With a lunar eclipse at 6 AM over Oulu, and nearly 350 participants from 37 countries gathered in Oulu’s City Theatre we’re off to a great start of the Global Forum 2015, “Shaping the Future”.

After Mr. Sebastian Lévy, the Vice President of the Global Forum, welcomed everyone to Oulu and officially declared the Global Forum 2015 open. Mrs. Sylviane Toporkoff, the Chairman of the Global Forum, warmly welcomed this year’s Global Forum’s participants to Oulu thanking the Prime Minister of Finland, Juha Sipilä,  and the Mayor of Oulu, Matti Pennanen, for the honor of their presence and acknowledging the incredible help from city of Oulu’s professional team, all the Global Forum partners, supporters, moderators and speakers who made the Global Forum 2015 possible.

Focusing on digitalization – an extremely important topic in the modern world – these 2-day long presentations and debates will broaden perspectives and act as the platform for new ideas and new collaborations.

Mr. Markku Markkula, the President of the Committee of the Regions, welcomed everyone at the opening pointing out the Committee of the Regions as an EU institution focuses on not only on what needs to happen at the local and the regional levels, but also on what could happen in the future. The concrete simple measures are not enough anymore; the mindset shift is needed to move “from unemployment to employment and from problems to challenges” and see the opportunities that exist. The mindset shift also means using the latest and coming technology effectively. The key priority of the Committee of the Regions is on sustainable growth and development, which involves:

• Boosting the research and innovation capacity of the regions and bridging the digitalization divide between them;
• Boosting the entrepreneurial spirit;
• Creating the right conditions for digital networks to flourish;
• Removing key differences between the online and offline worlds;
• Stimulating leading in the regional networks.

Innovation and digitalization are the drivers of the modern world, capable of unlocking people’s potentials and making them more connected to each other.  

Mr. Juha Sipilä, Prime Minister Finland, welcomed all the guests to the Global Forum in his hometown OULU, the Capital of Northern Scandinavia. He said ICT was his area of specialization before he went to politics, and mentioned the opportunity and challenges digitisation brings to healthcare and society. After taking office in May this year, Mr. Sipilä leads the government’s strategic effort that highlights the importance of development of digitization, experimentation and regulation. The Internet of Things will not only benefit the public service, but also the private sector. Mr. Juha Sipilä noted Finland’s role of a global leader in the field of ICT and related services, with positions in these areas still remaining strong. However, the world is changing and Finland needs to keep up with change, setting long-term goals of ensure Finland makes the best use of digitization. In doing this, we need to be flexible and think creatively to enable better decision making and better management.

The Prime Minister concluded his presentation with a small tip on how to do fine in Oulu: you have to be able to smalltalk about ice hockey and understand the engineering humour 🙂

Mr. Matti Pennanen, Mayor of City of Oulu, also welcomed Global Forum attendees and presenters from over 30 countries. He gave a brief overview of innovative city of Oulu, which is one of the youngest cities in Europe – average age of 36.5, with nearly 40,000 students out of a total population of 250,000, people and the first city to test the first 5G network. Oulu, Finland has a long tradition of technology and mobile sector, and has know-how and expertise in these sectors. Workers in Oulu are highly educated and highly skilled, with more than one third of the population holding an academic degree. The startup movement in Oulu is as strong as ever – more than 500 startups in ICT and other spheres are working, developing and being funded.  Oulu is well known for its innovation in ICT and digital research and development, which has been made possible by the co-operation between the Universities and companies. Mr. Matti Pennanen emphasized the advantage of Oulu region, for its connection with the Arctic.

Right after the welcome addresses, Mrs. Sylviane Toporkoff, the Chairman of the Global Forum, asked Mr. Juha Sipilä, Prime Minister of Finland, “What does the digitalization mean in practice in government?”. The Prime Minister replied that as an engineer, he always has his toolbox with him, and the digital tools are among the best ones in there.

This truly interactive and engaging opening session brought together:

• Anna Gomez, Partner and Attorney at Law, Wiley Rein LLP, USA – the moderator of the session;
• Mikko Kosonen, President, SITRA-Finnish Innovation Fund, Finland;
  • Yoshio Tanaka, Professor, Tokyo University of Science (TUS), Graduate School of Innovation Studies,Japan;
  • Jørgen Abild Andersen, Director General Telecom (RTD), Chairman of OECD’s Committee on Digital    Economy Policy (CDEP);
  • Adriane LaPointe, Senior Policy Advisor in the State Department Office of Communication and information Policy, US Department of State, USA;
  • Luis Jorge Romero, Director General ETSI-European /telecommunications Standards Institute;
  • Anja Wyden Guelpa, State Chancellor, State of Geneva, Switzerland.

Ms. Gomez opened the session by bringing to everyone’s attention that 57% population does not have access to internet. On the other hand, this year’s Global Forum is taking place in the city with the first testing lab for 5G which is estimated to bring about 65 billion dollar revenue by year 2025. With such a development, infrastructure, security and privacy become the main focus points for the future.

Mr. Andersen started his talk with the viewpoint that focusing only on full mobile broadband coverage is a narrow approach towards the forthcoming boom of high-speed Internet connectivity, and that our approach should address three major challenges faced today: poor innovation, low growth and unemployment. He stressed that the problem towards this boom should be dealt with by reliance on the following four pillars:

• E-infrastructure: Full broadband coverage and open internet to everyone.
• E-Applications: Provide services to fill the high speed internet pipes.
• E-Security: Ensuring privacy and trust that are vital for the system to be successful.
• E-Skills and e-literacy: People should be made digitally skilled and literate to fill the gap for the digitally industry.

According to Mr. Andersen digital economy is the solution to future economy and employment.

Mikko Kosonen is the president of the Finnish Innovation Fund (SITRA) since 2008. He discussed the importance of increasing the wellbeing while disconnecting the economic growth from the consumption of natural resources, and transitioning from top-down massive production of goods to bottom-up production of services.

He further discussed healthcare and ICT, and Finland’s potential to build a leading market for ICT-enabled preventive healthcare. The new framework of the preventive healthcare system will be enabled by the following conditions:

• Transparent steering
• Single channel funding
• Separating service ownership from service production

Mr. Kosonen also talked about the new economic paradigm –the circular economy – characterized by:

• A new business model which generates no waste or loss, and reduces the dependency of virgin natural resources;
• Products, materials and their value which remain in circulation instead of linear usage;
• Added value for products generated through digitization and services
• Consumer-based models creating added value for consumers instead of ownership

Realizing these opportunities requires:

• A new type of collaboration acknowledging that global competition increasingly takes place on ecosystem, not on individual company level.
• A new business ecosystem developed based on setting national priorities for new growth areas; multi-disciplinary research combined with active participation, and intensive public-private-people partnership
• New incentives (taxation, regulation etc.) and innovation-driven public procurement to make this happen.

Mr. Kosonen stressed the need for more innovation from the private sector in conjunction with the government, as well as the need for the public and private sector taking up a leading role in implementing more effective digitalization strategies in various industries to enable higher added value in production and service offering.

Anja Wyden Guelpa was the first woman to be elected the chancellor of state in Geneva 2009 and re-elected in 2013 for the second term and currently presides over the College des Secretaire Generaux of the seven states departments of Geneva and is board member of Swiss Tourism and of the RTSR regional council.

Ms. Guelpa focused on the importance of open data and open source – the new imperatives to be considered and implemented in the new digital economy as they enable greater transparency and accountability in the public sector, increased government legitimacy and co-creation of public goods. She illustrated these core building blocks using the example of Switzerland’s electronic voting system – CHVote in which the e-voting ballot was made transparent just like the traditional voting ballot boxes by making the source code publically available for future improvements. Few aspects of CHVote are worth being noted: internally developed system; public ownership of the e-voting system and public access to the code to test it and improve it. Yet, as Ms. Guelpa stressed, not everything is open and transparent. Some “good secrets” remain safe in the Switzerland’s e-voting system and that is the secrecy of each individual’s vote which should never be in jeopardy.

Jorgen Abild Anderson, Chairman Committee on Digital Economy Policy, OECD, discussed the main elements of today’s digital strategy and the main challenges we are still facing (poor innovation low growth and high unemployment). Mr. Anderson stressed the four pillars of the digital economy:

• E-infrastructure
• Openness of data
• E-security and e-privacy
• E-skills and e-literacy

Challenges that need to be overcome to achieve a flourishing digital economy:

• Building a full comprehensive system that encompasses the four pillars
• Re-establishing trust
• Filling in the gap in skills and qualifications
• Government’s unawareness of what needs to be done within its departments and across its department to establish a fully-functioning digital economy
• Strong coordination across different sectors

Adriane LaPointe, the Senior Policy Advisor in the State Department Office of Communications and Information Policy, US Department of State, talked about extending the benefits from the Internet and digitization to those who still don’t have access to Internet. The Internet can be a driver of a growth if it is available, accessible and affordable, and no country should be left out of the Internet Age. The real challenge nowadays is how to develop a coherent, holistic government approach about the Internet of Things.

The first session of the Global Forum 2015 was introduced by the Chair Mr. Kari Terho. Terho pointed out that even if the discussion around the Internet of Things (IoT) is all about connectivity, the connectivity isn’t the issue at all, anyway not in the small country like Finland, but there are other things that are even more important. Terho talked about machine to machine (M-M) connectivity. The problem and the key issue is actually how to use real time data in decision making, thus combining the data from machines and utilize it.

Terho continued that a big difference can be made to the consumers with the IoT if the companies understand that the things aren’t the thing but in the end it’s all about the applications. In order to gain benefit from the IoT, companies have to be brave and start testing and piloting their ideas, because these things are still new for everyone.

The moderator, Jean-Pierre Chamoux opened the floor for discussions. The first speaker was Mr. Harri Kopola from VTT technical research centre of Finland, who talked about the real world IoT solutions from sensor to cloud. He explained that we need to build solutions and applications to ensure connectivity. One practical example was the Singaporean harbor built by VTT, which enables the machines to cooperate in a connected way and help the people working in the harbor.

Mr. Gerald Santucci, Head of Unit Knowledge Sharing, European Commission, continued by talking about the great potential of the IoT. “The IoT isn’t just another technology hype, but it is dynamic and here to stay.” Mr. Santucci presented that the IoT will expand with yearly rates over 20% in value between 2013 and 2020. Combined, the IoT, Cloud and Big Data can offer new business opportunities for companies. Mr. Santucci ended the presentation with a relevant open question for everyone to think about “Where will the value come from in the future?” (The video of the interview of Gerald Santucci reveals his own idea what the answer is!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiTJvN7nEkE)

Mr. Samuel Laurinkari, Senior Manager, EU Government Relations in eBay, said that there are many barriers that make it hard to sell things to other people, such as legal barriers, customs, product rules, manufactures, limiting the retail and technical measures. eBay has its own philosophy to the IoT, which is all about eliminating the unnecessary barriers that people may have when selling things to each other.

Mr. Keiichiro Seki, Head of Research, Center for Strategic Management & Innovation from Nomura Research Institute continued that digitalization may need structural changes within companies. He also pointed out that there may easily be misunderstandings when talking about the IoT, because people understand it differently.

Mr. Denis Gardin, Senior Vice President in Airbus Group Corporate, started by discussing about big data analytics and using it to improve efficiency, savings and quality over the lifecycle of an aircraft development and employment. He also presented issues that Airbus Group finds challenging. One of the biggest challenges he mentioned was to train individuals to acquire new competences within the company, generate value and drive the new business model.

Antti Aumo, Executive Vice President in Finpro focused on the Smart traffic opportunities in Finland – an application that can really benefit everyone’s daily life. One of the global trends is the digitalization of people moving around regularly, which means all the related technology has to be reliable. Besides, this application needs to provide the fastest solution which explores hybrid service models, trains, buses, subs, taxis etc. working together do meet the needs of the user, and saving them time to move around by combined use of multiple transportation vehicles.

After that, Mr. Shoumen Datta, Research Affiliate MIT, in SVP IIC, illustrated the achievements of his research group up by now by playing a video on the usage of IoT.

Mr. Alberto Di Felice, Government Affairs Senior Analyst in Qualcomm Europe, thinks we need to create new standard in securing users’ privacy because of technology developed. The scary reality is that now we are able to know of every action of users just by silently accessing their Smartphones or Smart infrastructure and storing the data in our database. The use of this data needs to be highly regulated with proper administrator authorities.

Ms. Mariane Cimino, Consultant in Génétique, focused on the implementation of IoT in the dairy cattle breeding or the so called animal husbandry.  A survey-based research in this area revealed that 67% of farmers have at least one connected tool and 38% of the unequipped breeders envisage equipping themselves in the short term. These numbers show that the spread of electricity equipment in breeding field is not the problem for the appliance of IoT because the  farmers don’t refuse to use high-tech equipment in their daily working.

This session was focused on cyber and security and related new challenges in a global context.

Benedict Suzan, Senior Prospective Analyst, Airbus Group Corporate, France opened the session by stressing the importance of this topic and the different perspectives coming from different industries and multiple countries.

Shakeel Tufail, the CEO of SecureNinja, started his presentation by asking what are we trying to protect and his answer was all-encompassing from  data, time, money, reputation and brand, to legal issues and government. Some of these translate into money and lives. Data is the new currency. Many of the previous forums focused on BYOD (Bring Your Own Device or Disaster), that provided a dialogue to address solutions for the previously listed challenges. Some other cyber security challenges include: increased connectivity to the world, increased complexity of systems, risk of external vendors/third party software, too much reliance on compliance and standards, and lack of experience and knowledge. Privacy can’t be controlled in this day because there are no global standards. To catch a thief you have to think like a thief.

Colin Williams the director of SBL; Honorary Fellow at University of Warwick; visiting p professor at De Montfort University, UK, stated that “the future war is not with blood but with bits and bytes” and this war on cyber security is not fought with blood but rebuilding the democracy with bits and bytes. Citizens and state should not be living fear of each other with open or closed data, when there is nothing to hide there is nothing to fear.

According to Juha Röning Professor Department of Computer Science & Engineering, University of Oulu, Finland, cybersecurity is about cybertrust, vigilance and reducing vulnerabilities. It’s a serious game of hunting, but we realize that the bucks are hunting us, not us hunting them. US Government (White House) invited University of Oulu to brief on cyber security and trust, and US leadership was impressed by Oulu’s pioneering role in this domain. Research on cyber trust has gained nation-wide prominence and was set as a priority, but government’s plans for budget cuts may affect this effort. New strides are being made to maintain Finland’s status of a trusted digital services provider, and building its brand of integrity.

Mike Ahmadi, Global Director of Business Development, Synopsis, Inc USA, used the term 0-day vulnerability to address the time gap from the moment a vulnerability happened until it detected. Unknown vulnerabilities are bad. Known vulnerabilities are a big problem. Even with known vulnerabilities, we are delayed or negligent in solving these problems.  For example, Java has identified 374 known vulnerabilities in java runtime (of the 374, over 150 vulnerabilities in Java scored critical), but no solutions to prevent this were identified or implemented. It’s very important that you pay attention to the vulnerabilities, especially deal with those known ones before new products and services are launched to the market.

Today we can’t live without software, so we have to put pressure on the software industry, and require organizations to provide us as consumers with secure products and provisions ensuring security, such as the Cybersecurity Bill of Rights.

Lasantha De Alwis is the Director/Head of Operations Department & Corporate Secretary, CTO – Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization which helps developing countries and economies with online trade of goods and service (such as eBay) in a context where cyberspace is viewed by governments as a channel for development. The government’s priority to engage in the main stream cyberspace; and balancing this with people’s concerns about privacy in cyberspace is an illustration of conflicting objectives in the field of cybersecurity. More commonwealth countries are working on cybersecurity than on data protection and privacy. In national cyber-policy making, the engagement of civil society is limited.

Additionally, there are future  cybersecurity challenges and trends that have been predicted, such as:

• Increasing demand for greater degree of privacy and the control of own data
• Continuous friction between security and liberty, which takes precedence will be determined by the scale of economic development
• Practice of democracy will change due to cyberspace, vastly increased civil society engagement in the democratic process
• Global cyber-policy making may not be as broadband as is required, due to resource, knowledge and commitment constraints

According to Philippe Wolf, Cybersecurity Progect Manager, IRT System X – Institut de Recherche Technologique, France, there is nothing private anymore about privacy. As of 2010, public data and information is the new social law, so there is nothing to hide. There has been a clash of managing public information, dignity and liberty. Google is the largest data cruncher, and smart phones are the largest collectors of geolocation services. There are also various efforts in cyber surveillance. Four privacy functions/methods of cyber deception, which include: anonymity, pseudonymity, unlinkability, and unobservability. We are facing a Privacy Paradox, so in conclusion – we have to comeback to human rights.

According to Louis Granboulan, Senior cybersecurity expert, Airbus Group Innovations, a new approach may be needed for ensuring data privacy. a new approach may be needed for ensuring data privacy. The goal is to protect sensitive personal data but this concept is tricky to define and may for example include IP address and voice template. The privacy you want to protect is not your info on your ID card but who you really are. Medical data has been the first concern for personal data protection.

Data analysis is progressing faster than regulation and anonymization techniques. People usually give away some privacy for lower services or better services. Personal data will leak everywhere, e.g. finger print is not a secret because we leave it everywhere. The proposed new approach entails empowering people to enforce the right for anyone to know what can be deduced from using that data.

In conclusion:

• Fighting against the availability of the data will fail
• Fighting against the misuse of the data may succeed: misuse is the risk that people should really be afraid of.

Petri Vilander, Cyber Security Manager, Corporate Customer, Elisa Corporation, Finland, opines that technology is not the solution of cyber, but it is the process which we should look at including cyber risk prevention, preparedness, and threat protection. We should focus more on technology procedures than technology itself to address cyber vs. information security. He also pointed out some new security challenges which include the following:

• Threat diversity will increase: “Due to the variety of objects adversaries can target, many of which are in insecure locations, attackers are able to devise new methods the cybersecurity industry has yet to face and blend sophisticated techniques to accomplish their mission.“
• Remediation will become more urgent and more complex: “When an attack does happen organizations can’t necessarily isolate a system because the cost and implications of shutting it down may be greater than the cost of an infection, presenting serious tradeoffs between protection and continuity of operations.”
• The attack surface will expand: “Case IoT, with billions of new devices connected to the IoT (including smart meters, heating and air conditioning systems, health monitoring devices, remote sensors for gas and oil lines, etc.) and more devices connecting all the time, the ability to gain visibility into these attack vectors, let alone close them to malicious actors, is increasingly ”

Bror Salmeilin, Adviser, Innovation Systems, European Commision presents “Challenges for innovation; how to respond in systemic way”

At first, he introduced the essential drivers of innovation:

• connectivity
• openness
• interaction
• “organic”

Regarding creating innovation platforms, Bror quoted Prof V. Ramaswami, “Assemblages of persons, interfaces, processes, and artifacts, purposefully designed to intensify engagements to co-create value.” He continued with discussing the discovery of valuable ideas by crowds, and talked about the paradigm change from closed innovation through open innovation to Open innovation 2.0.

Stephane Grumbach, Research Director of INRIA, talked about the role of intermediation in innovation which offer new platforms and eco-systems for innovation and enable easy move from the supply side to the demand side of markets of new, innovative solutions. He also talked about the disruptive role of these information intermediaries.

Audrey Scozzaro Ferrazzini from Qualcomm talked about patents as incentives for inventors to take risks and effective tools to drive innovation, growth and employment.

Michael Stankosky, Research Professor, from George Washington University, USA talked about competitive collaboration, the new paradigm that is critical to innovation. In a traditional way, many companies innovate by themselves, and protect their innovations with patents. However, innovation is not only very expensive, but also too long for any realized tangible benefits. A new model has been seen that we call: competitive or business collaboration. Instead of going it alone, several companies are now teaming with their competitors to research on significant issues for their respective industries. One example of this are automobile companies. Where it is too expensive and risky to do research on the next evolution of the gasoline and electric engine, they are now collaborating with all their resources (people, know-how, money) [BMW & Toyota are sharing costs and knowledge for electric battery research]. The results will be shared, and their competitive advantage will remain in how they integrate the engine with all the other aspects of the car: design, safety, features, marketing, price, maintenance, etc., as well as their brand name. There are many other examples, to name a few: Coca-Cola + Heinz [collaborating to develop more sustainable containers], Philips [collaborating on multiple fronts], GMV + Lavina [using cross-sector know-how to advance neurological rehabilitation], and Reebok + Marvel [where athletes meet superheroes]. The old mantra: innovate or die; the new one: collaborate or die.

As a professor, he suggested to be innovative by daring to be curious, break the rules, challenge authority, and bringing change to the next level.

Evgeny Obrazstov showcased the use of innovative technologies in nuclear modelling in designing in Atomproekt.

Francois Stephan from IRT SystemX, talked about new innovation strategies for smart territories – digitization of territories which can be as small as a single city and as large as a whole continent – to achieve sustainability and security. One of the key issues to be addressed with this strategy include:

• How to guarantee confidence and security of data management?
• How to model and stimulate smart territories with all scales integrated?
• How to design sustainable architectures for territories development?

The key enablers of innovations for smart territories include: speed, interdisciplinarity, cross-sectoral collaboration, co-location work, continuum from upfront research to field testing, large communities working with startups, public-private partnership, joint research by academy and industry etc.

Jemery Millard, Chief Policy Adviser, Danish Technological Institute, Denmark, shared his insights in achieving greater societal impact through open, social and inclusive innovation. He further defined each kind of innovation:

• Social innovation is meeting a social need in meeting a social need in new ways which also collaborates with, and empowers, the beneficiary, rather than just doing something to them. He used “In Our Back Yard” from USA as an example of social innovation.
• Inclusive innovation – reaching the poorest and most excluded (Prahalad’s BoP) using the example of “Mission Leben” from Germany using ICT to adapt traditional work places to needs and capacities of individual workers offering easy interfaces.
• Frugal Innovation illustrated by the example of “Narayana Cardiac Care” from India which significantly dropped the cost of a cardiac surgery to just $3,000 and decreased the rate of mortality to just 2%

The underlying aspects of these types of innovation are:

• Continuous asset squeezing (more effective use of assets) and
• Moving from linear economy to circular economy which is characterized by shift from mass consumption/ production to mass customization; from Porter’s shareholders’ value to shared value and from abundant to constrained investment capital and resources, and new business models marking the shift from ownership and exclusive use to new forms of shared and collaborative consumption and increased importance of access over ownership.

The day’s last session was opened by the chair Giampaolo Armellin, the Head of Research Unit CRG. The session covered the very interesting and acute topic of Connected and Personalized Health in the Internet Age. The topic is universal and is important even for people not involved in the research on the topic itself, as the Internet is inevitably revolutionizing the science of medicine and the way the systems of medicine work in our everyday lives. Technology is meant improve the health care system, not to only simplify it and reduce the distance.

Carmelo Battaglia, the Sales Director of SMEs Customers at InfoCert, a company with 3 offices, 200 employees, 41 million EUR revenue in 2014, started the session by talking about the importance of our digital information’s safety. Everyone have to make sure his or her digital information is properly owned, stored and made accessible and available only to the allowed users and for allowed purposes. Everyone’s digital identity should remain safe at all times.

Kim Westerlund, the Chief Development Officer at Nixu, continued the topic of the importance of cybersecurity and data protection in the spheres of healthcare and medicine. The healthcare environment is being rapidly changed by technology and the expanding possibilities to analyse and access the huge amounts of biometric, genetic and other personal data, which is being stored digitally.This personal data along with other medical records can be extremely valuable to the cyber criminals, which no longer aim to steal only the credit card & bank account-related records and data, as one might think, and it’s very important to take measures to make sure this data won’t get hacked and stolen. We need to know and understand which actions do we have to take to protect our privacy and the privacy of our personal data. The only way to make it clear and accessible to everyone is to make it private by design. According to Kim, there are 7 foundational principles of privacy-by-design:

• Proactive not reactive – Preventative not remedial
• Privacy as default setting
• Privacy embedded into design
• Full functionality – positive-sum, not zero-sum
• End-to-End security – full lifecycle protection
• Visibility and transparency – keep it open to everyone
• Respect for user privacy – keep it user-centric

Giuseppe Grassi, the Director of Cardiology Division at ULSS 12 in Veneziana, Italy, continued the session by elaborating on the concept of innovating the processes of interaction between the doctors and the patients by automation and by the usage of the dedicated software. For instance, the hospital Mr. Guiseppe Grassi works at, is using the dedicated software for prescriptions of medicine, which helps to reduce both the prescription errors and pharmacological interaction as well as allergic reactions and the misuse of drugs. In other words, the automation of the whole process helps to make sure the right patient receives the right medicine at the right time. Also, the patients are being monitored after the treatment by an electronic device, which provides the data on whether you have to see your doctor or not.

Carefully designed automation can help to avoid errors, simplify the doctor-patient relationships and take the healthcare processes to the next level of efficiency.

Maritta Perälä-Heape, Director in the CHT – Centre for Health and Technology at the University of Oulu, talked about information flows and interactions among users and applications. Maritta introduced the MyData approach, which is all about the consumer controlling his/her own data. Benefits of MyData for the enduser were presented to be for example better ways to interact with companies and public organizations, easy-to-use tools for personal data management and better privacy and transparency. Also the health care providers and the industry would benefit of MyData.

Andrea Sandi, founder of SINTAC, started with showing images and practical examples of how digitalization transforms the healthcare sector. He showed how to define a physical model to craft a personalized prosthesis by a 3D printing innovative system. This enables the partnership development with the medical staff, which is the key factor to success. Tailored is better in the future healthcare.

Michele Thonnet, International eHealth Affairs Executive in the Ministry of Social Affairs, continued and talked about opening data and borders. Michele talked about health issues, ehealth and connected health to improve citizen/patient’s health by making life-changing information available. Openness is something to strive for, but Michele pointed out that the openness and open data are very difficult in practice, because healthcare is a complex system of systems. Michele calls for cooperation for interoperability in all areas: legal, organizational, technical and semantic.

Madis Tiik, Senior Advisor in Sitra – Finnish Innovation Fund, pointed out that even if the discussion is very much in the health care, there are, in the matter of fact, several factors that affect to our health: behaviour, lifestyle, genetics, environmental and social factors and health care. Madis called for better health outcomes and more personalized care, and as an example, he presented the Virtual Clinic, which offer personalized services, and connects all the current separate health care services and operators together. It’s a place where people can get guidance and virtual help to the symptoms and monitor own medical record. New entrants are creating options consumers want, and threatening billions of dollars in hospital and physician revenue.

In light of the recently ratified UN Sustainable Development Goals, the moderator Julia Glidden (Moderator), Managing Director 21c Consultancy, United Kingdom, announced that during this session with such a broad topic in its title, the panellists will be talking about the relationship between the sharing economy, IT and sustainable development, because the notion of sharing that IT facilitates puts a whole new challenge to the consumptive/ capitalist focus on acquisition of goods and constantly buying and selling and replacing things. Ms. Glidden finds the concept of circular economy very inspirational – not constantly buying and throwing away and buying and throwing away again, but borrowing and sharing in a manner that brings people together. The panel will have some very high level discussions as well as very interesting practitioners’ discussions of practical components of IT and the sharing economy, like security, ID cards etc.

Steffen Nerdal, Chief Strategy Office, Ascella AS, Norway, started his presentation by showcasing the company he works for, SmartDok which is the Nordic leader in digitization in the building and construction industry. He addressed the main challenges that the company had to overcome since its founding toward full use of digital systems: working in a conservative industry; reliance on traditional documenting (with pen and paper), and little ICT knowledge in the industry. The solution to the industry’s main barriers of growth was through digitization. The company started developing solutions together with and for their customers (having customer’s needs in mind) and ensuring that the right technology is used and providing knowledge about various markets.

Ascella has made some good impacts on the Norwegian and Swedish market by increasing quality, cost efficiency, developing effective processes for companies and customers, making sure that there are fewer errors and becoming more environmental friendly. Basically, the company is shaping the future by empowering the society and helping the development of smart buildings.

According to Nitya Karmakar, Professor MQC Macquarie University Australia, Australians have been at the forefront of inventing various tools. One of the most famous innovations from Australia include: the electronic pacemaker, Google Maps, polymer bank notes, cochlear implant, electric drill etc. They are not behind in improving of digital life. The innovation through science, technology and knowledge is growing and there are new catalysts for new way of innovations. Innovation and economic development are in place but they are challenges that need to be overcome still. Therefore the following aspects:

Innovation +creativity =commercialization

Innovation + proximity = commercialization

Tim Kelly, Lead ICT Policy Specialist, World Bank Group, started his presentation talking about the upcoming World Development Report which is focusing on the Internet and development, and how digital life impacts the sharing economy. World Bank’s approach is economical, based on transaction costs and how reduced transaction costs in the digital economy help create: processes of inclusion, processes of innovation, and processes of efficiency – the three mechanisms that drive the sharing economy.

The sharing economy/ the digital economy comes in direct conflict with the analogue economy, especially in the areas of regulation, professional services, universities, bricks and mortar stores, building and construction.

Ali Kone, Chief Operating Officer/Co-founder of Coders4Africa Inc, USA: The drivers of sharing economy – connectivity and knowledge are important aspects of digitalization. Being connected means that information will be shared. Sharing information has become so important such that people regardless of their status and regions are now coming into the digital life to share information. There are also more people who would want to share information but they are unable due to the lack of infrastructure in some areas. It is important to change the mind sets through simplicity, transparency and traceability. In regard to digitalization, developing countries are still lagging behind due factors such as: security and the infrastructure are serious issues that are poor and not there in some cases which is affecting the digitalization.

Eikazu Niwano, Producer and director of Produce Group, R & D, talked about the new e-ID cards in Japan that will come into effect in January 2016. Social activities are being expanded into the cyberspace in addition to the real space. Card holder will be able to select the spaces they want to use according to their convenience. The idea or aim is to have social activities be accessed and used digitally.

Therefore, the card number will support both digital signature and personal authentication services and may be used for medical insurance, as a credit card and cable TV. Credit card and paper certificate could be recongized as attributes of the card holder. Cyberspace passport selection of the private services will also be up to the card holder.

Alfredo Ronchi, Secretary General, EC Medici framework Italy, elaborated on important issues such as citizens in the global age and ICT safety and security, safety, health working practices transportation built environment infrastructure free time etc. Security for humans encompasses several areas such as: security, assets, food, drugs, ideas etc. All these important things will need to be protected one way or the other. Therefore, safety and security are an integral part of human rights; we must strive to provide all the efforts in order to guarantee such rights as stated.

Paul Wormeli, Executive director Emeritus, IJIS – Integrated Justice Information systems institute; innovation strategist Wormeli consulting LLP, USA, talked about opportunities and challenges at the intersection of the ICT between sharing information in government and private sector – looking at crimes that are committed in the cyberspace. Information safeguarding in the sharing environment is very vital and important digital life. Information must be safeguarded so it does not end up in the wrong hands or end up being used for unintended purposes.

The following are the fundamental truths about ICT in the sharing economy:

• The sharing economy is dependent on the information technology and including social media
• Information is a valuable assets and requires a lot of safeguarding
• Growth of the sharing economy is depends on establishing trust which requires safeguarding information asses and building a sense security
• Our inability to prevent cyber crime
• Cost on society cybercrime about 1.trillion dollars

There are various trends going on in the cybersecurity and the following trends have been noted,

• technology is getting better defense in depth
• Insider beings are careless or intentional are still largest threat
• Threats are migrating – more organized crime nation state new targets
• Data continues to experiential growth

Comment from the audience: What is the role of the government in all this? The govt seems to be missing especially that our govt are not paying much attention to the digital borders. Physical borders are being protected by different means while digital borders are largely ignored or less attention is shown.

Chair/Moderator

• Jay Gillette, Fulbright-Nokia Distinguished Chair in Information and Communications Technologies, University of Oulu, FINLAND; Senior Research Fellow and Institute Secretary, Digital Policy Institute, USA

Keynote Speakers

• Donald R. Davidson, Chief, Cyber security Lifecycle Risk Management and CS/Acquisition Integration Division, Office of Deputy DoD Chief Information Officer for Cyber security, US.
• Paavoo Lipponen, Finland Former Prime Minister.
• Markku Markkula, President, Committee of the Regions, European Union.

PAAVO LIPPONEN

Helsinki as logistic centre of northern Europe

• 17% of world mineral and 25% of World Oil is in Arctic Region.
• Arctic Region is the 10^th largest economy approx 1.4 trillion Euros.
• Arctic possibility for growth – the arctic region can develop Europe largest area of investment. It is estimated that investment worth EURO 140 billion are planned
• Key sectors are oil gas LNG mining industry wind power logistics investment and the development of the power grid.

DONALD DAVIDSON

• “Your technology solution might be my security risk”
• Globalization is good but it brings many challenges
• Global interdependent supply chain
• We also have a world of capabilities that are dependent on globally sourced, commercial off the shelf (COTS), information communication technology

Product Assurance – Tradespace

SCRM standardization and assurance will enable acquirers to better communicate requirements to system integrators and suppliers so that the supply chain can demonstrate good/best practices and enable better overall risk measurement and management.

Supply chain risk management has a landscape of activities

SCRM believes commercial acceptable global standard must be derived from commercial industry best practices.

MARKKU MARKKULA

• Setting the scene the regional innovation ecosystems
• Renewing and strengthening EU’s urban agenda cities
• Cities and urban areas are becoming more important
• As ¾ of 500 million people of EU live in cities and urban areas.
• As engines of economic growth and employment.
• We need to modernize the Triple Helix.
• Three layers for city development levels

1. Smart Regions
2. Regional innovation Ecosystem
3. City Innovations

JAY GILLETTE: Information Renaissance

• New Era Knowledge society driven by an information economy
• Challenging innovation yet not unprecedented in human history
• Like European renaissance

Management vs Leadership

• Management is about consistency and order
• Leadership is bout vision and change

Succeed and prosper in the information renaissance age

Succeed as a person – become renaissance man or woman.

Succeed as an organization add knowledge value to everything you touch

Incorporate knowledge value in all products/activities in whatever it is you do.

(Morale is itself a strategy advantage)