The government has been urged to invest in more than just high-speed broadband to enable the UK's digital industries to compete with their European and American rivals.

Speaking at a roundtable discussion organised by hosting provider UKFast, sales and marketing director for Wirebox and Flairsoft Carl Browns stressed the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition needs to have a better understanding of the sector.

According to Mr Browns, the use of open-source platforms enables the developer to halve the production time on new games, which in turn helps the company substantially.

He reminded fellow panellists at the event of the administration's pledge to support industries such as the creative sector that have the ability to outperform financial services providers in terms of their contribution to the economy by 2014.

"The government needs to back this industry properly. They've committed to investing in high-speed broadband to make the web more accessible but they need to address the skills shortage," the expert was quoted by RFP Connect as saying.

In particular, Mr Browns claimed there is a "severe lack" of decent iPhone games developers in London, meaning those that do exist command very high salaries.

Jonathan Bowers, communications director at UKFast, added: "Competing in any industry now depends on the quality of digital skills the company possesses."

Under the government's plans to improve the UK's broadband infrastructure, 90 per cent of the population will have access to super-fast services, with the remainder being able to connect to 2Mbps lines.

Last month, Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt announced the allocation of £56.9 million of funding to boost broadband provision in Wales, where fast internet is not available to many rural and remote communities.

According to Mr Hunt, if the Welsh government is able to match the investment from the Conservative-led coalition, it will be able to roll out super-fast speeds of at least 24Mbps to nine in ten homes and businesses across the country.

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23rd September 2009

When is the govt going to stop ISPs from selling products lower than the consumer believes. Its basically fraud when 99% of people do not understand they are talking in megaBITS and not BYTES. There is a world of difference between the two. Companies should be forced to stop using the megabit rating and have to use actual throughput speeds, in terms that an average consumer can meaningfully understand. As an IT professional, this practice makes me sick and I am constantly disappointed in the govts lack of understanding (they need to learn the difference too... when will we get a govt that knows what a computer is?)