ICT sector in Benelux

With its first-class infrastructures and telecommunication networks, linked to the long-term presence of two home grown European giants in the technology field, namely RTL Group in media and SES in satellite transmission, a strong and vibrant ICT community has been growing in Luxembourg.  Amazon,  iTunes,  eBay, PayPal, Vodafone, RealNetworks, Rakuten, Skype and many other ICT companies have chosen the Grand Duchy as a platform to access worldwide markets. Many state-of-the-art data centres are well-established in Luxembourg and provide full range data storage, management and processing service at all quality levels, whilst also incorporating the latest Green ICT thinking.

Belgium’s ICT sector is currently contributing over 4% of Belgium’s gross domestic product, and between 1997 and 2007 it accounted for a sixth of the country’s growth in GDP. The latest IT Industry Competitiveness Index 2009 ranked Belgium in eighteenth place worldwide.

Belgium has excellent network infrastructure. Thanks to a competitive fixed network market, more than 99% of households have access to a coaxial network and/or copper pair network. Over 70% of the population can potentially download files at a rate of 20 Mbit/s, and the country’s optical fibre network is constantly being expanded. Where mobile communications are concerned, Belgium’s 3G network already boasts 90% coverage and the upgrade to a 4G network will soon be made.

The Brussels ICT sector numbers nearly 2,000 companies, employs 30,000 people and generates annual revenue totaling €4.5 billion!

The Netherlands is the fourth-largest exporter of IT services, after the US, UK and Germany, ranks ninth in the 2009-2010 Top-10 of the ICT Index of the World Economic Forum. The Netherlands is a major driving force behind two crucial European initiatives in the area of embedded systems. During 2009, ICT expenditure in the Netherlands amounted to 29.1 billion euros. There were 25,500 ICT companies and approximately 268,000 ICT professionals in the Netherlands in 2009.

The software sector is a valuable and important economic sector in the Netherlands with a turnover of 25 billion euros and a gross added value of 17.3 billion euros.

Biggest Companies in the sector

ICT Clusters

ICT Fairs