Creating a cutting-edge city
Online travel company Orbitz claims first-mover innovations like the matrix display, price assurance guarantees, and a corporate travel management tool that won a Chicago Innovation Award in 2004. "If we hadn't come up with those ideas, that 10 billion dollars in travel would belong to our competitors," says Mike Nelson, president of the Partner Services Group of Orbitz Worldwide. "Ideas come from all over. A great idea can come from someone like me or someone who is a telesales agent."
Last year, Aon, the global risk management and insurance brokerage firm also headquartered in Chicago, developed the Global Risk Insight Platform, or GRIP. The technology gives brokers and clients real-time information and data about insurance buying around the world. "One of the real values of the Aon GRIP platform has been our ability to create a platform that translates language from one country to the next, and analyzes it on a global basis," says Maureen Burm, Chief Operating Officer of Aon Brokerage Group.
Despite their global scopes, both Aon and Orbitz have aligned themselves with one of Chicago's homegrown innovation programs supported by Mayor Richard M. Daley -- the Chicago Academy for Advanced Technology (CAAT). The high school opened last fall with 150 freshmen, who will be pipelined into the technology industry through mentorships and internships with more than 80 corporate partners. CAAT, an enterprise ensconcing government, private industry, and non-profits, is one item on the wider agenda to fashion Chicago into a center of innovation.
In April, Daley hosted more than a hundred mayors and international government officials at the annual Richard J. Daley Global Cities Forum under the theme, "New Partnerships for a New Economy: Driving Innovation in Cities." Tens of millions of dollars have also been funneled through a digital resource program for underserved communities in the city, as well as a job training program that aims to create an information technology corps to serve the many potential employers in Chicago.
"So many companies are headquartered here and have a large presence here; it's really a melting pot," says Tanen. "We're a leader in the Midwest, but who is to say we can't be seen as a leader in the entire country?"
