By Jason Kohn, Contributing Columnist

Shoes? Check. Computer gear? Check. Clothes? Flatware? Hot tubs with built-in TVs? Check, check, and check. There’s almost nothing these days that we don’t buy online. But there is one area where the local brick-and-mortar store still reigns supreme: grocery shopping.

When it’s time to stock the fridge, the vast majority of us still do it the old fashioned way. We trek out to the store, walk up and down the aisles, and fill up physical rather than virtual shopping carts. But just maybe, that’s about to change. A number of retailers are experimenting with online groceries, and a growing number of consumers are ready to buy.

Read More »

Tags: ecommerce, groceries, innovation, internet, logistics, online shopping, retailing

The journey to smarter cities and communities has gained momentum in recent years, as a recent BBC article highlights. I’d like to offer a few points from my experiences over the last five years exploring this territory:

• First, the critical issue is how to move beyond visions and prototypes, to scaling and adoption.
• Second, the whole notion of smart cities should also be reappraised.
• And third, the Internet of Everything Economy will fuel a transformation across communities, industries, and social interactions.

We are looking at a dynamic concept to which bounded definitions — whether physical, digital, organizational, or technological — seem increasingly inadequate.

Read More »

Tags: economic development, IBSG, Internet of Everything, IoE, IoE Economy, Smart Cities, value at stake

In late 2010, when Cisco began thinking about how best to respond to the Prime Minister’s call for corporate involvement in East London Tech City initiative, we quickly saw a great opportunity for us to contribute to a wider UK economic and social development agenda.

Read More »

Tags: BIG Awards, British Innovation Gateway, innovation, National Virtual Incubator

By Howard Baldwin, Contributing Columnist

John Horrigan spends a lot of time worrying about the digital divide – the chasm that divides certain demographic sectors when it comes to accessing information, transacting business, and interacting with government.

I wrote about this last year in Broadband: Exploring The Demographic Patterns, but Horrigan has dug a little deeper, both in his former position with Pew Internet Research and his current position as vice-president and director of the Media and Technology Institute at Washington, D.C.’s Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

Read More »

Tags: applications, broadband, internet, minorities, mobile, smartphone, social networking

By Jason Kohn, Contributing Columnist

We often think of technology in terms of flashy gadgets and slick new applications. But the technology with the biggest impact is often more prosaic. It’s about using straightforward tools to solve basic problems that make people’s lives better.

One of the best examples I’ve seen of this recently is NextDrop, out of Hubli in the state of Karnataka, India. NextDrop is attacking a problem that affects millions of people in India and in much of the developing world: unpredictable and unreliable water supply.

Read More »

Tags: Energy/Utilities, india, NextDrop, SmartGrid, sms, vni, VNI-SA, water supply