Siilasmaa spoke at a briefing in connection with the Informal Meeting of the Ministers of Industry of the European Union that took place in Oulu in Northern Finland. Siilasmaa illustrated the threat which the dominance of the United States in the software industry poses to the European economies. Software is becoming the source of an indirect competitive advantage in almost every industry. Most industrial products are becoming intelligent and networked.
Software enables the intelligence.
The better the software competence, the more competitive the products and services, Siilasmaa said in his speech. Currently, the software industry in the United States is far ahead of its European counterpart. US companies generate 78 percent of all software sales. Siilasmaa emphasized the vast economic potential the software industry can have. The industry had 2,065,000 jobs in 1996 and is estimated to be 3,345,000 by the end of 2005.