Giving Compass' Take:

• Tom Vander Ark explores the opportunities and challenges that emerging technologies present to cities looking to improve their services for their citizens. 

• How can philanthropy help guide the productive use of emerging technologies? 

• Read about preparing for AI and the future of work.

Spending on smart cities technology will be about $80 billion, perhaps $135 billion by 2021, according to a new report. These investments will make spread opportunity and make cities more convenient and sustainable. But they come with new complex challenges. In an interview with China Global Television, I discussed smart cities and the technology that’s driving them.

What makes a city smart? The Smart Cities Council promotes three core values:

  • Livability: Cities that provide clean, healthy living conditions without pollution and congestion. With a digital infrastructure that makes city services instantly and conveniently available anytime, anywhere.
  • Workability: Cities that provide the enabling infrastructure — energy, connectivity, computing, essential services — to compete globally for high-quality jobs.
  • Sustainability: Cities that provide services without stealing from future generations.

To their list, we add Learnability, the equitable access to quality learning opportunities across a coordinated ecosystem from birth through careers.

What’s driving the growth of smart cities?

On the demand side, people are moving to cities to look for jobs and a better quality of life. More than half of the world’s population now lives in urban areas and it’s projected to rise to two thirds by the middle of the century. Rapid urbanization led to big problems like pollution, traffic and crime. These all create demand for smart cities solutions.

On the supply side, access to cheap devices and broadband has connected more than half of the world’s population. Add sensors and cameras and we have billions of devices sharing data–the so-called internet of things.

Connected communities and cheap storage paved the way for the platform revolution–we work, learn, and play on platforms that get better as they get bigger (network effect).

Big data and cheap computing also enabled the explosion of artificial intelligence (AI), code that learns, in software applications supporting every aspect of life. Add enabling tools like robotics, drones, and autonomous vehicles (as shown below), and you have a world of shaping tools.

Read the full article about smart cities by Tom Vander Ark at Getting Smart.