Something really big will be hitting Chicago this spring. According to an official announcement made on Thursday, the coming spring will see the city hosting the mega tech conference Microsoft Ignite; this would be the first edition of Ignite.
During the event, a big group of techies, which includes the brightest minds of Microsoft, will be uniting at North America’s largest convention center McCormick Place.
Julia White, Microsoft’s GM, when making public announcement of the event said that Ignite is a signature event that the company has planned for its business customers; she added that Microsoft is extremely happy to be able come to Chicago for the first time with such an event.
Experts have predicted that this step by Microsoft will be a big coupe for technology and tourism in Chicago.
The Ignite will probably be the biggest tech conference Microsoft has ever organized. The Redmond, WA-based tech firm has decided to combine all the five technology conferences it arranges every year into a single event. White said that everyone knows how desirable Chicago is, everything about the city is amazing, the sports, the entertainment, and of course the food, which makes it the ideal venue for Microsoft’s mega conference.
Ignite 2015 is scheduled to take place from Mat 4 to may 8. People at Microsoft are expecting to succeed in bringing more than 20,000 tech enthusiasts to Chicago just for witnessing the event along with an estimated spending of $47 million.
Rahm Emanuel, the mayor of Chicago, said Microsoft’s decision of choosing Chicago as the venue for Ignite stands as the testimony of McCormick Place’s power and other strengths of the city, for instance its entertainment, its restaurants, its hotels, its airport and so on.
The announcement of the upcoming tech extravaganza was made at 1971, one of the 5 startup tech incubators Chicago has. The newest of them all i.e. the Chicago Innovation Exchange was opened in Hyde Park on Thursday. So, it can also be said that Microsoft might have picked Chicago due to the city’s emergent tech sector.
White when discussing the company’s decision said that Microsoft has recognized Chicago as a true technology hub; she further said that Ignite is just the beginning of the relationship between the city and the company and the world will probably witness more such partnerships in the future. Here, it must be mentioned that right now the city has entered only into a one-year partnership with Microsoft.
