Attendees at Northumbrian Water’s Innovation Festival are set to explore the power of smart, digital technology in revolutionising the way the company operates.
The company’s seventh Innovation Festival will see innovators from around the world arrive at its iconic Newcastle Racecourse location between Monday 10 July and Thursday 13 July.
They’ll be taking part in a series of sprints, hacks and dashes - workshop-style sessions which follow a five-stage process – to seek out new ideas and solutions to challenges faced by the water sector and beyond.
Five of the sprints and dashes will be focused on a ‘Digital Power’ theme, looking at ways smart technology can help improve the way the company and its workers operate.
One sprint, led by festival headline sponsors Siemens, will explore specifically how data and green technology within a smart network can reduce energy costs, as well as looking for new ways to generate and store energy.
Meanwhile, a daily dash (a rapid style sprint workshop taking place in just one day) will focus on how AI could be used to provide new digital tools to transform the digital experience for remote and field workers.
Other activities will look at addressing a skills gap in the cyber security sector and how the trial process of innovative ideas in the water sector can be accelerated.
The tech giants leading the way with these workshops include Siemens, Schneider Electric, Ntegra, Spring and Cyber North.
Northumbrian Water’s Head of Innovation, Angela MacOscar, said: “We’ll have a whole host of technology experts with us at our Innovation Festival, from all sorts of different backgrounds and it’s this collaboration that sparks brilliant ideas.
“Cutting-edge technology has the power to unlock innovative solutions to current and future challenges faced by the water industry and I’m certain there will be some great ideas which we can take forward.”
Registration to the Northumbrian Water Innovation Festival is open now. To find out more, visit www.innovationfestival.org