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 discussion exploring how the "datafication" of business and institutions is creating wholesale change in business economics, practices and employment, and how communities should prepare to respond. Moderated by Roberto Gallardo.

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.

“There are few things in life that are free. Being recognized as an Intelligent Community may just be one of them.”

That was the beginning of the blog on August 5, 2015 about the benefits that communities can expect by successfully applying to be recognized as a SMART21 Intelligent Community via https://www.intelligentcommunity.org/nominations. I have often been asked what the benefits are from the unique ICF Awards Program and I have referred them to the original blog from August 2015. But three years later, I felt we needed to update the original. Besides, the original listed only 12 benefits. Today, we are listing an amazing Top 20 Reasons.

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.

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.

ICF Director of Operations Matthew Owen sits down with ICF Co-Founder Lou Zacharilla for part 2 in this special series discussing 2018’s Top7 Intelligent Communities of the Year. This week, Matt and Lou focus on Ipswich, Queensland, Australia and Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.

ICF Director of Operations Matthew Owen sits down with ICF Co-Founder Robert Bell to discuss three of 2018's Top7 Intelligent Communities of the Year: Chiayi City, Taiwan; Hamilton, Ontario, Canada; and Taoyuan, Taiwan.

A Weekly Update on ICF’s 2018 Summit & Intelligent Community of the Year Awards

Last week I returned home from Vietnam & from London, where I met with one of our hosts, David Brunnen of Groupe Intellex, to review our pending 2018 Summit. David has been writing extensively about broadband issues and the “smart to Intelligent” concept as it applies to England for several years. As you will recall, he and his colleagues attended the last few ICF Summits and, after deliberation, the group decided to bring the ICF event to London in a time when the nation heads into uncharted waters and the future of its cities will be very different – in perhaps the best possible way.