Kansas City selects start-ups for innovation programme

Kansas City has announced six partners for its Innovation Partnership Program, which will test start-up solutions to its city services.

The six partners are Geospiza, DogSpot, Homebase, Gridics LLC, Snorkel, and Dynamhex.

Now in its fourth year, the programme is designed to give young enterprises the opportunity to develop a use case for their products to aid the city’s needs, including the efficiency of its crisis response (Geospiza) and maintenance of its sewage systems (Snorkel). The municipality will not incur any cost for the demonstrations, and the companies will not receive any financial investment from the city. The partners will however have access to the city’s data and infrastructure as a supportive test bed for their products and services.

Sly James, the mayor, has called the programme “the exact type of collaboration that will ensure Kansas City continues to build on its momentum and becomes the world-class city we know it can be”.

The partners will be expected to work with the Office of Innovation, led by Bob Bennett, the city’s Chief Innovation Officer.

Bennett told Cities Today: “I’ll be keeping an eye on all six of the companies. [Each] will have unique challenges–access to city resources, efficacy of the technology and adaption by private sector companies. For this to work, I’ve got to maintain good communications with all six CEOs and COOs throughout the process.”

Geospiza is one of the start-ups selected to work with the Public Safety Department. The company harnesses data from communities to allow for more effective, risk-conscious responses to crises. DogSpot meanwhile produces portable doghouses that are fitted with cameras to monitor citizens’ pets so that more dog owners can enjoy the downtown area, a move which is expected to drive business activity.

Each start-up will use 20 hours of office time during the 13-week test programme with City Hall, after which they will present and discuss their pilot products with the mayor in October.

The partners will be evaluated on their ability to boost economic development by improving the quality and efficiency with which the city functions.