About 3,000 people attended the inaugural Rally Innovation Conference in downtown Indianapolis last week.
It is considered the largest global cross-sector innovation conference and it was put on by Elevate Ventures where Christopher Day is the CEO.
“This type of conference, I think, based on the collisions allows for more idea generation, more collaboration, and hopefully will just fuel more innovation across each of those sectors as it relates to technology,” said Day in an interview with Gerry Dick of Inside Indiana Business.
He believes Indiana has a lot to offer, but isn’t getting talked about enough.
“We don’t talk about all of our number one rankings. We don’t talk about our arts and science and our trails and 43 miles of beach in Lake Michigan. And this is just an opportunity to let the globe know about all the assets that exist here in Indiana, because everyone is looking [for] where’s the best place to go to live, work and play. And when you add up all the different assets, there’s no question in my mind, we ranked among the best in the world,” said Day.
Day says the potential for innovation and growth at a conference like this is off the charts.
“It’s about domain experts from across sectors. So, med device can be health care, hard tech, software, it can even be sports, tech, all in the same product. So we believe it’s really critical to figure out how to get people together that don’t normally don’t run the same circles in one place at the same time,” said Day.
More than 200 speakers were there, including former NBA star Magic Johnson, who is also the Chairman and CEO of Magic Johnson Enterprises. Peyton Manning was also there. He is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame who spent much of his career with the Indianapolis Colts before going to the Denver Broncos. He won two Super Bowls and was the NFL’s Most Valuable Player five times. Other guests included ESPN Host, Gold Medalist, and author Victoria Arlen as well as Tech Strategist Crystal Washington and Radio and Podcast Personality Guy Raz.
