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Sydney Water Innovation Festival
SWIF25 is coming...
SWIF is back this year with a cross-sector focus on Collaboration for Innovation.
The most complex challenges of our time require not just groundbreaking or innovative ideas, but also the collective effort of experts from diverse fields. That's why this year, SWIF is bringing together leaders and innovative minds from across industries, utilities, academia, policy makers, and national and global innovators to foster partnerships that ignite change.
The SWIF25 program is comprised of pre-event activities and a 2 day live event with a mix of in-person and interactive online events.
Check out how to become a sponsor
About
Pre-event: Design Incubators
Live Festival
About SWIF
The Sydney Water Innovation Festival (SWIF) is a dynamic and engaging gateway to exchange innovative ideas and creative solutions to water-related challenges and beyond. SWIF25 will focus on highlighting our commitment to promoting a culture of innovation by pushing boundaries and engaging national and international innovators to fast-track business improvements and demonstrating industry leadership.
Pre-event: Design Incubators
- Dates: 1st Oct - 22nd Nov 2024
- Location: Online and Sydney Water Parramatta HUB
Live festival
- Dates: 4th - 5th March 2025
- Location: Online and Telstra Customer Insight Centre, Sydney, CBD
SWIF25 themes
The vision for SWIF25 is to create a safe and inclusive space for all participants to inspire, connect, collaborate, and embrace open innovation around the following themes:
Building an innovative culture
Human-centric innovation strategies
Generative AI and data for innovation
Strategic innovation frameworks (ideation to deployment)
Circular economy and overcoming linear constraints
Deployment for success
Regenerative sustainability and collaboration
Innovation for the future
Who should join
This event has been created to bring together diverse perspectives from:
Leaders and Executives
Industry, Innovators and Pioneers
Business Development and Financial Professionals
Government and Policy Makers
Young Professionals
Researchers and Academics
Pre-event: Design Incubators
Design Incubators are an excellent way to engage participants, stimulate creative thinking, and generate valuable insights and solutions to business challenges. They enable businesses to rapidly prototype and test ideas with real users - which is invaluable for innovation. This method condenses months of work into a short time, making it highly efficient and effective for quickly validating ideas and making informed decisions.
Pre-event: Design Incubators
- Dates: 1st Oct - 22nd Nov 2024
- Location: Online and Sydney Water Parramatta HUB
Outcomes
60 participants from different parts of the organisation worked in cross functional teams to address nine identified Sydney Water challenges. Throughout the program, an impressive total of 1,118 ideas were generated, 21 of which were tested on end users, and 12 were selected as top ideas. The teams received positive feedback from the Executives, highlighting the success of the Design Incubator sessions. The outcomes of the DI will be showcased at the Sydney Water Innovation Festival (SWIF25) live event in March 2025.
More about the Design Incubators
Delivered over 6 weeks prior to the festival (starting from 1st October 2024) with outcomes being showcased at the live event in March 2025
Facilitated workshops (half-day per week) over 6 weeks with participation of subject matter experts
Focus on universal emerging challenges and complex problems
Cross-functional knowledge fostering innovative solutions
Create tools, resources and outcomes to be used across the businesses
Accelerate pilot-orientated projects
Design Incubators challenge statements
- How might we optimise technology for the customer?
- How might we have a tech-led future-ready workforce?
- How might we best support our communities in building resilience to drought?
- How might we ensure Net Zero carbon emissions is a core principle in our designs and processes?
- How might we bridge the gap between First Nations wisdom, cultures and voices and Sydney Water through storytelling?
- How might we better care for our customers in times of disruption?
- How might we deliver fast interim servicing options in accelerated growth areas in western Sydney to meet developer demand?
- How might we attract skilled workforce of the future?
- How might we ensure that research and innovation effective in solving business problems?
Live festival
This 2 day live event includes a mix of in-person and interactive online events.
- Date: 4th - 5th March 2025
- Location: Online and Telstra Customer Insight Centre, Sydney, CBD
Registrations for the Live Festival will open in min January 2025
Live festival details
Connect to Innovate Executive Summit
The Summit will bring CEOs and Executives from various sectors to exchange knowledge, innovative ideas, and practices to encourage cross-pollination of insight, visions, and strategy to inspire new approaches and solutions that are beneficial across industries.
Keynote Speakers
To inspire new ways of thinking and approaching innovation.
Panel Discussions
Bringing together experts from various industries to share insights, discuss challenges, and explore opportunities for innovation.
Inspire and Ignite Sessions
These sessions showcase the journey of innovation projects from idea to deployment, in a structured and comprehensive way so that the audience can learn and emulate successful strategies.
Design Incubator Showcases
Showcasing the outcomes of the Design Incubator workshops.
VIP Networking Event
Opportunity to meet like-minded innovators.
