The Business Constituency is interested in building Latin American membership and participation. Though Puerto Rico is technically part of the the North American region, the hosts expect there will be additional participation from the region. The PR Chamber is the pre-emiment business organization in the nation, and working with their leadership we could gain both strong participation in an event and good visibility for the BC.
Given the schedule at ICANN, we are recommending trying to hold an event Sunday afternoon prior to the formal opening ceremonies as we did in Joburg. This will also enable us to have follow on conversations with Business leaders that decide to attend ICANN events — either sessions or evening events being planned.
The program would have two parts — a presentation at the Chamber (between 1.5-2 hours — as recommended by the organizers) and a networking cocktail in the neighborhood following the program. Working with Pablo and the Chamber, we’d invite Chamber members — especially members of the tech and communications committee (which itself has over 60 members) — as well as members of the Puerto Rican IT Cluster which has over 100 members that would also be appropriate targets for the BC.
Our goal would be to get a minimum audience of 40 local attendees.
We’d keep the presentations sharp and business-focused, addressing the key questions for PR and regional businesses as discussed with Pablo (and in keeping with our past experience):
- What briefly is ICANN and how does the ICANN system work?
- What role does business play? How do businesses participate?
- What are some of the key issues we’re looking at as businesses currently?
- What’s the value for businesses in participating?
We will work with the Chamber to identify other questions that are of potential interest to PR businesses at this point in its development and re-development.
The presentation piece of the program would take place at the Chamber offices which are two blocks walk from the venue. There is ample space to house an audience of more than 100 attendees, and Pablo has said we can have this venue at no charge. The second part of the program we're recommending would be held at a bar in the El Pastel, a 5 minutes walk from the Chamber. Getting together for a drink following a Chamber event is common and Pablo believes this would be a good way to build on our program (and I agree).
Total budget from the BC side would include coffee for the program itself and small budget for the cocktail. I’m estimating total budget request from the BC should be $1000 or less plus any costs for printing of banners/fact sheets. We would also be able to count on the Chamber’s communications team to help with promotion. I do not believe we would need any support from ICANN (though we would invite appropriate attendees of course). The meeting would take place in English, but I can provide additional Spanish language support.
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Andrew Mack
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