The FutureScapes project is the brainchild of Rohit Talwar – a global futurist and founder of Fast Future Research.

Margot James was appointed Minister of State for the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport in January 2018. Margot was previously Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy from July 2016 to January 2018. She was elected Conservative MP for Stourbridge in May 2010.

Today, we continue our series of episodes recorded at the 2018 ICF Global Summit, which took place in London. This discussion was one with mayors of UK communities about the opportunities, obstacles, and processes of rising local sovereignty in the industrialized world's most centralized economy.

A panel of government, university and technology experts debate the impact, potential and perils of Big Data and Open Data to introduce the theme of the 2018 ICF Summit.

As a 25-year resident of Hudson, Jim Stifler has chosen to perform his encore career as the City of Hudson’s Chief Economic Officer. After a successful 33-year career as a Wall Street executive, Jim is able to showcase his extensive private sector experiences and use his strong ties in the community to move the City forward. 

Kari Aina Eik is the Secretary General of the OiER – Organization for International Economic Relations, www.oier.pro, an international NGO and multi-stakeholder platform based in Vienna, Austria.

Kari Aina Eik is the Secretary General of the OiER – Organization for International Economic Relations, www.oier.pro, an international NGO and multi-stakeholder platform based in Vienna, Austria.

As COO for economic development and marketing, Ben Pole drives the strategic and operational direction of Economic Development, Smart Digital City, Marketing and Communications, Tourism and Events, and Media staff and resources for Queensland’s fastest growing city. He leads integrated programs and performance for one of Australia’s most successful destination marketing organisations to achieve key market advantage and new market success, with a particular focus on developing industry leading digital networks, multi-channel content marketing, and systematic change management. Previously, he served as Director of Strategy, Marketing and Communications at Gold Coast Tourism Corporation.

Juha Ala Mursula is an experienced Economic Development Director with a demonstrated history of managing large organizations engaged in change in the public sector. With skills in product lifecycle management, embedded and open-source software, innovation management and mobile technologies, he oversees economic development in one of Finland’s leading technology centers. A graduate of the University of Oulu, he holds an MBA in international business from the Helsinki School of Economics.

On June 6, Espoo was named as the 2018 Intelligent Community of the Year. Prior to the Summit, and before knowing his community would be named Intelligent Community of the Year, Mayor Jukka Mäkelä spoke with Lou Zacharilla about Espoo.