Communities from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Taiwan and Vietnam become finalists for Intelligent Community of the Year to be named at the ICF Summit in October

(New York, USA & Binh Duong, Vietnam – June 21, 2022) – In an announcement today at the conclusion of a hybrid live and online conference, the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) named the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2022. The 20th annual Top7 list includes cities and counties from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Taiwan and Vietnam. One of these seven finalists in the think tank’s annual awards program will be named the Intelligent Community of the Year at the ICF Summit in October. (www.icfsummit.com)

I’m excited and honored to be in Vietnam this week for the Top7 Conference - Post-Pandemic Recovery: How Digital Innovation Drives Growth in Our Community, an event that is helping to create a positive, peaceful future for our cities and our world. I would like to thank Binh Duong and Becamex for inviting us here to Vietnam’s first Intelligent Community for the conference. It has been a pleasure to watch Binh Duong continuously making progress and to be here to congratulate the city on its 25th anniversary. It will be good to see my colleagues from the Netherlands and Eindhoven, too. Eindhoven remains, 11 years after its achievement as Intelligent Community of the Year, one of the best examples of what can be done with innovation, cooperation and the power of the Trip Helix.

Our theme today is “How Digital Innovation Drives Growth.” We will ask our guests: what does that mean? And what kind of growth? Economic, social and cultural, political maturity and excellence? Yes, all of these! We should be proud that in Smart Cities and Intelligent Communities, governments also innovate and learn to provide better, timelier and more reliable services to their eager cities and towns.

(June 14, 2022 – New York City, NY, USA & Binh Duong, Vietnam) – On June 21, 2022, the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) and Binh Duong province will jointly present the 2022 Top7 Intelligent Communities Conference & Announcement: After the Pandemic: How Digital Innovation Drives Growth in Our Communities. The day-long conference features live and online events in Binh Duong, culminating in the announcement of the Top7 Communities of 2022. ICF co-founder Louis Zacharilla will be at the live event to deliver the keynote address on the current state and evolution of the Intelligent Community.

The Top7 Communities are chosen from among the Smart21 Communities of 2022 to be finalists in the yearly Intelligent Community Awards. In October 2022, one of these seven communities will be named the Intelligent Community of the Year at ICF’s Global Summit. The city of Binh Duong was one of the Top7 Communities of 2021 and is a Smart21 Community again this year.

For the second time since 2017, Moscow made it to the final stage of the Intelligent Community Awards rating. It involves the cities that show best practices in the development of communications, experts training, the use of innovation, digital inclusion, the involvement of residents in city management, and the maintenance of sustainability principles. The prestigious international rating is issued annually by the Intelligent Community Forum.

For the fourth time in a decade, Winnipeg has been recognized as one of the most intelligent communities in the world.

The Intelligent Community Forum’s (ICF) list of the Top 7 Intelligent Communities includes cities in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Russia and Vietnam, Economic Development Winnipeg (EDW) said in a recent press release. The recognition follows Winnipeg’s February 2021 selection as a Smart21 Community of Year, which reduced a competitive field of submissions down to the 21 most compelling cities in the world.

It looks like Canada is home to some seriously smart cookies. The top seven intelligent communities of 2021 have been revealed and three Canadian cities made the cut.

On June 30, a virtual conference of the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) concluded and the world's most intelligent communities were revealed. The list is based on a community's aspirations and its leadership in economic, social, and cultural development.

Communities from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Russia and Vietnam become finalists for Intelligent Community of the Year to be named at the ICF Summit in October

(New York, USA – 30 June, 2021) – In an announcement today at the conclusion of a virtual conference, the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) named the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2021. The 19th annual Top7 list includes cities and counties from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Russia and Vietnam. One of these seven finalists in the think tank’s annual awards program will be named the Intelligent Community of the Year at the ICF Summit in October, which will once again be a virtual conference as the world recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic. (www.intelligentcommunity.org/summit)

In alphabetical order, the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2021 are:

• Binh Duong Smart City, Vietnam
• Curitiba, Paraná, Brazil
• Langley Township, British Columbia, Canada
• Mississauga, Ontario, Canada
• Moscow, Russia
• Townsville, Queensland, Australia
• Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

“Mommy, I can’t breathe!!” he shouted. It was more a petulant shriek than a genuine plea for help.

The mother of the 8-year old boy jostled him in that motherly way, pulled him toward her and adjusted his small mask as they continued walking along the CVS parking lot to the store. He had her attention. Mission accomplished.

2020 is the year when we started to really look at one another in our communities and found new heroes and beauty within our chaos. And broadband boosted the conversations. Attribution: “Zoe” by Yung Jake, Courtesy of Tripoli Gallery, Long Island

One year ago, those words had a way different context when they met your ears. While someone claiming lack of breath was never, medically, a good thing, it was never the trigger phrase for a cascade of events that have put cities and citizens in a dizzying spin of traumas. What we witness (mainly from our devices) are seismic cracks in the status quo, a form of grief and, as if we need proof that nothing is born without pain, genuine awakenings.

It is in this climate that we begin this year’s Top7 Site Visits around the world.

Many communities are by now familiar with the annual selection and awards process of ICF. Selecting the Smart21, then the Top7 and ultimately the most Intelligent Community of the Year occurs in several phases and in many ways. There are rigorous quantitative evaluations conducted by an outside consultancy, field trips, a review by an independent panel of leading experts/academic researchers and a vote by a larger group of experts.

Although communities like to focus on the #1 spot, the biggest distinctions are not between the #1 and the others in the Top7, but between the Smart21 and the Top7. An especially important part of the selection of the Top7 from the Smart21 is an independent panel’s assessment of the projects and initiatives that justify a community’s claim to being Intelligent.

Small and Midsized Communities from Four Nations Become Finalists to be named Intelligent Community of the Year at ICF Global Summit in Dublin, Ohio, USA in June

(New York, USA and Taoyuan, Taiwan – 10 February, 2020) – In an announcement this evening at an international conference at Taoyuan, Taiwan, the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF) named the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2020. The 18th annual Top7 list includes cities and counties from the United States, Canada, Australia and Estonia. One of these seven finalists in the think tank’s annual awards program will be named the Intelligent Community of the Year at the ICF Summit in June in Dublin, Ohio, USA on June 18th. (www.icfsummit.com)

In alphabetical order, the Top7 Intelligent Communities of 2020 are:

• Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
• Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
• Hudson, Ohio, USA
• Markham, Ontario, Canada
• Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia
• Tallinn, Estonia
• Westerville, Ohio, USA