“The first edition of the Digital Economy Forum in Venice in May 2011 turned out to be a successful experiment. The positive feedback we received encouraged us to develop further on the 2012 edition.” said Sandhya Polu, director of the Digital Economy Forum, an initiative of the of U.S. embassy in Italy, which aims to stimulate the development of the digital economy.
“The Embassador Embassador David Thorne is strongly convinced that The Digital Economy Forum can strengthen the relationship between U.S and Italy, by supporting the creation of a digital culture through the organization of international events of exchange for Italian and American firms and organizations, but also from the rest of Europe.”
The 2012 edition of DEF is an itinerant tour of events: after the two dates in Cagliari and Florence, which already took place, the next date will be a conference in Milan about innovative start-ups on March 23. The 2012 edition of DEF will end in Venice on May 10 and 11 with a conference about the importance of digital content nowadays.
“We decided to plan a date in Cagliari because of its important network of firms operating in the digital industry. Florence was an important date in order to show the potentiality of the digital technologies to companies operating in more traditional industrial fields.”Sandhya Polu went on, “The Startup Boot Camp in Milan will be an important opportunity for start-ups and international investors to exchange views on how to launch and develop a digital start-up. I choose ‘the digital content’ as the topic for the final conference of the 2012 edition of DEF: indeed I personally believe that it is a crucial topic we have to understand in order to match the traditional industrial culture with the new digital technologies, which are today the leading factors for economic growth.” Digital content is a broad category which includes advertising, social network, websites, blogs, videos and pictures. “Online content does not require many resources, therefore it also allows small companies to reach more customers and in a more effective way: in our final conference inVenice we will present start-ups which have built their innovative business around the concept of digital content”.
The DEF, promoted by the U.S. Embassy, but also supported by companies and other institutions, represents an opportunity of exchange and an occasion to promote economic development. Concludes Sandhya Polu: “We hope that the DEF will stimulate the spontaneous creation of other similar projects focused on the relation between digital economy and economic growth in an international context.”
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