Featured image: Professor Jean-François Manzoni (left),
President, IMD and Professor Chong Tow Chong (right), Provost, SUTD at the MOU
signing ceremony. Credit: SUTD
The Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) and top-ranking business school IMD (International Institute for Management
Development), signed
a memorandum of understanding (MOU) last Thursday to spearhead a Smart
Cities Index. Within SUTD, the contribution to this project will be undertaken
by the Lee Kuan Yew Centre for Innovative Cities (LKYCIC).
The term ‘Smart Cities’ is commonly used today, but how does
one actually define a Smart City? Is it dependent on how interconnected the
systems in the city are or how much technology is installed in the city to help
citizens complete their daily tasks? Does equipping more sensors or automating
more processes equate to a smarter city? How are citizens’ lives improved?
Hence, there needs to be some guidelines to measure how smart cities are.
The Smart Cities Index is intended to provide insight into
how cities could be smart by learning from leading cities. It will act as a
global index that covers all regions in the world and provide recommendations
on how a smart city should promote inclusiveness beyond mere deployment of
technology.
IMD has produced the World Competitiveness Yearbook since
1989. The Yearbook includes the World Competitiveness Rankings of countries and
economies and their profiles. In 2017, it also included for the first time the IMD
Digital Competitiveness Ranking that introduces several new criteria to
measure countries’ ability to adopt and explore digital technologies leading to
transformation in government practices, business models and society in general.
The signing between SUTD and IMD marks the launch of a
two-year project.
SUTD’s Provost, Professor Chong Tow Chong said: “We are very
pleased to collaborate with IMD on the Smart Cities Index project. As smart
cities will be the norm in the near future, this index will serve as an
effective and well-recognised guide to help improve cities worldwide, through
technology and design.”
IMD’s President, Professor Jean-François Manzoni said: “The
collaboration between IMD and SUTD holds the promise of a very exciting
project. The Smart Cities Index that will be developed as a result should be
the global benchmark in which cities, businesses, citizens and other parts of
civil society can find a unique resource to identify best practices and to
design and implement their own strategies for the world of tomorrow.”