A major digital technology and media festival held in Derry has been axed over a shortfall in funding.
The festival has championed the creative industries since its inception as a four-day pilot project four years ago.
A subsidiary of the Derry Chamber of Commerce, it reported an attendance of 60,000 people in 2015.
The Chamber said CultureTech has ceased its annual festival “for now”.
But it added that CultureTECH remains the Chamber brand for all year-round activity in support of science, technology and maths skills in the city.
“It is a huge loss, CultureTECH was one of the largest family friendly technology events in the UK and Ireland,” said Dr Kevin Curran, a Reader in Computer Science at Ulster University.
“Fifteen thousand schoolchildren took part in this who were then encouraged to do science and technology in school, go to university and study a STEM subject and then build a company.
“It was also showcasing Derry, making it a brand outside of here.
“Companies, when they look to relocate somewhere, look for the quality of the talent and the quality of the life in an area. CultureTECH was doing that, it really was making a big splash in the technology world.”
In February, Chamber of Commerce board member Padraig Canavan said a review of the festival was being undertaken “in the context of ever tightening public finances”.
The festival cost just more than £320,000 in 2015.
Funding is just one of a number of factors for the festival not going ahead this year.
One of its success stories was Diarmuid Moloney, who created his own software named Rotor that specialised in making music videos on a shoe-string budget.
With the prize money of £10,000 Diarmuid went on to develop his software that attracted the attention of major record labels including Polydor and Universal.
CultureTECH was also one of the big successes of Dery’s year as the UK City of Culture in 2013.
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