Singapore wins Smart City 2018 award

Singapore has been recognised for its Smart Nation project, winning the Smart City 2018 Award at the Smart City Expo World Congress in Barcelona. Previous winners in the city category have included New York and Dubai.

The jury recognised the Southeast Asian city-state’s plan to become the smartest nation, transforming itself into a global benchmark of smart urban solutions. Nearly US$15 billion is being invested in research and development in the digital economy, digital government, and digital society, over five years until 2020.

“Singapore’s Smart Nation efforts are about the transformation of our country, through technology,” said Janil Puthucheary, Minister-in-charge of GovTech, Singapore. “We will continue to create a better lived experience for our citizens, and these efforts must benefit our future generations as well. We look forward to working with other cities to make all our cities smart together.”

The jury–made up of representatives from Barcelona City Council, Smart City Expo World Congress and others–recognised how Singapore has “become a global beacon of urban transformation”. They noted how a major reason for choosing Singapore was for the manner the Smart Nation plan not only enhances the city’s functioning but also improves the services provided to its citizens and “through them their quality of life”.

Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister-in-charge of the Smart Nation Initiative, told Cities Today that the award was a testament to the ongoing, collective efforts to realise the Smart Nation vision.

“Our government will continue to build strong partnerships with the industry, our people, and our external partners to develop innovative smart city solutions to benefit lives and create new opportunities in this digital revolution together,” he said.

A housing project from Cape Town, won the Innovative Idea category. {delft}LINK, a non-profit company that links prospective local developers, investors and tenants via a smart phone application, is South Africa’s first community-funded affordable housing scheme.

The Mobility award went to the North Avenue Smart Corridor project in Georgia (USA). The corridor serves as a living lab for active, multi-modal traffic management through technology deployment and data analytics.

In the Urban Environment category, Shanghai’s Jinshan District Government was rewarded for being able to balance a rapidly developing industry while promoting a healthy living and working environment construction through smart buildings capable of improving the quality of life of locals in a more sustainable manner.

The Chinese city of Gaoqing ICT deployment programme won the Digital Transformation project. The model is designed for a medium-sized city that other similar cities could take as a reference for development.

And the Hague’s e-Health living lab won the Inclusive and Sharing Cities award.