We hope you’re having a relaxing holiday and getting rested up for an exciting new year. 2020 was interesting to navigate, and we thought it would be fun to take a look back at some of the successes. From becoming an emerging partner with Esri Inc., to turning 1 year old and launching Q11 on both Alexa and the Google Assistant, we hope you enjoy our year in review, and we’re looking forward to what’s to come.
Matt Pietryszyn
CEO / Co-founder
BURLINGTON, ON CANADA – (Dec 9, 2020) – Qwhery participates in IT World Canada Event: Technicity, a yearly event that hosts conversations between industry leaders in the tech sector, and local government officials.
Matt Pietryszyn, CEO and Co-founder of Qwhery spoke with Mayor Sandy Brown of Orangeville, Ontario, Cyrus Tehrani – Chief Digital Officer of Hamilton, Michelle Holland – former Toronto City Councillor and current Director at PwC Canada, and Jeff Libis – VP, Sales at LED Roadway Lighting Ltd. The conversation on how citizen engagement is changing was moderated by Craig Mackereth – Senior Vice President – Global Support, Rimini Street.
BURLINGTON, ON CANADA – (November 30, 2020) – The 2020 Presidential Election season has been like no other, with numerous counties across the US seeing higher turnout than in 2016. Among them was Collin County, Texas, where local government worked to establish accessible voting information systems ahead of Election Day, guiding voters in rain, shine, or pandemic alike.
Ultimately, Collin County voters turned out in record-shattering numbers. During the early voting period alone, residents cast a total of 421,920 ballots, exceeding the 356,688 votes cast during the entirety of the 2016 Presidential Election. 36,689 additional votes were cast on Election Day itself, amounting to an impressive overall turnout rate of 76%. Collin County also had one of the highest early voting participation rates in Texas among first-time primary or general election voters, indicating a high degree of new voter engagement.
Data Visualization: Reach of […]
BURLINGTON, ON CANADA – (October 27, 2020) – Collin County, Texas is experiencing a very high voter turn out this election and there are still 3 days left of Early Voting and Election Day 2020 ahead of us. Now they’ve made finding a place to cast your vote in Collin County even easier.
Just use Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa and get pointed in the right direction in no time.
Use your smart speaker or mobile device to ask your virtual assistant where your nearest voting center is and what the current wait time is there. Avoiding large crowds and knowing where the nearest locations are helps you vote more efficiently and safely, avoiding crowds if possible.
The Google Assistant Action and Amazon Alexa Skills connect directly to the County’s Geographic […]
BURLINGTON, ON CANADA – (October 21, 2020) – Qwhery Inc has been selected as a finalist to compete in Haltech’s annual pitch competition, Hi5.
For the past seven years, Haltech, a regional tech startup accelerator, has hosted their pitch competition, Hi5, where five clients are chosen after an in-depth application process to pitch their business to a panel of distinguished judges.
This year, the competition will be held virtually on November 26th, from 3:oopm to 5:00pm ET. Save the date by registering for your free tickets Here.
Congratulations to the other finalists, vying for the top prize, Cubby, My Well Self, SPOT App and XProEM.
About Qwhery Inc
Qwhery Inc, is a leader in implementing voice technology and geographic information systems. Their flagship product, Q11, connects smart home devices and voice assistants to local government open data portals. The Qwhery cloud helps Cities connect the services that they provide […]
One more spin around the sun and Qwhery is celebrating its first birthday. 2020 hasn’t turned out how we expected it to and just like many, we’ve had to think differently about our products and what’s important.
We started Qwhery with a focus on voice technology, connecting your smart speakers and voice assistants to your Towns, Cities and Regions and the services and information that they provide. When we were faced with the pandemic, we decided to try and do something for everyone by bringing COVID-19 related case data to you via SMS text messaging, Facebook Messenger, Alexa and Google Assistant. Today, you can register for free COVID-19 alerts for any Health Region in Canada or County in the United States. We’ve enabled our Alexa Skill, Q11 to also provide anyone with the same information. Google Assistant is on the way.
The pandemic doesn’t […]
When it comes to municipal services, citizens either benefit from them or bear the brunt of their effects, and in turn, ultimately determine the extent of policy success. As a result, community engagement by local government has incredible potential to help craft effective city initiatives—so how can municipalities leverage technology for greater community engagement and constructive dialogue with residents?
Community engagement is a multi-step process which begins with decision-making itself. Traditionally, government decisions are made from executive third-party perspectives which can fail to embody community sentiments. When people are given channels of direct
communication with their cities, they’re empowered to bring truly important issues to light from positions of personal experience. The more accessible these channels, the more diverse these voices can be, ensuring the service of as many community groups as possible.
Still, effective community engagement doesn’t stop with the centralization of initiatives in […]
BURLINGTON, ON CANADA – (May 6, 2020) – Qwhery, who recently announced their emerging partnership with Esri, the global market leader in geographic information system (GIS) software, along with SaFuture Inc has just launched a new platform to help inform people with up-to-date COVID-19 stats and information, directly to their mobile devices via text message.
Anyone can register to receive free COVID-19 alerts or daily and weekly summary notifications for confirmed cases, recoveries, tests and deaths within their Health Region in Canada or their county in the United States.
“We heard from people in our communities that they didn’t know where to find local information about this pandemic” said Sabrina Tang, Owner of SaFuture Inc, a collaborator with Qwhery on this initiative. “We wanted to do our part and build a solution that could help […]
With the vast array of information at our fingertips today, people expect near-instant answers to their questions to local government. Even basic, everyday inquiries become all the more urgent in times of crisis, and to an extreme, the Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted the key responsibility that municipalities have to keep residents informed in a timely manner.
Over the years, cities have moved to fill in gaps on their end by creating open data collections. Enormous amounts of information are categorized and made available for public use through online tools such as parks locators, City Councillor lookups, community events and meetings calendars, zoning maps, and far more. Even so, people often struggle to efficiently find what they need, when it’s needed. Why is this?
A great example of how open data can be used by anyone to benefit everyone. ~ Ryan Nolan, Director of I.T., […]
