Singapore
Investvine-Mar 13, 2018
Singapore tops the list of the world’s best performing smart cities ahead of London, New York, San Francisco and Chicago in a new studyby UK-based market intelligence firm Juniper Research sponsored by IT giant Intel.
The city state ranks first in all four major categories surveyed, namely mobility, health, safety and productivity, with the only other Asian cities in the top ten being Seoul and Tokyo. Dubai, which aimed at becoming the smartest city in the world a few years ago, ranks just 11th in the current list.
The Global Smart City Performance Index ranks the top 20 global smart cities in terms of the integration of Internet of Things technologies and connected services across four above mentioned categories.
The report noted that in the area of mobility, Singapore has applied “smart, connected traffic solutions” together with a very strong policy curtailing car ownership in an effort to reduce the number of vehicles on its roads.
It also highlighted Singapore’s focus on addressing healthcare service provision for elderly citizens through a range of technologies, including digital service platforms as well as remote monitoring devices. In the area of safety, the report noted that Singapore has started trials using smart video surveillance to detect criminal activity.
In addition, Singapore is a leader in allowing citizens to access digital services and city information with its “large open data stores” and “strategies to encourage private innovation” through specialised test-bed environments, the report stated.
“Singapore was lauded for its rapid transformation since independence into the world’s leading smart city and was held up as an example which other cities can learn from,” Intel said in a media release on March 13. It also noted that Singapore’s “Smart Nation” initiative and its position as a city-state makes the country unique in its ability to execute its smart city vision.
