Sessions at Digital London on Wednesday 14th March

This session looks as how organisations can replicate the innovation fostered by open app markets by building open data internal app platforms allowing for the development of apps for your organisation.

This session looks at the technology trends, platforms and best practices for social engagement across the B2B and B2C spectrum. It will look at how leanings from generic platforms like facebook, Linkedin and twitter can be combined with similar technologies applied internally.

A series of seminars by experts from Microsoft on how the latest technologies can enable and digitise your business.

In the wake of extended economic downturn and changing (and growing) constituent demands, a new paradigm of governance is emerging: engaged government. That is, governments better engage with constituents in order to fulfill their missions more efficiently and effectively. New information and communication technologies contribute to the engagement, which will happen at the local level – through increasingly digital cities. This session will explore how technologies – such as smartphones and mobile access, collaboration and social media, business intelligence and analytics, and cloud computing technologies in the form of both software and platforms as a service –enable and enhance constituent engagement, transforming government and methods of governance. Beyond just individual citizens, technologies and new governance models also enable governments to improve business environments and reach out to both small businesses and larger enterprises. Specific best practices such as Transport for London’s Developers’ Area enabling citizen-sourced applications, Boston’s Citizens Connect for citizen reporting, NYC Big App competition, Rio de Janeiro’s Rio Idéais initiative, Portland Oregon’s use of the Kickstarter platform to encourage social entrepreneurship, online participatory budgeting and the use of budget simulation games, and other constituent engagement initiatives will be discussed. Key takeaways of this session: Complex socio-economic dynamics challenge current governance models. Governance through constituent engagement goes beyond eGovernment services. Consumerization of IT – through mobile and social technologies – expands tools for governments to reach and engage their constituents, and vice versa.

The BIG Initiative is an idea that enables future generations to make use of the technology Cisco is contributing to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. BIG will mark the start of a five-year effort to catalyse sustainable and scalable growth of innovative high-tech small and medium sized enterprises.

BIG will include two networked Innovation Centres – an open innovation centre in Shoreditch developed in partnership with the local SME community, and another at the Olympic Park providing a 'state of the art connected community' with special focus on developing and demonstrating a new wave of solutions for London and other cities.

These centres will be underpinned by state-of-the-art networked collaboration technologies linking innovation and technology centres across the UK and other global hubs of innovation.
Cisco anticipates that the BIG initiative will both support and sharpen Cisco's future capacity to make such investments in the UK over the next 5 years, and stimulate UK hi-tech innovation and growth.

The digitisation of content and the convergence of telecommunications, media and high technology companies is creating unprecedented business opportunities. Dave Tansley looks in detail at how these companies are increasingly exploiting advanced digital technologies to receive and deliver content across a widening range of devices and channels, the impact this is having on consumers in a digital world, what this means for competition and the implications for the overall technology, media and telecommunications value chain.

The IET Is it purely a matter of coverage, speed or service? What Applications, Services and Solutions will be needed in a hyperconnected digital world?

Paul Coby will address the steps necessary to ensure that the UK has the technology-related skills it needs to compete in the global economy. He will review London’s role as the hub of the UK innovation and explain how businesses can benefit from its leading position at the forefront of decades of business and IT change. Paul will talk extensively about the need to improve IT skills training as a critical factor to the future, discuss some of the challenges in education today and what is being done to address those challenges and explain why a culture of skills retention and improvement is essential if technology is to hold the key to innovation, global competitiveness and sustainable economic growth.

Engaging with your customers in on social platforms only works if the resulting dialogue can lead to connections with those who can help or support. Social is not just a marketing thing or an HR thing its as company thing.

This session will describe how an upgraded network enabled LGfL to provide bandwidth-rich multimedia teaching and learning services, including videoconferencing with museums and specialist learning centres; content streaming; and online managed learning resources to all 2,600 primary and secondary schools in greater London.

Niall Murphy will share his vision and provide a perspective on opportunities in a world where an increasing number of physical products and other objects are becoming connected into the Web. Often called the 'Internet of Things', Niall will talk about his thinking on how the increasing digital presence for physical products opens new opportunities for product managers through digital consumer and product relationships.

One of the biggest challenges that cities face is to improve the skills profiles of their populations. Any improvement will have long term benefits for both individuals in these cities and the businesses that are located there. And by implication it is likely to have a positive impact on future economic growth. As current patterns of educational attainment and training provision appear to be compounding the skills challenges cities face, Joanna Averley will discuss the significance of skills as a key input for many businesses and explain why addressing the skills problem that cities face should be a central component to any strategy to improve long term growth.

Big Data will have a large impact on the ICT landscape in 2012. The combined effects of social and mobile technologies, the constant need for driving improved competitive advantage, and the pervasiveness of analytics software and services will change the way vendors and end-users create and consume information. In this session Benjamin Woo looks ahead into the top 10 drivers for Big Data in 2012, and examines its impact on the ICT industry at large.

In this session Rajeeb Dey will talk about the need to celebrate, inspire and accelerate entrepreneurship and how creating linkages between academia, startups and entrepreneurship is key to the future.

Two years ago Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Professor Nigel Shadbolt unveiled data.gov.uk – and now it provides and single point of access to many thousands of government datasets. In this session Professor Nigel Shadbolt looks at why public data consumption works, what open public data can do for transparency and how it can generate real economic returns.

Professor Shadbolt will also discuss the achievements of data.gov.uk and how it is being emulated and copied around the world and will provide is view on why this open government data revolution could be as important as any we have seen in the Web era.

Traditional ecommerce platforms for digital goods and content sellers were created when ecommerce simply copied in-store retail processes and in today’s rapidly evolving world they are always inadequate, often irrelevant, and sometimes unsuitable. Sal Visca will talk about the future of ecommerce for digital enterprises - digital commerce - and how success means leveraging the unique properties of digital commerce to create an enduring digital relationship with customers.

The nature of business and the workplace is changing rapidly as a result of the revolution in digital technology. This creates new opportunities for UK businesses, consumers, charities and public bodies, but also requires a significant reconfiguration of the UK skills base. This extends from the way in which we educate young people through professional development of the workforce to the way we operate our organisations. Young people need to be able to engage with technology, not as passive consumers but able to harness it solve business and societal challenges. Developments such as cloud computing require a reconfiguration of the skills of the IT workforce, while business unit leaders need to be able to embrace new ways of working to deliver better quality services at lower cost.

Networking government - using design and social technology to transform government, politics and the relationship between people and the state.

This session shows how you can build deep customer experiences by connecting structured and unstructured data with high intelligence giving customers what they want every time.

This session looks at how to harness the potential of this content and deliver it to the right place at the right time.

Making Tech City the centre for technological excellence is one of the country's most exciting projects. Eric Van Der Kleij will talk about the phenomenon and its progress to date and discuss the opportunities and challenges ahead.

From customers to employees the answer is at your doorstep. This session will show how crowdsourcing has consistently outperformed other innovation practices and is used but some of the most digitally savvy organisations to stay ahead of the curve.

If you are a city leader looking for ‘smart’ solutions to meet sustainability challenges, you are not alone. Smart technologies have enormous potential to help run cities more efficiently and to offer new choices and services to citizens. Many smart technologies – such as Smart Grids, Smart Transport – are being implemented in cities today to improve operational and resource efficiency. However, gaining the funding for these often capital intensive technologies remains a challenge for businesses and city governments. Justin Keeble, Lead of Sustainability Services at Accenture UK, will talk about the potential for cities to realise great energy and cost savings through ‘Smart Buildings’. Based on his experience as programme director for the London Building Energy Efficiency Programme (now Re:fit) he will describe how cities can fund smart initiatives using innovative business and service delivery models.

Mobile is the embodiment of ubiquitous computing and today's smartphones could easily be more accurately described as cloud-connected computers, available at the ready. With the global majority of internet usage likely to be done via a mobile device, for most people the mobile web will be their primary, and probably only, way of experiencing the internet. This will require a very wide spectrum of mobile devices with cloud-based services essential to making it easier and easier to own and use multiple devices.

This session will describe how to build a digital presence and capabilities for local and global businesses and ensuring that digital is at the core of solutions. Consideration will also be given to how to leverage cutting-edge technology and digital platforms to enhance digital performance.

• David and Goliath Must Dance
• The world is becoming feminine
• Economics is trumping politics
• Your Unique Contribution

Digital cities are founded on the connection and integration of city and building infrastructure and services with technology. In this session Lucy Dimes will discuss the central role for technology innovation and explore some of the future challenges of adapting buildings and infrastructure for digital cities.

The successful development of technology clusters depends on bringing startups together. Why are clusters important and how can they benefit startups and others in the startup ecosystem?

Does it matter where you start? How do clusters help with growth and not just getting going? Elizabeth Varley will share her experiences of creating TechHub and her tips for startups looking to make it big.

For years, what comes ‘after the dot’ has remained the same, with co.uk and .com becoming firmly established in consumers and businesses minds. This picture is about to change as brands, businesses and cities all invest in their own space on the internet.

This presents huge opportunities for companies in London. Here Glenn Hayward from Nominet explains the opportunities and challenges of the changing internet landscape.