(Note 1) Nowadays it is becoming more and more common for people, businesses and public administration to use the internet as a means of exchanging information and data and accessing services. Telecommunications infrastructure needs to extend the availability of broadband services that can keep up with the population's data transfer requirements in order to ensure they become more common and more efficient. Telecommunications networks are therefore seen as a strategic asset towards guaranteeing the social, cultural and economic advancement of an area. The net will be used to provide ever more complex and developed services, such as Telemedicine and Telehealth, Telework and Videoconferencing, as well as services for businesses for sharing applications and computer resources, e.g. Software as a Service (SaaS), utility and cloud computing.
Given the social and economic importance of providing broadband services and the network infrastructure to enable the use of such services in the region, the regional government has created Centro Regionale di Competenza sulla banda larga, its Department Specialised in Broadband, to provide technical and administrative support and to better coordinate, organise and monitor activity in this field, also through the use of new tools such as its annual Operational Plans.
Various initiatives have been undertaken so far by the Department Specialised in Broadband, with the aim of continuously updating the provision of broadband infrastructure and services to the population. Since 2007 a survey has been carried out in the first few months of every year to find out from the region's telecommunications businesses what the current state of play is in terms of broadband coverage throughout the region.
A web-based survey was also carried out in January 2009 (using the regional broadband portal) of all of the municipal authorities in Veneto in order to find out about broadband coverage, not only in the municipal capitals but above all in the decentralised areas, to count the number of service providers, and to monitor the presence of fibre optic networks or other initiatives regarding broadband within the region.
The Department Specialised in Broadband has also created a web portal designed to collect documentation, knowledge and experiences on activity in this field within the region and to share this know-how with the outside world.
Lastly, a monitoring system known as the "broadband dashboard" has been created; this is for internal administrative use and can be personalised to give different levels of detail on the progress of particular phenomena in the sector.

The spread of connection services and the increasing use of online services are the main driving force behind the development of advanced network infrastructure. In 2008 over 4 million citizens in Veneto had access to broadband connections with a download speed of 640 kbps or more, a share of 92.4% of the region's residents. In 2009 this share rose to almost 95% of residents (Note 2). The increase in the spread of connection services has accompanied a clear intensification in the use of online services.
In Italy in particular, 70-80% of citizens use email and the internet, and this is growing. In 30-50% of cases, citizens also use the internet for their daily information (radio, newspapers) and for more specific purposes (information on health and work), and this is also on the increase (Note 3).
This means that connecting all Italian citizens to the network has become an essential objective. To this regard, Veneto's regional administration has set up an initiative to support the spread of internet access through public-access points, where aid and training are available to help improve citizens' computer skills and knowledge of the internet and its available services, in particular of eGovernment.
Regarding businesses, Italian enterprises which have more than 10 employees (excluding the financial sector) use the net fairly intensively, in particular to exchange data and information with suppliers, partners and clients (more than one-fifth of businesses) and to interact with public administration (more than 80% of businesses). Managing trade online (buying and selling, i.e. ecommerce) is less common, but could reach up to 20% (in line with the European figure) (Note 4).
Many small and micro enterprises are still far from computerising the management of their businesses as this often requires implementation plans which are demanding and fairly lengthy. The spread of broadband networks and the provision of online application services, storage and resource sharing for calculations and processing (utilty and cloud computing) would enable cuts to costs and times in making solutions for computerisation available to businesses. Regional administration is also involved in supporting the spread of computerised services for small and extremely small businesses in the region.