FIREBALL Smart Cities Workshop February 15, 2012 No Comments

Check the presentations from the FIREBALL Smart Cities Workshop here.

Session 1
09.00 – 10.30
Opening session: Towards Smarter Cities

Session 210.30 – 11.30

Moderator:
Dave Carter,

Smart City CIP portfolio chair

Challenges for cities in becoming smarter: current practice, issues, solutionsThis session introduces the current issues, problems and challenges which cities are addressing in “becoming smarter cities”, told by the cities themselves, as a starting point for improved knowledge sharing:

MANCHESTER – Dave Carter (Head of Manchester Digital Development Agency & chair of Smart Cities Portfolio Working Group)

AMSTERDAM – Audrie van Veen (Amsterdam Innovation Motor)

LISBON – Joana Fernandes (Project Coordinator, Lisbon E-Nova)

HELSINKI – Jarmo Eskelinen (CEO, Forum Virium, Helsinki)

BARCELONA – Julia Lopez Ventura (Project Manager & Technician, International Cooperation at Barcelona City Council)

Session 3

12.00 – 13.15

Moderator:

Pekka Sauri,

Deputy Mayor of Helsinki city

Opportunities for creating smarter cities, This session brings a spectrum of topics to the foreground which are currently being worked on in various EU projects. Special emphasis on results from the FIREBALL project. The FIRE relevance for cities. The Smart Cities CIP ICT-PSP projects will also address their relevance for cities.
Topics includes:

  • Technologies for smarter cities.
  • Promises of the Future Internet and how to realize them in cities
  • Future Internet empowered Innovation culture of the city

Speakers , (invited presentations , Maximum: 10 minutes each)

Session 4

14.15 – 16.15

Moderator/facilitator:
Dave Carter,

Smart City CIP portfolio chair

(Coffee will be served in parallel with the break out sessions)

Towards smarter cities: policies, approaches, actions

This break-out session is addressing the issues cities are experiencing with a forward looking view. What are the innovation roadmaps of cities? What are the actions, initiatives to be taken in next few years? How could policies support such roadmaps, at EU, national, regional and urban level? This session will see participants split into multi-disciplinary groups to discuss :

  • Roadmaps towards smarter cities: interactive session
  • Horizontal issues in the roadmaps: pilots for creating network effects, innovation culture, infrastructure, bottom-up empowerment etc.
  • Policies to stimulate the implementation of city roadmaps, at urban, regional, national and EU level
16.15 – 17.00

Moderator/facilitator:
Roberto Santoro,

FIREBALL

Panel – Conclusions and outlook
Panel of people from the previous sessions, representing the Commission, Eurocities, Fire, and Living Labs.

The questions will be answered by the panelists and by the participants. Discussion on:

  • Understanding : The Smartness in Smart Cities: what progress have we made today in understanding the substantial elements characterizing city`s programs that have decided to become smarter.
  • Experiencing : Are there Initial cities experimentation that show the way (reference practice)? Innovation Culture, FI Infrastructure, the Innovation process…
  • Building a Smarter Future: Strengthening interlinks among Cities, Future Internet and Living Lab Communities. Creating joint working groups on critical horizontal issues. Suggested groups form the workshop?

Big Data, Big Impact: New Possibilities for International Development February 13, 2012 No Comments

Fireball and Eurocities organised a workshop Jan 25 in Brussels, Smart Cities and the Future Internet. Reading this you will partly realise why we see a future opportunity in combining Future Internet + Living Labs + Cities in a smart environment.

” The amount of data in the world is exploding – large portion of this comes from the interactions over mobile devices being used by people in the developing world – people whose needs and habits have been poorly understood until now. Researchers and policymakers are beginning to realize the potential for channeling these torrents of data into actionable information that can be used to identify needs & provide services for the benefit of low-income populations. This discussion note is a Call-to-action for stakeholders for concerted action to ensure that this data helps the individuals and communities who create it. ”

http://www.weforum.org/reports/big-data-big-impact-new-possibilities-international-development
By: Michael Nilsson

Special issue of the Journal of Theoretical and Applied Electronic Commerce Research February 6, 2012 No Comments

Call for papers: Smart Applications for Smart Cities: New Approaches to Innovation

Guest Editors: Hans Schaffers, Carlo Ratti and Nicos Komninos

The Journal of Theoretical and Applied Electronic Commerce Research is planning a special issue on Smart Applications for Smart Cities: New Approaches to Innovation.

Cities are complex, networked and continuously changing social ecosystems, shaped and transformed through the interaction of different interests and ambitions. Ensuring employment, sustainable development, inclusion and quality of life are important concerns. Infrastructures of cities, addressing these concerns, comprise a diversity of services such as healthcare, energy, education, environmental management, transportation and mobility, public safety. Increasingly these services are enabled by broadband infrastructures, wireless sensor networks, Internet-based networked applications, open data and open platforms. The concept of “smart cities” has emerged during the last few years to describe how investments in human and social capital and modern ICT infrastructure and e-services fuel sustainable growth and quality of life, enabled by a wise management of natural resources and through participative government (Caragliu, Del Bo, Nijkamp).
Read the rest of this entry »