Objective

One of the Chamber Foundation’s core competencies is to enhance economic development opportunities throughout the region.  Along that mission and aligned with the Foundation's goal of transforming Illinois into a center of innovation, entrepreneurship, and creativity, the Foundation recently hosted a roundtable session with Chamber member DLA Piper to examine Illinois’ current economic development incentives portfolio. 

We believe the right incentives can help our region’s businesses compete in the knowledge economy. 

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Hosted in partnership with the Illinois Institute of Technology Institute of Design, the 2009 Innovation Summit brought together influential innovation experts, business executives, academics and government leaders to discuss innovation and accelerate Chicagoland's development as a globally recognized center for innovation. The Summit was a full day of innovation education, tools, case studies, demonstrations, and networking. Now in its third year, the Summit will continue to focus on creating and sustaining an innovation culture and establishing recognition of the region for leading the innovation imperative on a global scale.

Watch Larry Keeley, President of Doblin, Inc. discuss effective and winning innovation practices, developing a signature innovation competence and innovation leadership.

• Now in its third year, the InnovateNow* initiative has a goal of making Chicagoland and all of Illinois global centers of innovation, entrepreneurship and creativity. The initiative focuses on enabling innovation within organizations, fostering collaborative networks and open innovation, building a strong innovation and entrepreneurial talent pool, and demonstrating the success of innovation through the development of new economic development metrics. The centerpiece of the initiative is the Innovation Summit, an annual event that focuses attention on the importance of innovation and entrepreneurship. 
• Two initiatives, The Applied Innovation Series and the Chicagoland Innovation Leadership Network, assist firms in becoming more innovative through a series of hands-on workshops and social networking for like-minded innovators and entrepreneurs. 
• An initiative with Innocentive, a leader in “crowd sourcing” and open innovation, identified innovative solutions to reducing greenhouse auto emissions by increasing the use of public transportation. A $5,000 cash prize was awarded to the competition winner.
• New programs are examining how the region’s businesses can better compete, including: 
• A research study benchmarking Chicagoland against other global cities 
• Focus on the link between workforce health and economic development 
• Focusing on the innovative/design strategies needed by the region to reach its sustainability goals and remain competitive in the global marketplace