Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar wins the bid to host ICTD conference

Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar has won the bid to host the third International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development (IEEE/ACM ICTD) conference in April 2009. ICTD is the premiere conference for innovating technology accessible and relevant to developing communities.

It is a multidisciplinary forum for academic researchers and practitioners designing computing technology solutions for developing economies.

"This conference is one of the most important new directions for computing. By hosting the ICTD conference here in Doha we can get the Middle East and Qatar more involved in this emerging field," says M. Bernardine Dias, Ph.D., assistant research professor at Carnegie Mellon University.

"Qatar is an emerging leader in the knowledge economy and it wants to use technology in a way that can help the entire region. This conference is a great opportunity for Carnegie Mellon and Qatar because it identifies ways in which technology can make a difference in underserved communities and how we can contribute."

The conference presents state-of-the-art research by technical and social scientists, with original, peer-reviewed papers and a poster session, as well as keynote addresses by leading scholars in the field. Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who is transitioning from company chairman into a full-time philanthropic role, has agreed to deliver a keynote address at ICTD 2009.

Of the six billion people in the world, four billion are at the base of the economic pyramid, living on less than $2 a day. A lot of these populations are represented here in Qatar, and these are the people who can benefit greatly from the research and innovations of the ICTD community, Dias says.

Scholars presenting at this conference are part of a fast growing new field of research on the application of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to address the challenges of developing economies. There has been an explosion of public, private and non-profit ICTD projects in the past decade; however, systematic and scientifically rigorous research is just beginning to emerge.

UC Berkeley in California and Microsoft Research in India hosted the first two conferences. Both events attracted more than 200 scholars from around the world. Dias expects that having the conference in the Middle East, as well as having Bill Gates as a speaker, will draw an even larger crowd in 2009.

The two-day conference will inaugurate on April 17, 2009.Gates will give the keynote address on April 18. Dr. Hessa Al-Jaber, Secretary General of ictQATAR, the Supreme Council for Information and Communication Technology in Qatar and Kentaro Toyama, assistant managing director of Microsoft Research India, are both honorary chairpersons. The organizing partner of the conference is ictQATAR, and the Qatar National Research Fund is a platinum sponsor.