Forum2000: Empowering the Internet @ Home is being hosted by Parks Associates October 17-19 in San Francisco at the Fairmont Hotel. This year, Forum2000 focuses on the business and technology-based product opportunities emerging from the rapid diffusion of the Internet into US homes. Featured speakers are from the industries creating new IP-based services, systems, and user devices including security, computing, broadband access, controls, entertainment, home networking, and community intranet.

Sears & Roebuck, Invensys, Panja, Home Director, Sony, CISCO, Personal Genie, ADT, IBM, Qubit, Telcordia, and Enron among others will present on initiatives and new products that bring consumers more benefits from the Internet and networking. With topics ranging from emerging Internet-enabled home systems/information appliances to community Intranet, Forum2000 will draw more than 250 executives and planners from the security, computing, networking, appliances, information devices, energy services, broadband access, and entertainment product industries.

Parks Associates forecasts that 24 million US households will have a broadband connection by 2004 (Figure 1). Paralleling this growth are new opportunities in home networking; an increase of services using IP for security, entertainment, controls, and even home appliance applications; and increasing opportunities for devices that benefit from IP capabilities (Figure 2). These developments are spawning the introduction of new devices to access information and control home systems and products.

The circle of change also encompasses distribution and advertising. More alliances and ventures will join those that exist today. These opportunities, across industries and between multiple players, are the focus of Forum2000 .

"The penetration of Internet technologies and services will fundamentally shift the ways in which consumers and home systems leverage data," said Kurt Scherf, Senior Analyst at Parks Associates. "Beyond ‘home networking,’ high-speed and always-on Internet connections will pave the road for enhanced control, security, and efficiency in the home."

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