The UK’s investment agency UKTI has this week launched its report Smart cities of the future in Asia: The opportunities for UK business as part of its Explore Asia campaign. The report analyses a number of cities, in terms of ‘smart development’, across ten high-growth markets in Asia: Japan, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam.
The report highlights significant business opportunities for UK companies across a number of sectors including; buildings and the environment, education, energy, health, digital media, and transport – taking into account how British expertise could be deployed to meet each opportunity. It asserts that increased urbanisation around the world has created a broad range of both challenges and opportunities which require a reassessment of the way in which cities are planned and resources and opportunities are shared. It is in this context that the concept of a “Smart City” has emerged as a route to better quality and more sustainable living, UKTI suggests.
Its key findings are:
- In Asia, there is a wide variation in the stage of development of Smart Cities both within and between countries. Cities such as Singapore, Hong Kong, Seoul and Tokyo can already be considered to be smart, whilst conurbations in Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, for example, are behind the curve in terms of their current status but are evolving quickly.
- It is notable that both Japan, the most advanced Smart market, and Indonesia, which is firmly in the second group, are developing 4G LTE mobile networks. The difference – and this is a trend that repeats itself across the themes – is that the former is a network upgrade whereas the latter is closer to a green field roll out with the country effectively “skipping a cycle” in its infrastructure development.
- Tokyo and Seoul are the most advanced cities and require highly advanced technological solutions across a broad range of themes. Despite a relative lack of English language skills and a historical preference for working with local companies or consortia, the sheer breadth of the opportunity, together with tendency in each market to “test” smart solutions in areas outside of the capital, provides additional market options to UK business.
The report also mentions the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) five-year master plans for demonstration of Next Generation Energy and Social System launched in August 2010. Each of the four demonstration areas (Yokohama City, Toyota City, Kansai Science City and Kitakyushu City) has different initiatives to promote smart grid and demonstrate smart community. Finally, it notes that Kashiwa-no-ha Campus City (Chiba Prefecture) has aims to be a “smart city”, “healthy long-life city” and “new industry creation city”, as well as the existence of several early stage smart city projects aimed at recovery in the quake-hit Tohoku region, citing the opportunities for UK businesses to demonstrate their expertise in these projects.
You can download the report from here.
