Stockholm organizes IT competition for European cities: "The Bangemann Challenge"
The City of Stockholm in Sweden is organizing an information technology (IT) competition for European cities with more than 400,000 inhabitants. The competition, entitled "The Bangemann Challenge" has been organized in response to the Commission's "Bangemann Report" on Europe and the global Information Society. The Bangemann Report stresses the need for interaction between government and business and focuses on ten key areas in which concrete measures should be taken in order to put Europe at the forefront of global IT developments: - Teleworking; - Distance learning; - University networks; - Telematics for SMEs; - Road traffic management; - Air traffic control; - Healthcare networks; - Electronic tendering; - Public administration; - City information highway. The Stockholm IT competition will enable cities to compete in one or more of these areas. The competition will run throughout 1996 and the winner will be chosen at the beginning of 1997 by an independent jury of representatives from the academic world and from the European Commission. The first prize is free space at the 1997 Stockholm Exhibition, a major interactive exhibition about tomorrow's society. Mayor of Stockholm, Mats Hulth, noted, however, that the competition is above all an instrument for turning the visions of the Bangemann report into reality: "Simply by taking part, every city will be a winner in its own way. New contacts will be made and everyone will learn from each other. It is the process itself - not winning the first prize - that is important for the IT society of Europe and its ability to compete with the USA and countries of the Far East."