic foresighting

Strategic foresight plays an integral role in developing a better understanding of the future of the information economy.

To this end, the Department's foresight analysis takes a long-term perspective to identify and explore the major trends and emerging technologies that will have an impact on Australia 's future information economy performance.

Previous and current foresight projects include:

Achieving value from ICT: Key management strategies

Produced on behalf of the Department by IT consultants Opticon and the Australian National University's National Centre for Information Systems Research, the study Achieving value from ICT—Key management strategies was published in 2005.

This report established—for the first time—independent, broad-based and empirical evidence on the productivity gains of effective utilisation of ICT in an applied organisational context. It is believed to be the most comprehensive survey of ICT use and its management undertaken in Australia .

The main findings show that organisations that combine their ICT investments with good management practices that get the greatest value from their investment.

The report highlights three elements to good management relating to ICT, which apply regardless of industry sector, organisational size, amount spent or type of application used. These are:

  • being ICT-aware, through knowing about the ICT opportunities that are available and investing in ICT in order to gain a competitive advantage;
  • being open to organisational transformation, through integration into existing business processes and increased ICT skills; and
  • being persistent, in realising ICT benefits.

Achieving value from ICT—Key management strategies , the related booklet and research dataset all available from the links to the right of this page. The dataset is freely available for use by researchers and scholars on the condition that any results are shared with the Department.

E-Payments

A key issue for the future development of Australia 's information economy is the ability to complete electronic transactions successfully, efficiently and confidently.

Given this, the Department engaged a research consultancy to investigate the future of the electronic payments markets in Australia . The report Exploration of future electronic payments markets contains the results of this study.

The main findings indicate that while there has been a progressive move towards electronic payments in Australia , acceleration of this trend is likely to bring substantial gains to the economy.

Current electronic payments instruments appear weighted towards higher value electronic transactions. The development of new and emerging electronic payment technologies, such as real-time micro-payments and mobile commerce transactions, has the potential to provide net benefits to the economy.

The report identifies areas and activities to help realise the potential gains from more effective use of electronic payments, including measures to:

  • close information gaps and raise awareness about electronic payments options;
  • accelerate business and consumer adoption of electronic payments; and
  • raise and maintain Australian innovation.

It also includes a detailed examination of domestic and international market developments with a particular focus on business-to-business e-commerce, peer-to-peer and device-to-device transactions, and micro-payments and mobile commerce.

Radio Frequency Identification Technology

An emerging technology with the potential to transform business processes and supply chains is radiofrequency identification (RFID).

RFID systems are typically used to improve efficiency in inventory and supply chain management. For example, the use of RFID tags to identify pallets of goods in a warehouse can improve tracking of inventory, storage and transport logistics, and supply contract management.

Uses for the technology are not limited to the warehouse, however. Other uses of RFID include new consumer payment systems and smart appliances for the home.

The Department has published Getting the most out of RFID to clarify the issues surrounding RFID and to impart a few basic strategic messages for decision makers in SMEs. It also includes case studies on the implementation of RFID in SMEs.

  • Document ID: 36320 |
  • Last modified: 5 February 2008, 7:41pm