Manchester in New York
Last week I was lucky enough to be in New York for a few days at the international conference of the Intelligent Communities Forum – ICF – on “Broadband Economies” – there is more info on the ICF website. Not only was this a great opportunity to meet up with cities from all over the world involved in developing Next Generation Access (NGA) broadband, but it was also a great experience to see all the work that I and the MDDA team have been doing over the past few years recognised when I was presented with one of the three ICF annual international “Founders Awards”. More information about the award can be found on both the MDDA website and the Manchester City Council website. The most amazing thing about the experience, as well as frustrating in a way, was realising just how far ahead of us most of these cities, regions and, indeed, nations are, in terms of not only having really detailed policy commitments to go for NGA (based on fibre everywhere) but also actually doing it. Many of these places are rolling out open access fibre networks at an incredible rate and demonstrating real economic benefits in terms of job growth and new investment. This is the presentaton of the award, at the Steiner Studios, the second largest film studios in the USA (after LA), where ‘Sex in the City’ was shot for example (no stars in sight though!), which is also an fascinating regeneration project, being in the heart of what was the Brooklyn Naval Yard.
Rober Bell, Exec Director of ICF, presenting me with the award
This is me making my thank you speech, thanking friends, family and everyone and everything “Made in Manchester”. If you really want to experience the full thing there is a video of all the speeches (it does go on a bit) on another part of the ICF website.
Unacustomed as I am...............
