1.1 The Committee was set up this March by Mr Kenneth Baker, the Minister for Information Technology, to advise on the scope for a collaborative research programme in information technology (IT) and to make recommendations. We were asked to report during the summer.
1.2 The catalyst to the formation of the Committee was the unveiling last October of Japan's Fifth Generation Computer Programme, and Japan's invitation to other countries, including the UK, to discuss participation in this Programme. The UK delegation to the conference in Tokyo at which the Programme was announced reported back to a conference in London in January, which was attended by a representative cross-section of industrialists and other experts. The scale and cohesiveness of this and other Japanese programmes, which we outline later, were seen by this conference as a major competitive threat. There was also the response to the Japanese programme which was bound to be made by the US industry which would create an equal if not greater degree of competition for the UK industry. In the light of these factors the conference called for an urgent study into the scope for collaboration in the UK, geared to our particular strengths and requirements. Our remit was to conduct this study.
1.3 A major objective of the Japanese Programme is to apply information technology to those areas of society where increases in efficiency and productivity could be most beneficial. These are largely the areas in which existing information technology has not been successfully applied. The Japanese analysis of the reasons for this has indicated the clear necessity to overcome the limitations inherent in existing technology, as well as the need to improve understanding of how to successfully apply the technology. Apart from making the technology more widely and cheaply available, which is also clearly the objective of some of their other strategies, the Fifth Generation Project is aimed particularly at improving the ease with which the technology can be used, and at the use of IT for knowledge processing as opposed to data processing and computation. We believe they have correctly identified the major advances in the technology which will be necessary to achieve these objectives and we believe they are right in identifying that the magnitude of the advances required is such that collaboration in the necessary research is highly desirable.
1.4 From our studies and discussions we have concluded not merely that there is scope in the UK for collaborative research but that such collaborative endeavours are essential if we are to preserve and strengthen our capability and competitiveness in IT. We have identified four key areas in which we believe major technical advances are required if the more wide-ranging application of IT in the future is to be achieved. We propose a programme for Advanced Information Technology (AIT) which selects and focuses upon a number of specific projects and tasks which we believe should be given priority and which together form a coherent collaborative action plan. The content of this programme will need to be kept constantly under review and the programme must be managed in a flexible and adaptive manner as events unfold and as research results are obtained.
1.5 There are other potentially important areas of technology which are not covered by our programme. There needs to be a continuing review of the UK's technological capability in IT which will consider inter alia the relative priorities of many developing areas of the technology.
1.6 Collaborative research, with which this report is concerned, is of course only one part of an overall UK IT strategy, and whilst it is of great importance it is of little value alone. Other parts of the overall strategy such as the present Department of Industry Awareness, Promotion and Development support schemes, and the strategic use of Government procurement are vital and must continue, to complement the collaborative research.
1.7 There are yet other matters to which attention should be given as part of an overall IT strategy and with which we have not dealt. There is much that could be done to improve the exploitation of existing technology and the scope for Government stimulated collaboration in this should be examined with some urgency. Any actions which would take forward the efficient and productive use of existing information technology will pave the way to the subsequent use of the more advanced technology which will emerge from the collaborative programme which we now propose. We believe it is particularly important to improve the capability of the users of IT. The understanding in all sectors of society concerning the scope for the use of IT is very poor, despite the many measures already taken.
1.8 The four major technical areas we have identified in our AIT Programme are: Software Engineering, Man Machine Interfaces (MMI), Intelligent Knowledge Based Systems (IKBS) and Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI). These sectors and the close inter-relationship between them are discussed in detail in the report. Working Groups were set up to devise action plans in these sectors. These form the heart of our programme. The Working Groups consulted a wide range of industrial, academic and other expert opinion in the UK and took account of overseas developments. They also drew upon current studies being carried out by a dozen or so of Europe's leading IT companies under the auspices of the European Commission. A list of those who participated in these Working Groups or provided inputs to them is at the Appendix.
1.9 There is a solid consensus amongst industrialists and among the many other knowledgeable people in the IT community whom we have consulted that the areas which we have identified are key to the future development of IT in this country. There is general agreement on the priorities which need to be tackled in these sectors and our report reflects this. We believe that the thrust of the programme which we recommend, will be widely welcomed and supported. We urge that it be implemented speedily.
