Hard to give a flavour to an event that was quite so eclectic. Imagine a concert hall in one of Vienna's central parks. Filled with an intriguing mix of entrepreneurs, designers, architects and a few politicians. Add some keynote speakers and some panels. And see what happens next. That seemed to be the formula as far as I could tell. This is the second year that IncrediblEurope has run. Its founder describes it as less an event than a movement. But if it is a movement it isn't clear what its moving towards. Which might be frustrating for those who want a clear destination. But fascinating because of the ebbs and flows of the exchanges.
The theme for this year was Imagining what Europe might look like in 2049. That was kicked into the long grass rather quickly by Manfred Reichl, a persistent contrarian from the World Economic Forum who argued that there had been a revolutionary change in social structures every 150 years. The last one had been in 1915. So there wasn't a lot of point in planning for 2049 since a revolution in values would transform the current intellectual landscape out of all recognition anyway.
There was a lot of angst around the lack of innovation in Europe. And the feeling that the USA had a built in advantage in tolerating failure and encouraging and funding entrepreneurs whatever age they were. This didn't happen in Europe. Which translated into a sense that Europe wasn't keeping up and the European 'project' was failing. And outrage that the USA rather than Europe might be the global thought leader. All of which made quizzical viewing from my perspective. The sheer range of opinions was dizzying at times. There was a lot more talking out from the stage than conversation between panelists much less a chance for the audience to challenge or ask questions of their own.
Highlights of the first morning were de Bono's introductory keynote - de Bono style creativity is a known quantity these days but he's an expert and original presenter. Mirko Ilic - troublemaker from the start did a barnstormer of a deconstruction of the redesign of the Pepsi logo - an orgy of self indulgence and postrationalisation leading to a bland concept - and it cost them more than a billion dollars to do.
Cameron Sinclair stole the show at the end of the morning with his keynote. Complete with ipad - the first time I had ever seen anyone present with one he explained how he built a global aid organisation staffed by architects who co-design buildings with local communties and then build them together. Its an inspiring story which demonstrates how co-creation is more tangible than organising on the internet. I include a film of my asking Cameron a couple of questions - the interview coming to an abrupt end when someoene interreupted.
In the afternoon Jillian de Beer chaired a panel session about the connection between creativity and innovation. Any temptation that panelists might have had to theorise about creativity was punctured when Jillian brought the audience in relatively early ensuring there was a wide range of questions. This panel was a vivid demonstration of how broad the contributor base was: a professor of Economics, the head of 3M in Austria, a serial entrepreneur, a 23 year old PHD student taking a double PHD in mathematics and finance and the Ideo's global head of knowledge - Gentry Underwood. Putting people this diverse together is bound to create sparks. What is less easy to see is what kind of fire the sparks will light.
We had a session with angels and VCs about how to finance creativity. They weren't putting money on the table at this session but this was followed by a pitch from a selection of young entrepreneurs who were pitching business ideas to recruit teams to prepare business plans until Sunday at which point they would pitch to VCs and angels and try to raise some capital.
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