The International Communications Award Cristoforo Colombo, established by the City of Genoa in 1954, in cooperation with the Istituto Internazionale delle Comunicazioni (IIC), is given each year to individuals and organizations having contributed, with a discovery, initiative or research, either from the technical and scientific point of view or the social and human one, to the progress and the diffusion of communications as a mean of economic and social development, friendship and cooperation among peoples.