US concedes top spot to a more consistent performer

The United States loses the top spot in the Connectivity Scorecard 2010, largely due to more consistent performances delivered by this year’s leader, Sweden. The US, however, remains one of the strongest performers in the leading group of countries on the Scorecard, with no overwhelming gaps in any category.

The country achieves the top score in business infrastructure, boasting a high number of secure internet servers, reflecting a strong and sophisticated e-commerce culture, and also a high penetration of fixed and mobile business telephony. The US gets a high score in consumer usage and skills, driven by high and frequent internet usage by consumers and the highest consumption of voice telephony services. The US also performs well in government related metrics with a high availability and usage of online services, and internet access in virtually all schools.

The US falters in consumer infrastructure where it has witnessed the gap widen compared to leading countries such as Japan, Korea and Hong Kong. The country has a mixed performance in consumer infrastructure, with modest yet uneven levels of home broadband penetration, and lagging particularly in broadband infrastructure quality as measured by peak and average download speeds. Its performance on the metric of human capital quality introduced this year also raises concerns. Whilst the US fares well on account of an early lead in university enrolments and graduation rates, its mediocre performance in recent graduation rates shows that it is fast losing that advantage.

U.S. Connectivity Performance by Scorecard Component