THE third in a series of innovation conferences, to held at BT Adastral Park tomorrow brings Digby Jones, Minister for Trade & Investment, to the East of England as the event's keynote speaker.

THE third in a series of innovation conferences, to held at BT Adastral Park tomorrow brings Digby Jones, Minister for Trade & Investment, to the East of England as the event's keynote speaker.

Lord Jones will talk about leveraging UK innovation for impact in the global economy at the latest conference organised under the Networking in the 21st Century programme.

Entitled “Innovation in the Global Economy”, the event held at BT's research park in Martlesham includes a line-up of high profile senior business and technology leaders.

Philip Hargrave, chief executive of KTN, talks about stimulating innovation in digital communications; Sean Phelan, founder of Multimap, shares his experience of developing a global business; and Paul Exell, director of BT Group Technology, looks at technology and innovation in the global economy.

Networking in the 21st Century is supported by BT, the East of England Development Agency and the Suffolk Development Agency and aims to promote sustainable economic growth through innovation, enterprise and entrepreneurship. It says the conference will provide “critical insight into the innovation opportunities and challenges that face businesses already competing in the global economy” as well as the chance to share views and experiences.

This is the second time in less than a week that the region's businesses have been invited to gain valuable insight into preparing for the future.

Last Thursday, Ipswich technology firm HTK teamed up with IP-City Network to host an evening seminar looking at the opportunities and challenges for SMEs, and how technology can help.

Phil Todd, head of research at Analysys in Cambridge, presented the findings of a national survey conducted by Analysys on behalf of HTK, which indicated that many firms recognised the need to improve their processes for dealing with customers but were reluctant to use customer interaction software for fear of capital costs.

HTK managing director Marlon Browser talked about the company's latest Software-as-a-Service product which gives organisations the chance to pay for use of the software via an internet connection rather than having to buy and maintain the software.

HTK has an EEDA grant to work with local companies who want to trial hosting their existing or new software applications rather than buying and running them in-house.