The Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) will present its annual Summit from June 13-17 in Columbus, Ohio, USA. The Summit is an international gathering of mayors, chief administrative officers, chief information officers and economic development officers from cities, state and regions around the world. It is a place to find economic development opportunities, strategic partners and technology solutions that help community leaders build prosperous, inclusive and sustainable communities.

Throughout the week, the ICF Summit will feature the presentation of the 2016 Intelligent Community of the Year Award, keynote addresses, panel discussions, master classes, an economic development matchmaking session, tours of intelligent communities in the area, evening receptions and more.

The ICF Summit is open to the press, and we encourage reporters and editors to reach out to us to arrange press passes to the event.

More information about the Summit can be found below, or at www.icfsummit16.com.

Intelligent Community of the Year
On the evening of June 16, ICF will announce its selection of the Intelligent Community of the Year from among the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2016 (see below for details). Selection is based on analysis of detailed quantitative and qualitative information submitted by the communities as well as the results of an onsite inspection and the votes of a prestigious international jury.

The Intelligent Community Visionary of the Year
ICF has announced that it will present the 2016 Visionary of the Year Award to Rio de Janeiro’s Knowledge Squares (Nave de Conhecimento) program. ICF is recognizing the program for its novel approach, which makes digital inclusion the centerpiece of neighborhood regeneration for some of the city’s most impoverished and excluded citizens. A representative from Rio will be at the Intelligent Community Awards Dinner to accept the Award. Read more about the Visionary of the Year Award.

Program and Speakers
The Summit program runs through Tuesday, June 14 through Thursday, June 16, and features speakers including representatives from the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2016; former Mayor of Columbus Michael Coleman; Ipswich, Queensland Australia Mayor Paul Pisasale; Eindhoven, Netherlands Mayor Rob van Gijzel; Dr. Roberto Gallardo, Director, ICF Institute at the Mississippi State University Extension Service; Dana McDaniel, City Manager, Dublin, Ohio; and Chris Murray, City Manager, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. More speakers will be announced leading up to the event. The City of Columbus and surrounding Intelligent Communities are offering an exciting optional program featuring community tours on Monday, June 13 and an IDEAS Day on Friday, June 17. Click here for the full program and list of confirmed speakers.

The Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2016
The Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2016 were named by ICF in February. One of these Top7 Intelligent Communities will be named the Intelligent Community of the Year on June 16 at the ICF Summit in Columbus. Following are brief profiles for this year’s 2016 Top7 Intelligent Communities. More complete profiles can be found online on ICF's Website.

Hsinchu County, Taiwan: In 1980, Taiwan’s National Science Council set up the nation’s first science park in Hsinchu County, as a means to create a domestic high-tech industry. Today, the 500 companies in Hsinchu Science Park employ 150,000 people and generate US$16.6 billion in total revenue. More than 10 percent of them are spin-outs from one of many Hsinchu’s universities and research institutes. Today, the city’s challenge is to translate economic success into civic success: to make Hsinchu County a sustainable Intelligent Community with a high quality of life, where innovation is a part of people’s daily lives. Government and business are pursuing the goal on multiple fronts. Read more

Montreal, Quebec, Canada: The largest French-speaking city in North America, the Montreal Metro Area is home to more than a tenth of Canada’s population. The region was hit by the decline of heavy industry in the Eighties, and launched a large-scale transition of its economy to ICT, aerospace, life sciences, health technologies and clean tech. Together, these clusters contain more than 6,250 companies employing about 10% of the workforce. The city’s economic future depends on helping those small-scale innovators to collaborate in building a bigger future, while preserving the culture and beauty that attract 3.5 million visitors to the area each year. Read more

Muelheim an der Ruhr, Germany: To ensure that the city has the broadband infrastructure it needs, Mülheim completed an inventory of the telecom conduit network owned by multiple organizations that underlies the city, which reduces the challenges for new broadband providers and has encouraged the city to consider construction of its own network. As the city changes, it has been careful to engage organizations and citizens as partners in envisioning the future. One multi-partner initiative is coordinating a program to cut carbon emissions in half by 2030, while another is forging a new urban development model that includes everything from business and social services to sustainability and health. Read more

New Taipei City, Taiwan: New Taipei City (NTPC) became the nation’s most populous city with its official creation in December 2010. Previously, it was a county surrounding the capital city of Tapei, and NTPC has worked to unify the new city and create a dynamic economy distinct from that of the capital. Massive investments in transportation are creating highways and transit lines that, ringing Taipei, connect the city’s 29 districts and more than 1,000 villages. The NTPC government has collaborated with telecom and cable TV companies to make ADSL available to 99% of the population, while speeds of up to 60 Mbps are available to 94% and 4G WiMax reaches 85%. Read more

Surrey, British Columbia, Canada: Surrey is a city in transition, from a suburban past to a sustainable urban future. It is Canada’s third fastest-growing city, which welcomes 1,000 new residents each month and where residential construction is a major industry. It is part of the growing metropolitan area of Vancouver, from which it derives most of its economic energy today. To gain greater control over its destiny, Surrey has developed a diversification strategy calling for deepening the partnership between its institutions of higher learning and local business. Development is focused on an Innovation Boulevard project, where the city, universities and business are building clusters in health technology, clean tech and advanced manufacturing. Read more

Whanganui, New Zealand: Bypassed by national rail lines in the 19^th Century – which led to the closing of a railways workshop that was a major employer – it was bypassed again by broadband providers in the 20th. For Whanganui, on the southwest coast of New Zealand’s North Island, the best of times may lie ahead. Rich in natural beauty and culture, Whanganui is currently the ninth poorest district in New Zealand and ranks near the bottom of the national index of social deprivation. However, the city has begun its transformation and is in the 8^th year of a” Family-Friendly Strategy” that has overlaid broadband on goals set for the economy, community partnerships, health, safety, cultural richness and environmental sustainability. Read more

Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada: Located midway between the two coasts of Canada, Winnipeg is the capital of a province rich in agricultural and natural resources. The city has pursued economic growth by connecting industry and education more systematically, and leveraging its indigenous geographical and cultural assets. A public-private R&D organization develops technologies and supply chains for high-performance composites based on agricultural materials, while there has been a programmatic attempt to equip its large aboriginal population with digital tools. Read more

In order to qualify as a Top7 Intelligent Community, these cities and regions first needed to become an Intelligent Community Forum Smart21 Intelligent Community. The Smart21, named in October 2015, were chosen from communities from around the world that had submitted completed Intelligent Community Index questionnaires to ICF. ICF is currently accepting submissions of the Intelligent Community Index for consideration in the 2017 Awards Program.

About Intelligent Community Forum
The Intelligent Community Forum (www.intelligentcommunity.org) think tank, headquartered in New York, is a global network of 145 counties, cities and towns with a think tank at its heart. ICF studies and promotes the best practices of the world's Intelligent Communities as they adapt to the new demands and seize the opportunities presented by information and communications technology (ICT). To help cities and towns build prosperous economies, solve social problems and enrich local cultures, the Intelligent Community Forum conducts research, hosts global events, publishes books, and produces its high-profile annual international awards program. The Forum has two Institutes in North America dedicated to the study of the movement and an affiliate ICF Canada organization. Global leaders, thinkers, and media observers follow and participate in the ongoing global dialogue initiated by the Intelligent Community Forum. In 2012 ICF was invited to participate at the Nobel Peace Prize conference in Oslo and in 2014, its model and work was recognized by the U.S. Department of Commerce under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, which, according to the American government, was "aimed at creating a more flexible and responsive system of workforce development to meet the needs of employers looking to fill 21st century jobs.” The Forum’s Foundation has an association made up of 145 designated Intelligent Communities worldwide, which is represented by mayors and key civic leaders. For more information, go to www.icf-foundation.org. For more details on the Intelligent Community Forum’s recent publications and programs, www.intelligentcommunity.org.

Intelligent Community Forum Contacts
Louis Zacharilla
Co-Founder, Intelligent Community Forum
Phone: (M) +1-917-715-0711 (O) +1-212-249-0624
Email: [email protected] – Skype: lou-zacharilla

Matthew Owen
Director of Operations, Intelligent Community Forum
Phone: (O) +1-646-291-6166 x105
Email: [email protected]