Smart Cities Article Series: Introduction

IMD Business School recently published the Smart City Index 2020 and Singapore was ranked as No. 1 once again. Inspired by the publication, I invited my colleagues Niklas Sutela (based in Helsinki, ranked No. 2, jumped up from No. 8) and Daniel Müller (based in Zurich, ranked No. 3) to start a series of interviews with leaders in academia, government and industries.

We are curious to learn about what makes these three cities ranked as the best Smart Cities in the world. The following article is an introduction to the topic and we will follow up a series of expert interviews. Stay tuned!

Ricky: Hi Daniel, Hi Niklas, thanks for joining me for this interesting discussion on Smart Cities! Let’s kick off the discussion today by looking at “what makes our cities ranked as the top Smart Cities?”

Niklas, how about sharing with us about Helsinki?

Smart People build Smart Cities

Photo: Helsinki, Finland's capital (source)

Niklas: On a global scale, Helsinki is a small place far up north. As Finland does not have huge natural resources, a well functioning education system is very important for us. Many people are interested in technology development and they are well aware of the latest innovations.

Nokia (the mobile phone giant) had a big influence on the country. The company has created a strong tech footprint to the country. After the downfall of Nokia, the technical knowhow was put to great use, as many of the engineers have created their own start-ups and continued to advance technological innovation.

Ricky: Wow! That’s a great story and I do miss my old Nokia phone! Daniel, what about Zurich?

Photo: Zurich, Switzerland's capital (source)

Daniel: Zurich is a people centric city, which is well connected, collaborative and agile. These are the main principles that make Zurich smart. There is a strong digitisation within the public administration. The government data is open and transparent. Comparing the Swiss administration system, to its large neighbour in Germany, Switzerland is much more efficient, user-friendly and service-oriented.

Zurich has one of the best technological universities in the world; the ETH Zurich. Having a top ranked university is an important factor to make Zurich a smart city. For example, Google has its largest office outside the U.S. in Zurich.

Photo: Singapore (source)

Ricky: Let me share about Singapore, my adopted home country. The Singapore government is very visionary and it has strong drive for Smart City adoption. The country is well controlled and hyper efficient.

It has two top universities in the world: National University of Singapore (NUS) and Nanyang Technological University (NTU) – which are leading in many research fields such as AI.

Also, all residents can get access to government systems through a digital pass (“SingPass”). It can be used for managing your taxes, checking your pension, buying government apartments and paying traffic fines!

Ricky: Niklas, back to you! Can you share how Helsinki is unique as a smart city in the Nordic region?

Niklas: As said before, Finland is a small country very far north and the country has had to figure out something in order to prosper and be successful. The country does not have many natural resources, with the exception for forest! After the World War II, Finland had a boom in the engineering and machine building industries. This has led to a strong technology and engineering culture.

Photo: Slush (source)

The image of Helsinki is start-up friendly. Slush is one of the largest events in the world for start-ups. It is usually held in November or December every year and it brings together start-ups, venture capitalist and investors to one place. This year the Private Equity (PE) industry has also gathered record numbers of new investments, even during the unforeseen pandemic times.

In Finland, people are very proud of our start-ups. It is highly encouraged and it is cool to start your own company. Personally, I have a few friends who started an AI (“artificial intelligence”) company while still in the university and today they employ tens of people and are continuing on a strong growth bath.

Helsinki is also committed to create open access of data. There is a strong base of IT talents. At the same time, there is a shortage of up to 25,000 developers in Finland.

The government is strongly behind the digital transformation of the country. Finnish people are typically pro-technology and are well equipped to handle digital stuff.

Ricky: Finland is really an exciting place for start-ups. In fact, there is also Slush Singapore started by a Finnish lady, Anna Ratala, since 2016.

Ricky: Daniel, can you share about how Zurich is unique as a smart city in Central Europe?

Daniel: Sure! Zurich is my adopted home, as I came from Southern Germany. It is a nice and attractive place to live with a very high quality of living.

Switzerland has an attractive tax system, it is very safe and clean, like Singapore. Being an attractive city, brings a lot of European- or even global headquarters to the greater area of Zurich.

IT spend per citizen is the highest in the Western world. People are wealthy and they can afford to have the latest technology, iPhones and digital gadgets.

The country is also very international, with German, French and Italian as its official language. Due to its location, Zurich airport is an important hub for central Europe.

Daniel: Ricky, what about Singapore?

Ricky: In my view, Singapore can be seen as a combination of Helsinki and Zurich. On one hand, it does not have any natural resources (like Finland). On another hand, it is also wealthy city after many years of fast development and being a financial hub in Asia.

Photo: Jurong Island (source)

Singapore is good in creating new things and it is very good in building infrastructure. It has created an artificial island “Jurong Island” to support the development of the petrochemical industry; one of the best airports in the world “Changi Airport”; and it has the busiest transhipment port in the world.

The country has become rich and with wealth, people are willing to spend on digital products. It has one of the highest smart phones adoption rates in the world!

The government is encouraging every citizen (young and old) to switch to digital payments. People are also much more open and positive towards digital adoption. Data privacy is seen totally different as compare to Europe. There is a strong trust towards the government of not abusing the data.

Ricky: This is a really interesting discussion and a good start for our Smart City article. I look forward to subsequent interviews with our expert panel from the academia, government and industries.

Daniel, Niklas, thank you very much for joining me today! 

Want to read more?

Here is the first expert interview with Prof. Dr. Andreas Herrmann of St Gallen University. The interview is conducted by Daniel and Niklas.