BUSINESS MODELS FOR SMART CITIES – DISCUSSION PAPER 1/2017 PUBLISHED

The ‘smart city’ concept has been gaining popularity over the last few years for several reasons. First, the world population living in urban areas is experiencing a relentless growth. Second, information and communication technologies (ITC) are booming as sensors and radio frequency identification (RFID) are getting cheaper. Third, the irruption of the smartphone had facilitated transferring and receiving real-time information to and from almost everyone and everywhere. And fourth, cities provide a large amount of services that consume a lot of natural resources and energy thereby having a great impact on the economy, the environment, and the quality of life.

After some years of implementing the smart city concept, it is clear that the main issue for the success of this approach is not so much related to technological aspects as it is to finding ways for successful business models.

This paper, authored by Prof. José Manuel Vassallo of the Technical University of Madrid, discusses the main challenges of putting into effect models that may contribute to speed up smart city solutions.

The Discussion Paper is available for download here.