One month ahead of our Technology Meeting

Last January, on two posts in this Blog, one from Socorro, and another mine, we announced our first CIAT Technology Meeting that will take place on October 10 to 12, in Miami. We discussed the reasons that led us to undertake this effort, which I must confess was somehow risky, aimed at creating a space of contact between our tax administrations and private companies that develop technology solutions.

Almost everything is ready. The hotel is reserved. The scheduled sponsors and exhibitors have their stands. The technical program is closed; while there can always be a change or two, due to last-minute unforeseen contingencies. Many of the participants already have registered; if you have not made it yet, you still have the opportunity to do it on the site of the event. Remember that this is an open event and the registration is available to all, but physically the quotas are limited and, as a show promoter would say on the radio some years ago… not many slots remain available.

One of the elements also ready from now on is our application for mobile devices. This includes sections with access to the event program, to the profile of the speakers (with access to contact data, including those of networks as twitter and LinkedIn). It includes the map of the hotel area in Miami; the interactive map of the hotel and the rooms; access to the mentioned tweets with hashtags #ciatevents and #CIATTECH16 as well as the references to our corporate account of @ciatorg.

The application also contains a section for accompanying the sequence of activities. This  enable all the users to share news and messages for all the participants, such as impressions on the event, photos on our participation at the relevant time and, particularly, to send comments and questions during the development of the conferences and panels, which will be moderated by the MC during the questions and answers period following each session. Of course, the application allows evaluating the usefulness of each presentation after it concluded.

We invite you to download it and accompany our meeting from now, even if you are not going to participate to the event in Miami. It can be downloaded from mobile applications stores using CIAT as keyword or following these links for Apple and Google.

As we had anticipated, this event differs from those that the CIAT organizes traditionally, in particular from the General Assemblies and the Technical Conferences. In the first place, this event is not organized by a Tax Administration or a member country, and as a result, it has fewer resources. Therefore, in good measure, it has to be partly self-financed by the participants. Nevertheless, we hope that the lack of assistance in areas such as reception or transfers between the airport to the hotel will be somewhat compensated with this excellent news, for me at least: the expected outfit is “business casual” and therefore a great opportunity to let the dark suits at home, along with ties and high heels.

Good luck.

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