The Mayor's Commission on Technology (MCOT) was created to provide advice to the Mayor on telecommunication issues as they arise.  In practice, the members of MCOT have sought to contribute to the economic development of the City.  The following statement of MCOT's Mission, Goals and Action Steps is intended to demonstrate our commitment to servicing the City in ways beyond the important, but narrow, role of policy forecasting, analysis and recommendations.

We believe that the next five years is a critical period for the City, and we note that in this same period, the value of intellectual property is projected to outstrip the value of physical property in our nation’s economy.   This is an astonishing transformation which is heralded by the fact that the manufacture of information and telecommunications equipment is now the single most important subset of American manufacturing.

Consequently, we propose both a short-term tangible scenario for creating "infotech" jobs and a process for developing (and continuously updating) a strategic plan for technology as it relates to the development of Philadelphia in its economic, educational, cultural, civic and recreational lives.

We fully recognize that other city agencies and commissions have responsibilities for economic development, and we look forward to cooperating fully with them as we concentrate on communication and information intensive technologies and the commercial and employment activity they stimulate.

MCOT will concentrate on stimulating economic development by targeting activity aimed at bringing technology intensive businesses and jobs to the City of Philadelphia. For the next 18 months, MCOT’s efforts will focus on the areas of economic development and job creation, training and education, public relations and advisory.