Building a strategic regional partnership to improve quality of life in Phoenix
The Arizona Institute for Digital Progress (iDP) envisions a country where each community is part of an interconnected “smart region”, improving the quality of life for citizens and businesses, and supporting sustainable, resilient, healthy, and equitable communities and neighborhoods. In pursuit of this vision, iDP has created a consortium of public, private, university, and community partners to develop a greater Phoenix smart region, using connected, scalable technology solutions to promote equity, mobility, and sustainability. iDP has implemented an innovation-as-a-service model that allows disparate organizations to collaboratively design and develop new technologies in the pursuit of enhanced quality of life.
Contributing time, funds, and expertise as a consortium member
In 2019, Microsoft donated $12,500 to be used towards iDP’s mission. Microsoft is also a consortium member, attending meetings every two months to help drive the creation of the Phoenix smart region. The Greater Phoenix Smart Region Consortium uses applied research and implementation to create, advance, and increase adoption of smart city technology. The consortium members include iDP, Arizona State University, the Greater Phoenix Economic Council, Maricopa Association of Governments, and 22 Greater Phoenix communities.
Microsoft’s participation as a consortium member solidifies its commitment to the Phoenix area becoming an innovative region, whose community partners collaborate to improve the quality of life and well-being of all residents and businesses. The Phoenix smart region will be a global leader in public-sector governance and private-sector innovation to support the vision of equitable communities. As part of this journey, Microsoft has the opportunity to participate in various strategic activities, like regional opportunity projects, research activities with local universities, validation and testing of technologies, and best practice sharing.
Recently, Microsoft and other consortium members attended a State of the Smart Region Gala. Event attendees included local elected officials, CIOs, and university and tech industry leaders. The evening included a networking cocktail hour; opening remarks by Kate Gallego, the mayor of Phoenix; and a panel discussion to address opportunities and challenges around the creation and implementation of smart technologies in the Phoenix smart region.
iDP Director of Operations Brian Dean recognized Microsoft for their support, saying, “Thank you for all the hard work and support from your team for the State of the Smart Region Gala. We are tremendously grateful that the Microsoft team was able to attend and we hope they enjoyed the event as much as we enjoyed gathering everyone together to highlight the amazing things happening here in Arizona!” Mr. Dean continued “While the Gala was an overall success, we are even more excited to keep the momentum going and get to work with all of our partners on building the largest and most connected smart region in the United States. None of it is possible without the intense commitment to collaboration from our communities, industry partners, academic institutions, and NGO partners, so we thank you for all that you have done thus far to get the region to this point, and we look forward to continuing to build our communities of the future, together!”