February 2001

Czech Republic Summary Report (1999 - 2000)

Unlike the previous governments, the current Government has directly declared support of the development of the Information Society already in August 1998, directly in its mission statement. (see http://www.vlada.cz/vlada/dokumenty/prohlas.win.htm).

1.1 The political situation and its consequences for creating of the legislative framework of the IS

The actual efforts to implement the mission statement have been starting up rather slowly in the recent years, particularly due to political. The efforts had been rather formal at first, i.e. when the Governmental Council for the State Information Policy (www.vlada.cz/rady/sip/sip.win.htm) had been established in December 1998 and the document, called The State Information Policy – The Way to the Information Society (www.vlada.cz/rady/sip/dokumenty/sipcesta/sip.win.htm), which has been approved by the Government during its session on May 31, 1999

Some unimportant activities have also been carried out by the Czech Forum for Information Society (www.vlada.cz/rady/sip/forum/dokumenty/csfrpis.win.htm), which has been established at the end of 1999 based on an initiative of the Czech Government as a platform for dialogue about the issue of development of the Information Society, with a wide range of external specialists as well as laymen from different social spheres.

Thus the preparations of other governmental decisions, measures and activities in the first quarter of 2000 took place more or less out of sight of professional as well as general public, which can be, for example, said about preparations of the "Draft of the basic measures for supporting of the e-commerce in the Czech Republic", which was approved by the Governmental Decree No. 56 from January 1, 2000, based on a proposition of the State Information System Office.

Rather clumsy media, information and communication policy of the State Information System Office, which has been, among other things, reason for complaint by the influential Industry and Transport Union (www.spcr.cz) to the representatives of the Government, which resulted in dissolving of this office as of October 23, 2000 and establishing new Public Information Systems Office as of the same date, with the same staff and same seat.

Greater development in activities of the Czech Government in the field of development of the Information Society has occurred only when the new Minister without portfolio, Mr. Karel Březina (www.vlada.cz/_AUTOCHARSET/vláda/sekmivl/html/zivotopis_frm.htm), Head of the Governmental Office (www.vlada.cz/1250/urad/urad_postaveni.htm). Mr. Březina has also taken over the function of Chairman of the Governmental Office for the State Information Policy from the Economic Vice-Chairman and Minister of Finance, Mr. Pavel Mertlík.

This particular change contributed also to increased governmental support to development of the Information Society in the following months. Already during the session of the Government on April 24, 2000, the Concept of the State Information Policy in Education (www.msmt.cz/pdf/kestazeni/SIPveVZ.doc), has been approved, which expects every single school in the Czech Republic to be connected to the Internet until the end of 2001. During one of the later sessions on April 27, 2000, complete Action Plan for Implementation of the State Information Policy Until 2002 has been approved (see www.vlada.cz/1250/vrk/rady/sip/sip.htm).

The outlined steps taken by the Czech Government have had a positive influence on the successful accomplishment of an approval process of the Electronic Signature Bill (www.spis.cz/ZEP/zep.htm), which has been approved on June 10, 2000. The Czech Republic became the first country of the Central and Eastern Europe to have such a law formally in power, however, in practical terms, the effectiveness of the law has been postponed until mid-2001, when the respective documents will be issued by the Personal Data Protection Office, whose director, Mr. Karel Neuwirt, has been appointed only on August 29, 2000.

Shortly after the approval of the Electronic Signature Act, on July 17, 2000, Minister Březina presented a start of a new governmental activity: “Realisation of involving of the private sector in the state information policy“ (or „Public Private Partnership"), through which the Government of the Czech Republic turns to the private sector with invitation for active co-operation in support of development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic.

Minister Březina has actually started collecting suggestions for practical activities of the Public Private Partnership in the following months also by taking part in press and other conferences, such as the press conference of the ESIS II project in the Czech Republic, which took place on October 3, 2000 in the EU Prague Information Centre, the Information Society and the New Economy of the Czech Republic program (www.park.cz/esis), which took place on November 21, 2201 or the informal debates with free lance specialists, known as e-breakfast.

However, activity, which had a great media attention but failed at the end of 2000 due to different views of the minority Cabinet and the majority opposition, was amending of several laws, the purpose of which was to provide tax relieves for citizens buying computers. A rather controversial activity of the Government, which found support of the Parliament, has been approval of the Telecommunications Act (www.psp.cz/sqw/text/tiskt.sqw?O=3&CT=390&CT1=0), which enables the incumbent telecommunication operator, Cesky Telecom, not to provide their customers with the option of call-by-call selection of operator, despite the long awaited liberalisation of the Czech telecommunication market as of January 1, 2001 and despite the fact that the relevant EU Directive No. 98/61/EC does not allow such postponement.

Thus it is hardly surprising that great media attention has been paid to the tender for wireless FWA network licenses holders in the second half of 2000. According to the results, published on September 10, 2000, the winners of the tender are companies or consortiums Broadnet, GiTy/STAR ONE and Nextra, there of the latter two put their first local networks in selected Czech cities into operation already by the end of November 2000.

Another governmental activity, closely followed by the media in the second half of 2000, has been the preparations for sale of licenses for operating of UMTS mobile telecommunication networks – also thanks to the expected revenue from such sale of CZK 20 billion, which amount was included into the revenues of the state budget in 2001 after reaching agreement with the opposition. Approving of the state budget for 2001, which also contains an entry for covering of expenses, incurred during implementation of the Action plan of implementation of the state information policy in 2001 in the total amount of CZK 880 min (i.e. approx. Euro 25 min), and of the plans for implementation of the Concept of the state information policy in education in 2001 in the total amount of approx. CZK 7 billion (i.e. approx. Euro 200 min), can be considered practical conclusion of the governmental activities in the field of support of development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic.

The fact that the practical implementation of some of the governmental intentions could lead to some rather controversial results in 2001 is supported by a proposal, which the Government had to decide about at the end of 2000 and in which the open effort to maximise the price of the state-owned share in the Cesky Telecom communication company. Cesky Telecom, which had a monopoly for providing of public voice telecommunication services in fixed networks, proposed to receive a governmental exception in 2001 from the law on public tenders and to become the operator of the information infrastructure of the public administration – including data and multimedia services.

1.2 IS supportive activities of other state administration bodies and reaction of the media and public

One of the activities of the state administration, which has been performed since 1997 and which demonstrates the elementary advantages of the Information Society in ensuring free access of citizens to information, has been establishing and further development of the publicly accessible online version of the Trade Register (see http://www.justice.cz/cgi-bin/sqw1250.cgi/or/l_hled.sqw). This online service of the Ministry of Justice of the Czech Republic (see www.justice.cz) has been gradually extended with the possibility of searching of the individual entities by names of corporate body co-owners and liquidated companies. This meant decisive breakthrough for the increasing transparency of the Czech business sphere and thus for practical promotion of the opportunities brought by the Information Society.

During the autumn of 1999, the Ministry of Finance of the Czech Republic (see www.mfcr.cz) made accessible its online system of providing of selected information from the Ares meta-register (see http://wwwinfo.mfr.cz), which, apart from the information from the Trade Register, uses the information of other public registers, such as the Register of Economic Entities, the Business Register and other registers (Church Register, etc.

An important contribution to promotion of the advantages of the Information Society was brought also by the Ministry of Interior of the Czech Republic (see http://www.mvcr.cz), which has made publicly accessible an interactive Internet application Search of motor vehicles (see http://www.mvcr.cz/vozidla/default.asp). Those who intend to buy a used car can use this application to find out, whether the concrete car is included in the database of vehicles, theft of which on the territory of the Czech Republic has been reported to the Czech Police within the last three.

The practical promotion of utilisation of advantages of the Information Society has also been substantially contributed to by starting up and further development of the public information interface of the House of Commons of the Parliament of the Czech Republic (www.psp.cz), through which the general public can not only monitor the work of the House but also communicate with the MPs via the e-mail.

The development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic received indirect but still important support at the beginning of October 2000, when the current Chairman of the House of Commons of the Czech Parliament and the former Prime Minister, Mr. Václav Klaus, took part in the opening debate of the INVEX COMPUTER 2000 trade fair (www.invex.cz). Even though Mr. Klaus does not hide his negative opinion on the emerging Information Society changing some of the established laws of economics, he changed his attitude from a sceptic towards possibilities of practical use of the Internet and information technologies to rather a pragmatic Internet user, who has his own web pages (www.klaus.cz).

2.1 Branch-focused and expert-focused associations and unions

One of the first branch-focused associations, founding of which has been a direct reaction to the origins of the development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic, was Association of Content Providers (APO http://www.apo.cz), founded in 1997. This association, however, have not performed any activities during 2000 and thus it comes as no surprise that founding of an alternative Association for Internet Advertising has been announced on August 28, 2000 (www.spir.cz).

Another branch-focused association, which has been established with the goal of active support of development of the Information Society is the Association for Information Society (www.spis.cz), members of which are particularly influential entities from among suppliers of information and telecommunication technologies. Activities of this association during the second half of 2000 focused particularly on intense lobbying at state institutions of the Czech Republic, also through the regular debates with representatives of the state administration during the so-called "Club Evenings of the Association for Information Society". An actual practical result of activities of the association has been approval of the Electronic Signature Act, the original bill of which has been prepared by specialists, hired by this association.

During the second half of 2000, also the Association for Electronic Commerce (www.apek.cz) and Centre for electronic Commerce (CEO) (www.e-commerce.cz). The APEK association, which has been carrying out, e.g. the project of certifying of electronic shops, acts mainly on behalf of the electronic shop owners, while CEO has been more of a platform for co-operation of individuals and companies from the business sphere, state administration and schools.

Formally, Centre for Electronic Commerce has emerged as a specialised section of the Czech Society for System Integration (www.cssi.cz), which also partially finances its operations. One of the most important current activities of CEO has been co-operation with the FEMIRC-CZ Czech centre (www.femirc.cas.cz) with distribution of information about the possibilities of financing of projects, supporting the Information Society, from funds of the 5. Framework Project of the EU (www.park.cz/fp5), accepting of a patronage over the Czech branch of the First Tuesday project (www.park.cz/firsttuesday) or participation in organising of the Information Society and New Economy in the Czech Republic conference (www.park.cz/esis).

The civil association "March the Internet Month" (www.brezen.cz) started developing its activities in a very intense matter during the last months of 2000. This association had then already started preparing and promoting another, fourth round of its framework promotional initiative. Within the framework of this activity, number of different conferences, seminars, contests and other promotional events will take place in March 2001, with the goal of supporting development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic.

The increasing intensity of events, concerning development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic, has been increasingly reacted to by, for example, the influential Industry and Transport Union (www.spcr.cz), the activities of which have been greatly strengthened in the second half of 1999, when the President of Association for Information Society, Mr. Zbyšek Bahenský, has been elected the member of its board of directors. Mr. Bahenský has contributed significantly to development of activities of the Association for Information Society in the Chamber of Commerce of the Czech Republic (www.hkcr.cz) and the governmental Czech Forum for Information Society (he was elected its Chairman on November 29, 2000).

2.2 Online media

The issue of development of the Information Society has attracted attention of the Czech mass media particularly after these media started to provide quality online information services via the Internet. Development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic has been substantially accelerated during the second half of 1990´s thanks to making available the online news service of the Ceska Tiskova Kancelar (Czech Press Agency) (www.ceskenoviny.cz), commencement of online Internet broadcasting of the state-owned Cesky Rozhlas (Czech Radio) (www.cro.cz), putting into operation of online version of one of the most read Czech dailies, called iDnes (www.idnes.cz) or thanks to opening of an online Internet version of the economic daily Hospodářské noviny, called iHNed (www.ihned.cz).

Promotion of the idea of Information Society in the sphere of retail enterprise has been substantially contributed to by both paper and Internet version of the Profit economic daily (www.profit.cz) and mobile telephony and telecommunication Internet magazine, called Mobil Server (www.mobil.cz). The promotion of the Information society among the youth by the state-owned media is represented particularly by a specialised Czech Television weekly called Zavin@č (http://www.zavinac.com) and a radio weekly of the Czech Radio, called Megabajt.

One of the popular online media has traditionally been the independent "political, family and dog daily www-paper" The Invisible Dog (http://pes.eunet.cz), which has become the very first regularly updated Czech online daily in 1996. Among the www-services, which make researching of the requested content on the Czech Internet easier, the Centrum search engine (http://www.centrum.cz) has become rather successful in 2000 and it has been successfully competing with the well established services of the Atlas (see http://www.atlas.cz) and the Seznam (see http://www.seznam.cz). All the three portals have already received funding from foreign investors.

A similar path of the above mentioned Internet portals, which provide searching engines as well as up-to-date news and some other services, has been followed by a portal, operated by the M.I.A. company (www.mia.cz), which has been taken over by the still monopolistic Cesky Telecom (http://www.telecom.cz), which included its services into its new integrated portal QUICK (www.quick.cz) in the autumn of 2000.

2.3 Media and advisory companies

Increasingly detailed information about the state of development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic started to be published particularly in 1999 and 2000. While companies as IDC (www.idccentraleurope.com) have traditionally been focusing on mapping of development of information and communication infrastructure in the Czech Republic, another multinational consulting company Deloitte & Touche (www.deloitte.cz) has published several rounds of its researches, which deal with development of electronic commerce in the Czech Republic.

Substantial media attention during the second half of 2000 has been attracted, for example, by the results of the electronic commerce development research, according to which the turnover of the researched group of the Czech Internet shops increased by 497% year-to-year to CZK 30 min (approx. Euro 1 min) in the second half of 2000.

A great media attention in December 2000 has been attracted by a statement of the Czech Press Agency (www.ceskenoviny.cz), according to which the number of mobile phones, operated in the Czech Republic, should reach approximately 4 million by the end of 2000,whichmeans the total penetration of this technology within the general Czech population should be approx. 40%, i.e. 10% more than only six months ago!

Certain specialised Czech entities publish information, structured in even more detail, concerning the current state and the further development of several key indicators of the development of the Information Society in the Czech Republic. As examples of this approach can be seen the periodical mapping of the trends in the utilisation of information technologies in the individual segments of the Czech economy, the results of which have been continuously published in the EISF Inside project (see http://www.eisf.cz) during the fourth quarter of 2000, or the repeated Internet Users Survey (http://www.park.cz/pruzkum), which has already gone through its four round in the fourth quarter of 2000. The characteristics of the Internet users are also subject to the researches organised by the Acron (see http://www.monitor.cz/analyzy.html), GfK (see http://www.gfk.cz) and Medián (see http://www.median.cz) companies.

2.4 Fairs exhibitions, conferences and seminars

The trade fair, extent and importance of which has very much exceeded the importance of any other similar event, is the information and communication technologies fair INVEX COMPUTER (see http://www.invex.cz), held in Brno between October 9 and 13, 2000. Compared to the previous year, 17% more visitors visited the show (approx. 153 000 people more). However, compared to the previous years, Invex has suffered yet another decrease in number of exhibitors, particularly from among the providers of complex solutions for business sphere and the state administration. This fact could be considered a signal that INVEX COMPUTER has been transforming from the original professional fair to a computer "hubbub."

Even though the organisers of INVEX COMPUTER tried also in 2000 to reverse this trend by organising accompanying events, such as the second annual conference, called Information for the 21st century" (see http://konference.cpress.cz), these efforts are still rather useless. The prospective exhibitors, who’s focus is on the clientele from the company sphere, prefer to take part in events with less mass character and they opt for smaller and more particularly aimed events, several of which took place in 2000.

On September 5 – 7, 2000 the Technical University in Brno, together with the Masaryk University in Brno, organised another annual conference RUFIS (http://www.vutbr.cz/konference/rufis2000), which deals with the role of universities in the Information Society.

During the traditional International Engineering Fair in Brno, the S-COMP Centre company (www.scomp.cz) organised a seminar on September 19 in the morning, called „E-Commerce 2000 – the current state and the future." The visitors of the International Engineering Fair had the opportunity to take part in the seminar called „The Possibilities of Participation of Czech Companies in the Projects of the World Bank and in the Internet B2B-trade" (http://www.e-commerce.cz/docs/seminar-SB-190900.doc), which has been organised on the same day by the Czech Trade agency.

Only a few days after the INVEX COMPUTER 2000 fair, on October 18, 2000, the Czech Marketing Company organised its annual conference, called "Internetmarketing, which has been traditionally participated by over a hundred of marketing and PR managers of Czech companies and institutions.

The development of the previous period in the Czech Republic has been followed up with at the end of 2000 by a promotional and communication activities, organised within the framework of the First Tuesday world-wide activities (www.park.cz/firsttuesday), which are focused on various aspects of the issue establishing and financing of new companies of the New Economy. The traditional informal meeting of prospective investors, entrepreneurs and other individuals, interested in this issue, which have been taking place in Prague on every first Tuesday, have been followed up, for example, by slightly differently focused meeting, called Wireless Wednesday (www.firsttuesday.cz), which took place in Prague on September 20, 2000. This meeting has been followed by the so-called First Tuesday Bootcamp (www.firsttuesday.cz/Bootcamp.htm), which took place on October 31, 2000, and during which the business novices could made themselves acquainted with the practical experience of those, who had carried out successful Internet projects and financed them successfully. On November 14, 2000, First Tuesday eXtra conference (www.firsttuesday.cz/extra) has been organised with similar topic. Several days later, meeting of implementers of selected perspective Internet project with representatives of investors has taken place within the framework of the First Tuesday FirstFunding event (www.firsttuesday.cz/FirstFunding).

A relatively wide range of events, organised within the framework of the First Tuesday during the second half of 2000, have been further complemented by similarly focused workshops, called Bonton TechTalk (www.bontontechtalk.cz), held since January 2000 on every second Thursday, organised by the Bonton company (www.bonton.cz), which has become one of the first Czech companies in the 1990´s to finance their activities from sales of their shares on international capital markets.

From the point of view of the Czech implementation team of the ESIS II project and also from the point of view of the Czech respondents, the most important event of the third quarter of 2000 has been the conference, called Information Society and the New Economy in the Czech Republic (www.park.cz/esis), which has been organised by the ESIS II Czech implementation team (www.park.cz/esis) in co-operation with the Centre for Electronic Commerce on November 21, 2000 in the assembly room of the Senate of the Czech Parliament, and which has been taken part in by the leading representatives of the Senate and the Minister of the Government, Mr. Karel Březina (www.vlada.cz/_AUTOCHARSET/vláda/sekmivl/html/zivotopis_frm.htm).

Among purely commercial projects, promotion of the advantages of the Information Society has been started at the end of 1997 by IBM company (see http://www.ibm.cz), which launched a massive campaign promoting the commercial exploitation of the Internet by companies and financial institutions.

The commercial entities, which have been contributing to the promotion of the development of the Information society in the Czech Republic the most since 1998, has been, in particular, the extraordinarily keen and medially very active Expandia Banka (see http://www.ebanka.com), which has contributed promotion of the development of the Information society not only by focusing of integration of all forms of electronic banking but also by its project of the virtual city, called eCity (www.ecity.cz).

After the bank has acquired a strong strategic partner, Česká pojišťovna (Czech Insurance Company) (www.cpoj.cz), which, as a former monopoly insurance company, retains its dominant position on the Czech insurance market, both companies announced steps towards integration and strengthening of activities of both companies during the fourth quarter of 2000.

The September 2000 television campaign, through which the Seznam company (www.seznam.cz) promoted the Internet access via its frequently visited portal has been completely surmounted by a long-term massive campaign of the Cesky Telecom, which promoted its new portal Quick (www.quick.cz) during the fourth quarter of 2000. Simultaneously with this campaign, Cesky Telecom launched another campaign, promoting seasonal discounts on ISDN equipment and services.

4. The likely development in the coming period