Smart Cities 2016 conference
Trilix participated in the conference “Smart cities – the future starts now”, held on March 17, 2016 in Vatroslav Lisinski concert hall, organized by Lider business magazine.
The central theme of the conference was wp-contentlication of technology in the service of cities and their citizens, and how these new technologies make life easier and optimize processes. We had the opportunity to see smart city development trends, ready-made solutions for analytics and data transparency (financial reporting and budgeting), various models of public private partnerships and solutions useful for citizens (CityHub).
We were honored to have had the opportunity of hearing so many renowned experts, especially Ivica Perica from Deloitte and his presentation “Smart cities development trends” as well as Damir Juričić from the Investment and Competitiveness Agency and his presentation “Can alternative organization and financing models speed up the implementation of Smart Cities projects”. The conclusion of these presentations was that previous financing models of such demanding projects, where cities invest in capital investments and buy IT systems, is no longer popular. The current trend comprises companies offering Smart City solutions within a model called “Software as a Service”, and finding financing possibilities through various service models in cooperation with cities.
We also listened to the presentation of IBM’s Alexey Ershov “Smarter city Europe” who explained why IBM positions itself on the market by offering pro bono consultants who help city management become ready for the introduction of Smart City solutions. The implementation of the solution is merely the last step.
Igor Cerinski from the Croatian Telecom presented their concept through best practice examples in Croatia, where CT offers a wide range of services based on their infrastructure that cities use as components. When working in synergy, these components result in smart city management.
It is also important to emphasize the action plan, which outlines clear guidelines and prerequisites for turning a city from an “ordinary” to a “smart” one. These guidelines should be respected during the creation of technological solutions aimed at optimizing processes and collecting data from the entire city in order to improve the city services for its citizens and vice versa, which in the end makes a smart city.
We can conclude that smarty city solutions are a dynamic arena with no real standardization or best solution, at least for now. Conference key message is that the smart city concept cannot be seen only through sensors, measurements, ID cards, digitalization of management and central data processing. A city becomes smart once its citizens and management decide to use the resources optimally, and plan city development with ecology and savings in mind. It is only then that city life makes sense and successful implementation of Smart City solutions becomes a force to be reckoned with. At any rate, serious projects of this type are multidisciplinary and include urban planners, traffic, financial, energy and IT experts.
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