First Digital Cities Challenge Workshop with Local Government and Business Representatives Took Place in Sofia

On May 9, 2018, as part of the European Commission’s Digital Cities Challenge Project, Sofia Investment Agency organized a Vision and Ambition Workshop, part of the project’s schedule.

The workshop gathered local government and business representatives, as well as representatives from utility companies, telecoms, and academia. The aim was to formulate a vision and ambition statement, as part of the roadmap to the creation of a digital transformation strategy for the city.

Based on the insights from interviews with close to 30 stakeholders, held last month and the discussions at the workshop on May 9th, we agreed on a Vision and Ambition for digital transformation for Sofia, as well as on next steps, action plan, priorities, and milestones, a SWOT analysis assessing Sofia’s digital maturity, the strong points, and the areas that need to be developed in order to aid the digital transformation of the urban environment, society, business, entrepreneurial environment, policies, and institutions.  

We will present the results from the discussion, the SWOT analysis and Vision and Ambition of Sofia for digital transformation at the Second Digital Cities Challenge academy seminar “Vision & Ambition seminar”, on May 16-17th, 2018 in Brussels. The seminar will mark the closing stage of the Vision and Ambition phase and will kick-start the Strategy phase of the project when each city will receive support in solving and implementing individual urban projects.

Digital Cities Challenge is a tailored programme of coaching and facilitation launched by the European Commission to help 15 European cities develop and implement digital policies that can transform day to day life for residents, businesses, workers, and entrepreneurs. Challenge cities entered into a 14-18 month programme to help develop and implement a digital strategy through tailored advice and support from high-level experts.

We would like to thank all participants for their interest and the strong commitment to the discussion and all the organizations and companies that responded to our invitation and attended the meeting sharing valuable insights and ideas for the digital transformation of Sofia. This will give us the opportunity to present in Brussels ideas that are supported by local utility companies, the IT sector, startup ecosystem representatives, academia and city administration.