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By Tony Moretta, chief executive of Digital Jersey
DIGITAL Jersey’s focus over the course of 2023 has been firmly on nurturing digital innovation to drive transformation, across all sectors of our economy and in all corners of Island life.
We have seen the fruits of those efforts play out in numerous ways through exciting collaborations such as our partnership with Mastercard, a big focus on skills, such as the implementation of our Digital Skills Strategy and our Skills Credits pilot scheme, and a significant emphasis on innovation, including supporting local disruptors through initiatives such as our Tech Start-Up Bootcamp.
One particularly significant part of our efforts was the launch earlier this year of the new Government of Jersey Impact Jersey scheme – impact.je – which is being delivered through Digital Jersey.
Designed to play a major role in accelerating and strengthening Jersey’s technology ecosystem, Impact Jersey was created to support the Island’s future economy, environmental ambitions and community goals.
Through a series of “open” and challenge programmes, Impact Jersey will offer people and businesses grants for projects designed to implement or grow technological solutions to various Island challenges. This open approach is similar to the UK Smart Grant scheme, designed to focus mainly on stimulating small and medium enterprise, a key target group in Jersey’s innovation ecosystem.
The first Impact Jersey Open Programme, which launched earlier this summer, is providing funding of up to £75,000 (with a total pool of £500k) for projects that tackle one or more of eight strategic priorities: addressing climate change, responding to housing needs for Islanders, supporting sustainable transport transition, increasing health and wellbeing, driving productivity, improving supply-chain resilience, supporting digital skills growth and creating new economic opportunities.
Meanwhile, challenge programmes will focus on one of the strategic priorities and welcome a range of innovators to find technology solutions to impact a particular topic.
Overall, the idea is that Impact Jersey will identify and fund the brightest ideas and solutions from across all sectors of our local community, to help drive real impact and positive change.
CONFIDENCE
The launch of the first grant programme marked a particularly exciting moment in Jersey’s evolution as a digital-first island, reflecting the confidence that Jersey’s authorities have in democratising problem solving and drawing on expertise from across the community.
And the response to it was incredibly positive, confirming the belief that Jersey has an enthusiastic and engaged community of innovators.
With applications being accepted over the summer, “bids” for the open grants from individuals and businesses were assessed by an independent panel of judges, with the successful bids being announced in late 2023.
It is a scheme that underlines the belief that getting to grips with some of the issues the Island and its community face needs a collaborative response, as well as an openness to reframing how we think about risk and a genune appetite to embrace digital-first solutions.
It’s been important to get it right, which is why a considerable amount of time was spent on the design phase of Impact Jersey, to ensure it was as transparent as possible and able to demonstrate good governance, while at the same time giving innovators the freedom to develop groundbreaking solutions.
FUTURE
The creation of the Impact Jersey scheme in 2023 reflects why Digital Jersey exists today − both to nurture a vibrant and thriving digital sector and to enable the adoption of technology in non-digital sectors of the economy and lay the foundations for a digital future for our Island as a whole too.
Looking forward, we are excited to see how those who are successful in the first round of awards from the programme can make an impact and how our local community of innovators can continue to help drive meaningful change through the power of digital in Jersey.
We are also looking forward to the next stage of the programme as, in due course, we launch the first “challenge” initiative through the scheme.
Overall, the objective is for Impact Jersey to help develop a culture of digital enablement within businesses and enhance entrepreneurial and community spirit.
As Digital Jersey continues to focus across all of its workstreams on skills development, collaboration and driving innovation, Impact Jersey will remain a pivotal initiative. It truly has the potential to positively transform our Island in all sorts of ways, drawing on the collective ingenuity and innovative mindset of Islanders.
It is exciting to consider how a scheme like Impact Jersey can bring our communities together to solve our shared challenges, reflecting perfectly our understanding that our success as an Island depends on our ability to integrate digital technologies in smart and diverse ways.
