Pantelis Koutroumpis is honoured for his thesis

Top award for PhD thesis 

4 February 2011

School alumnus Pantelis Koutroumpis has been awarded a prestigious accolade for his doctoral thesis - Growth, Institutions and Investments: The Economic Impact of Telecommunications - by the American Economic Association/Allied Social Science Associations. 

He won the Transportation and Public Utilities Group 2011 Dissertation Award and received his prize at a meeting in Denver. Now working as an economist at the European Investment Bank, Dr Koutroumpis is continuing to research the effects of mobile infrastructure on economic growth and productivity. 

His supervisor at the School, Prof Tommaso Valletti, said: “His thesis was of the highest quality and fully deserved the prize. From the start of his studies it was clear that Pantelis was an exceptional doctoral student even in an institution with standards as high as Imperial’s.” 

The first part of his thesis examines whether there is a link between investment in broadband infrastructure and country-level growth. 

Explained Dr Koutroumpis: "What emerged was a two-way relationship. The results show a strong positive link and suggest that a critical level of investment in telecoms can result in rewards for an economy. 

“Simply, once more than half the population has access to broadband, returns to the economy, at least double - when compared to countries with lower broadband access. This has important implications for regulators and policy makers in the developed and developing world.” 

The second part of the thesis presents a global index measuring telecommunications regulatory governance and the relationship to social infrastructure and the third at the diffusion of different generations of mobile telecommunications technologies.

Ends

Notes to Editors

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