The Big Question: Vodafone CEO top of the Agenda

Mobile phones are going to completely change the way the world works, and Chris Gent, CEO of Vodafone, will be at the centre of that revolution.

That's the view of Silicon.com guests in this week's Big Question. A select panel of experts affirmed Gent's right to the top spot and confirmed Silicon.com's Agenda Setters 2000 poll. In the survey, Gent was awarded the highest accolade for his power in Europe, longevity and vision.

Andrew Boswell, CTO at ICL, explained: "Over the next year or two we're going to see yet another wave of change as people start to use mobile phones to access the Internet. This is gong to change people's lives even more dramatically than we have seen to date with the Web. And Gent is in a brilliant position to continue that lead."

Brinley Platts, managing director of the Impact Programme, agreed: "I think he's had tremendous vision, not just with the mobile telephone, but also mobile devices generally. I think that he's dominating the world at the moment and he's taken what was a good company and made it a fantastic global player. We probably haven't seen the end of it yet."

However, Dirk Gates, CEO of Xircom, maintained Gent's leading role is only applicable in Europe. Gates said: "If it was a worldwide poll I would have to go with the number two, which is Steve Case. I think he's really going to change the industry radically."

Gates wasn't the only Silicon guest to point to an alternative number one contender. Duncan Chapple, analyst at Ovum, insisted Linus Torvalds will have a profound effect on the technology industry over the next 20 years. "It's not just changed the choices of what is available on the server - it has introduced a completely different paradigm for developing software that will encourage brand new business models and fantastic opportunities."

You can see the full Vox Pop on Silicon.com today (http://www.silicon.com/a36554 ) - but don't forget to let us know who you think should have topped our poll at http://www.silicon.com/agendasetters2000 .
We'll be publishing the result of the viewers' poll later this week.