Message from the Chairperson

Covering a broad spectrum of ICT-related companies, the Telecom Services Association (Telesa) is an organization aimed at facilitating the healthy development of a competitive market and contributing to the overall business growth of the telecommunications industry. In an industry that is facing ever-advancing technological innovation, Telesa plays an important role in facilitating the development of the ICT sector. Besides information gathering, studies and research, advocacy and such activities related to ICT in line with its role and mission, Telesa contributes to the invigoration of regional communities through initiatives to support regional business creation leveraging ICT.

In recent years, with tremendous advancements in the fifth-generation mobile communications system (5G) and other digital infrastructure, IoT, big data, AI and such digital technologies as well as ICT, solutions leveraging ICT have come rapidly into practical use. As the world becomes increasingly global and borderless, ICT grows in importance as technology indispensable for maintaining the people’s lifestyles and economic activities.

For Japan’s Reiwa era, 5G is considered a basic infrastructure, and consumer 5G services were first launched in March 2020. In addition to offering super high speed and high capacity, 5G also features ultra-low latency and multiple simultaneous connections, and it is expected to be further leveraged as a telecommunications infrastructure.

With the advent of 5G, mobile communications system will further evolve from the infrastructure supporting people’s lifestyles into industrial and social infrastructure. This is expected to contribute to Japan’s economic growth and help address social issues such as aging and the declining birthrate, energy and environmental challenges, as well as rural depopulation.

Japan’s vision for its society in the 2030s is the realization of a resilient and vigorous society that is “inclusive,” “sustainable,” and “dependable,” the realization of cyber physical systems (CPS) that integrate cyber space and physical spaces on an information and communications network centering on “beyond 5G,” and the realization of “Society 5.0,” which will resolve many different social issues while achieving economic growth by maximizing utilization of big data generated.

In our industry, the MVNO and FVNO markets have undergone enormous change. In the MVNO market, to ensure a fair and competitive business environment, carriers are now expected to offer easy-to-understand, reasonable fee structures and services while continuing to work on initiatives to encourage fair competition and smooth inter-carrier portability. For the FVNO market, we can expect efforts toward enhancing competition in the telecom market to lead to developments such as a greater diversity of service offerings and more affordable pricing. Other than providing safe and secure communications services, carriers are expected to take detailed care in responding to the requests of consumers. Toward the realization of a safe and secure network society, which is part of the association’s vision, besides engagement through various committee activities, Telesa will cooperate with related organizations and work to develop an environment for users to utilize ICT in a safe and secure manner.

Going forward, we will strive for future changes in the ICT field in a unified manner so that we make steady contributions to the development of the ICT sector and the improvement of people’s lifestyles. We ask for your continued support and patronage for our initiatives.