Our visit to the Smart City Expo is coming up
This year again, the Sofia City of Knowledge Cluster will participate in the Smart City Expo in Barcelona, the largest and most influential global event for smart technologies and urban innovation, which will take place from November 7 to 9. Together with another 25,000 participants from all over the world, we will have the chance for direct contact with potential partners and for meetings with the best experts in the field of smart cities in the world. We are witnessing an unprecedented rate of urbanization.
According to the United Nations, in 2050, 70% of the Earth's population will live in cities, and this rate of urban population growth and the emergence of new megacities is a market force driving technology and innovation.
Cities are complex 'systems in systems' where citizens, businesses and institutions interact in multiple areas. A smart city ecosystem is one where new technologies enable value creation for all stakeholders. Thus, a new market for technology is created, which grows at a rapid pace and itself generates new needs for better living conditions for citizens in an increasingly urbanized environment.
Many of the cluster members are interested in the trends in the development of urban spaces and the market needs that these trends give rise to. The cluster collects and disseminates information about the possibilities of this new market and presents the experience of the market leaders in the implementation of smart city projects. We support any initiatives in the application of new technologies and business models in all domains of a city and try to discover the opportunities that appear when implementing joint projects and initiatives. Therefore, we believe that the information that we will receive and the partner meetings that we will carry out during the Smart City Expo in Barcelona will be beneficial both for the members and for the city of Sofia itself.
What is our general agenda for our visit to Barcelona. First of all, on November 6, we plan to actively participate in the annual meeting of representatives of the Smart City Tech Partnership. We are members of this partnership together with a dozen other European clusters, with which we have been exchanging information and good practices for the past 2-3 years, participating in events and initiatives and implementing European projects. We will choose a new leadership of the organization, draw a work plan for the next year and exchange ideas for new initiatives and projects related to smart cities and the technologies and models used in them.
In the following days, November 7-9, we will participate in B2B meetings organized jointly with the Silicon Europe Alliance and visits to pavilions in various cities. Joint visits to the pavilions of Bavaria, Portugal, Scandinavia, Catalonia, the Nordic Pavilion with Business Finland and the City of Tampere, the stands of AMEC Urbis from Spain, Ubiwhere from Portugal, the SCS and Minalogic clusters, etc. are planned. As a result, we hope to gather impressions, information and new contacts to share with our members. New projects and initiatives are coming, for the implementation of which we will be able to take advantage of the EU programs supporting sustainable and "green" development of cities and digital transformation. These are all processes that directly generate new market opportunities and innovations in business models that cluster members will be able to benefit from in the near future.
