All you need to know about the Smart City Expo World Congress

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Bright Cities attended the leading international event focused on cities and smart urban solutions

There is no doubt that the Smart City Expo World Congress is the world’s leading event for smart cities and urban solutions. Held in Barcelona, ​​Spain, the congress reunites technology industries, public managers and entrepreneurs to discuss the most urgent issues in our cities.

With the theme “Cities Made of Dreams”, its ninth edition discussed how the city of the future is closer than we imagined. Afterall, if we can already count on technologies that we had only imagined before, the challenge is to now turn all these innovative projects into action. To this end, the event was structured around the five most urgent topics faced by cities today: Digital Transformation, Urban Environment, Mobility, Governance and Finance and Inclusive and Shared Cities.

There were three intense days of panel discussions, presentations and debates, bringing together 24,000 visitors, 1,000 exhibitors, 700 cities and 400 speakers – including Raquel Cardamone, CEO of Bright Cities. Just one year after the launch of our platform, held at SCEWC 2018 edition, we returned this year with two presentations in our agenda.

Our first stop was at Central Agora where we joined Leading Cities organization to launch the North American version of Leading Cities Rating powered by Bright Cities. First launched during the Smart City Expo Atlanta, our Rating System uses Bright Cities’ disruptive platform to analyze data from each of the participant cities to score them on a scale from A + to D-, in areas such as Governance, Education, Entrepreneurship, Environment, Health, Mobility, Security, Technology and Energy. For SCEWC19 we expanded our database and ranked 500 US cities. The result was a surprise: none of the cities achieved the highest score and the smaller ones, in scale and population, presented better results.

Raquel Cardamone, Bright Cities CEO, and Mike Lake, Leading Cities CEO, presented the Leading Cities Rating powered by Bright Cities for Smart City Expo World Congress’ public.

A few hours later we attended another presentation, this time at the City Possible Tech Talk Citizen-Centric Communities: #MakeTechWorkForPeople. Created with the support of Mastercard, City Possible is a collaborative network of over 40 metropolises around the world, focused in sharing innovative solutions for the most urgent urban challenges. One of its members is Juazeiro do Norte, one of Bright Cities partner cities. The town was the only Brazilian one to appear on the panel, together with cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Medellin. Joined by Michel Araújo, Secretary of Economic Development and Innovation (Sedeci), Raquel Cardamone explained the partnership between Juazeiro and Bright Cities, and how the city is moving towards increasingly intelligent policies.

Raquel Cardamone, Bright Cities CEO, e Michel Araújo, Secretary of Economic Development and Innovation (Sedeci) of Juazeiro do Norte, presented their partnership during City Possible Panel.

On the second day, the main word was inclusion. If creating smart cities requires the commitment of governors, enterprises and start-ups, it is only because they all have a common purpose, that is, to improve the life quality of their citizens. From shared technological innovations to the provision of public spaces, the city of tomorrow must create opportunities for people to interact and live the best life they can, with freedom of choice, security and opportunity. From cities like Bristol, UK, everyone has argued today that the changes will come from shared actions and solutions, as we are doing at Bright Cities.

The collaboration between public governors and private initiatives was precisely one of the main topics discussed during the first day of SCEWC. Called PPPs – public-private partnerships, such contributions have been pointed out by experts such as Roland Busch, Siemens CEO, as solutions to remedy public shortages and to encourage its citizens participation in urban policies. Mayors of cities such as Milan and Barcelona, ​​along with academics, also pointed out the need to think globally, where countries and cities can collaborate with each other.

The third day was all about innovation. From smart initiatives for solving our everyday traffic to the future of Artificial Intelligence, SCEWC has brought together the latest in technology. We have had the opportunity to update our database with the latest intelligent solutions and to closely follow what is being discussed in countless cities around the world. We know can’t wait for next year!

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