Josep M. Piqué receives the Prize for Excellence as an ICT professional

Josep M. Piqué, executive president of La Salle Technova Barcelona and President of the International Association of Science Parks and Areas of Innovation (IASP), was awarded the Prize for Excellence as an ICT professional at the Information and Communication Technologies Open Day. At this moment in time, Josep M. Piqué is in Istanbul presiding the 34th Conference of the International Association of Science Parks and Areas of Innovation and was unable to accept the award in person. He did however say that he interprets "excellence as a combination of passion, vision, commitment and results" and he wanted to point out that he was receiving “this prize in acknowledgement of people such as Brother Daniel and institutions such as La Salle, which have given him the chance to give the best of himself in order to make the world a better place."

The Prizes for Excellence distinguish people, companies and institutions that foment the incorporation of ICTs and use them to improve innovation, the external effort and social ethical compromise. The category of Excellence in the ICT professional acknowledges the efforts of people who have contributed to the expansion of the Information and Communication Technologies in Catalonia. This prize also praises the leadership skills and the ability of the award-winner to achieve excellence in this sector. An example of this would be the innovation and creation of ICT products and services which contribute to social, cultural and financial improvements.  There are 5 prizes in total and each one has 4 business excellence sections namely: the social Integration of the ICTs, digital innovation, and the dissemination and innovation in ICTs.

Josep M. Piqué is a Telecommunications engineer who graduated from La Salle, obtained an MBA at the Universidad Ramon Llull and completed further studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the California-Berkeley University. His lengthy professional experience in the management of higher education centres made him an ideal candidate to promote postgraduate programmes, Technology Transfer centres, University Incubators and Science and Technology Parks and he has actively promoted the creation of different hybrid organizations based on the University-Industry-Government model. His professional activity is mainly focused on the promotion of Knowledge based on the economy and society in an effort to consolidate Knowledge Cities within Smart Cities and he has successfully exported the model of the 22@ district in Barcelona to the cities of Medellín, Río de Janeiro, Busan, Porto Alegre, Múnich, Canberra, etc. Piqué drove the creation of La Salle Technova Barcelona and after a few years on local government, he returned in 2015 as executive president to promote its international scope.