This collection contains papers of the

27th European Regional ITS Conference
Cambridge, UK, 7th – 9th September 2016

"The evolution of the north-south telecommunications divide: the role for Europe"

Worldwide telecommunications and Internet provide the integrated infrastructure used for the global sharing of information, economic and financial transactions in an integrated World economy. This shared availability of information also plays a key role in motivating and coordinating mass social phenomena such as economic and political migrations that are currently redefining integration policies in Europe. Moreover, migrant communities often maintain their internal social links through mobile social media, the diffusion of which is adding richness and complexity to emerging European identity.These macro social and economic phenomena rest on the existing worldwide information infrastructure, that has emerged from an initial public investment in the original Internet backbone and has, since then, evolved into a complex ever-changing information ecosystem, where traditional carriers, internet exchange points, mobile operators and content providers interconnect. The accessibility and affordability of this information infrastructure varies significantly between developed and developing countries and between rural and urban areas in Europe. The societal and economic implications of these information divides risk to create new barriers to participation and new forms of marginalisation in the world economy.The 27th European Regional ITS Conference aims to address these issues and their implications for Europe’s dynamic telecommunications market and to provide a forum where academics, policy makers, users and operators, can identify problems and suggest solutions to shape the future evolution of the European information infrastructure and its role in the wider world.