Connected City Board Invites CIOs To Share Smart City Knowledge

London is one of several cities joining the Connected City Board, a new initiative designed to allow CIOs from municipal authorities to share information and to find the best way to manage public-private smart city partnerships.

Smart cities are touted by operators and suppliers as a way of transforming the management of public services, stimulating urban development and improving the lives of citizens through connectivity and associated services.

Among other things, the board will promote the concept of the connected city, share best practices, challenges and opportunities and to give cities the chance to provide updates about their projects.

Connected City Board

The board is the brainchild of the Wi-Fi industry body the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA), and builds on conversations with senior officials from London, as well as Barcelona, New York, San Francisco, San Jose and Singapore.

Other cities will be invited to join the board as will representatives from government organisations and other parts of industry working on the development of smart and connected cities. The board’s first meeting will take place at Wi-Fi Global Congress in San Jose this October.

“To power the vision for Smart Cities, cities around the world are deploying city-wide Wi-Fi and integrating unlicensed and licensed spectrum-based services and business models for managing connectivity, Internet of Things, Big Data and converged services based opportunities for city residents, visitors and businesses,” said JR Wilson, WBA Chairman.

“The WBA, as a global trade association, has a strong heritage in bringing together licensed and unlicensed technologies and creating best practices and de facto industry standards for a diverse ecosystem.”

The UK government recently launched a £10 million Internet of Things (IoT) competition, inviting local authorities to submit proposals for projects that can provide benefits for citizens, economic benefits for the private and public sector.

But despite the perceived benefits a recent YouGov survey claimed 96 percent of Brits don’t know anything about smart cities.

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