Rome Hosts International “Innovation Week”
From September 27th through October 5th, Rome will welcome leaders in the world of technology and innovation for the 2nd edition of Innovation Week – “a place for innovators, coders, hackers, makers, futurists, financers and anyone who has a story to tell about how the future could be.”
Innovation Week will be the conclusion of the second European Maker Faire, the largest tradeshow in the world focusing on digital manufacturing. The Chamber of Commerce of Rome has taken responsibility for hosting and sponsoring the event, while the department’s Asset-Camera agency, which supports the management of innovative services and the development of local industry, has filled the role of organizer.
The week hosts an array of ground-breaking events from start to finish, starting with the “Living Hackathon”, a 24 hour marathon of invention that focuses on innovation within digital technologies while also welcoming crucial names in Italian furniture and design, such as Helix and Valucucine and Slamp. During this event, innovators work in teams to develop solutions to the cases companies present them with, then develop working prototypes to be judged by a jury of company members at the end of the 24 hour period.
The event also encourages discussion about the political ramifications of invention, and hosts the first-ever Italian edition of the “Personal Democracy Forum”, established ten years ago in New York. The forum will welcome ideas and opinions surrounding the modern push for transparency within ‘information society’, where enormous amounts of data can now be published for entire legions of citizens in an instant. Innovations in the world of fashion will also play a major part in the event, and the Cavea Auditorium at the Parco della Musica will host a catwalk exposition of dresses, jackets, and shirts integrated with interactive LED textures and microelectronics that can be controlled through an iPhone app. The smart clothing company CuteCircuit, created by Roman-Italian innovator Francesca Rosella, will be the star of the gala.
The goal of Innovation Week is to enter Rome into the center of the global innovation debate, which centers on topics such as: Open Hardware, Social Innovation, Maker City, Social Democracy, Open Data Sharing Economy, Impact Bonds. For the final four days of the program, it is projected that more than 50,000 visitors of all-ages will attend conferences in the Parco della Musica, in which the ‘makers’ (participants in the European Maker Faire) from around the world will have the opportunity to present projects to international investors. Hopes are high that the event will surpass both last year’s attendance and the projections for this year’s, while also drawing a diverse group of international representatives.
