With the communications dynamics of the oil & gas sector extending beyond the geology and seismology of locating and extracting raw energy sources from underground or beneath the sea, to include the various individual segments of the industry vertical as a whole, the communications requirements of the industry are obviously very extensive.  Panel 8 will explore the practicalities of extending the bandwidth employed by the ‘turnkey solutions’ that are so often required by ICT mangers in the sector to a true end-to-end connectivity, that is able to serve not only the entire range of oil & gas industry communications demands at any one physical location but which can also be used by organisations and agencies within the local area, such as schools and local government offices, at times when the industry’s demand on the available bandwidth is low.  The example of the use of real-time video applications will be discussed as a case-in-point, in terms of how the technology behind the application may be considered as a shared resource when oil and gas industry demand falls-off to allow other potential end-users access.  A new take on sharing the benefits of connectivity and Bridging the Digital Divide!