Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Meows Coffee, the Piedmont ICT Innovation Award to local … – economyup

  Even kittens can be innovative. This is demonstrated by the recent award of the ICT Innovation Award Piedmont in the digital community, to meows Coffee , the first local cats born in Turin and in Italy.

 It is a recognition that the ‘ Observatory Smau assigns to the most innovative use of digital technologies by enterprises and that time is gone, on May 14, who has placed at the heart of its business great friends of man, adding the ingredient “technology.”

 Opened in March in Turin, mews Coffee you can eat and drink like in any other place but it has a peculiar feature: the inside lives a cat colony of 6 cats. The venue was constructed on the basis of the needs of animals in compliance with local health authorities. Cats for circulating the room, they leave cuddle and hug to the customers, they sleep, they wake up. An ideal place for many lovers of the feline race. You can not bring their pets, but can be temporarily “adopt” those in the field. Also in the room there is a large video wall, in collaboration with lazampa.it, which projects video images shot in catteries and kennels, telling stories of animals abandoned or in need of care. In Italy it is a novelty, but spaces so there are already Tokyo (the tendency is born in the East), Berlin, Paris, London and Vienna.


 What has allowed the mews Coffee to win the award was the marriage between innovative idea in any case (housing cats in a space reserved for the public) and an equally innovative technological solution. meows in fact adheres to PlaceJam , start-up I3P/Politecnico born at Turin, which has given rise to a community wi-fi which already has 100,000 users involved not only in Italy, but throughout Europe.

 Basically you enter and there is free wi-fi. What is new? “Who is our local – says the founder Andrea Levine , 36 year old born in America but in Italy as a child – is surrounded by people who love animals. I liked the idea of ​​putting in communication both offline and online, say, the referent of an association gattofila with a cat lady: the two meet, sipping a cappuccino and in the meantime, thanks to the use of wireless access, share their Fb pages and their Twitter profiles, in short your references online. It is a kind of sharing real-virtual. Also – continues Levine degree in international diplomatic sciences – when the customer looks at the images of the video wall, thanks to wi-fi can easily decide at that moment to go looking in the video that the network interesting, perhaps to keep it or relaunch on social. “

 It must be said that through Placejam mews Coffee can make media marketing: having the contact details of online customers who connect to the network, can send their information through email and newsletters on various events and initiatives helping to feed the community.

 For the future it is planned to set up a room for video-conferences with industry professionals (veterinarians and ethologists), also useful for the coworking space. Another innovative element: the team is all female and young. The founder chose to work with 4 women, all in their twenties and thirties.


 ”In a place where communication is central – Levine concludes – technology helps but does not replace the dialogue: the aim is indeed to speak to the people inside the room and facilitate socialization. But technology can help create community in the real world. “


 How to PlaceJam hot-spots allow you to connect to the Internet through their smartphones and easily find information and tips on the most interesting activities in the surrounding area. The community and built in collaboration with retailers and local authorities, which, thanks to Placejam , transform their adsl wi-fi zones in zero maintenance and professional in no time, if possible, through the integrated software, create mini-campaigns using the web, email, social networks and the SMSO reaching contacts directly on their smartphones.

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