 Okay, hello everyone. I Hope you can hear me and that everything is working and that the technology gods are on our side today My name is Astronomaline Carlberg and I am open forum Europe's policy director Open from Europe or OFE is a Brussels based think tank working at the intersection of open technologies and public policy So welcome today To our event on open source and smart cities This event is the first installment of the OFE open source policy series During which we're hoped to offer deep dives Into the most relevant topics in the area of open source open technologies and how they intersect with the most pressing digital policy challenges facing Europe So first of all, I'd like to Thank our series partner the eclipse foundation and our event sponsor red hat for helping us make this event and The series happen at this exciting time for open technologies and public policy So this policy series follows our EU open source policy summits Which took place in February where a high-level policy makers such as European Commissioner theory pretend Set the scene for what is at stake We will host six virtual event events during the spring and early summer and During these we will address the role of open technologies in crucial areas such as the European chip industry green Transition institutional capacity building digital sovereignty 5g and the EU's competitiveness and You know, I hope to see you at several if not all of these events So just some quick housekeeping for today's event We want these sessions to be a space for an open exchange So so we'll have a discussion in Q&A after the panelists remarks if you want to ask a question, please just write in the chat and the OFE team will bring it to the attention of the moderator and Like all our activities this exchange is covered by the OFE community participation guidelines Which you can find on our website But you know simply put just make sure to be your most friendly self But today my main job is really to to introduce our moderator Leslie Hawthorne Leslie who's an American living In Europe for for several years is the manager of vertical community strategy in red hats open source program office Which is within the office of the CTO There she leads the team responsible for shepherding community engagement around red hats participation in open source and open standards projects So this relates to vertical such as automotive telecommunications in the public sector We wanted to have her involved as we know that her interest in smart cities goes beyond her professional commitments She's had she has a deep personal desire to see the vision for a broadly connected civic infrastructure manifest for all citizens and Stakeholders particularly more vulnerable populations including disabled persons and the elderly and of course to do so In a fashion that respects privacy citizen autonomy all while delivering more sophisticated and accessible services with this Please Leslie the floor is yours and welcome all speakers Thank you so much for the kind introduction asked her Good day and greetings to all of you who are joining us for today's exploration of open source open standards And how these two things can inform our understanding of the future smart cities My thanks also to all of our esteemed panelists for being here today to share your wisdom and perspectives I think it is no great secret that the climate crisis is the greatest single threat facing humanity today with our global populations expected to rise to 10 billion people by the year 2050 and 68% of the world's population therefore expected to be living in urban environments at that time These questions become ever more pressing to citizens civic planners and policy makers alike How we architect our response to the climate crisis through conceptualizing and building out resilient Hyper-connected cities will play a large part in the needed response for us to all create a sustainable future together We're convening today to explore some of the greatest challenges and opportunities facing policy makers Questions such as how to architect our civic infrastructure with environmental sustainability at the top of mind How we address the needs of our rapidly urbanizing population How we can provide consistent and high quality services to citizens in a time of rapidal digital transformation And how to ensure that solutions in the smart city domain address these needs while maintaining Adequate data protection and ensuring citizen sovereignty Based on our collective experience is the thesis of today's event organizers that we can create smart city solutions Atop open-source software and using open standards in order to produce the best possible outcomes for Europeans That through open source and open standards based solutions smart city deployments can provide replicable models That will advance the state of the art within Europe and allow for wider sharing and repurposing of that time and work It has already been invested allowing it to be adapted to the widest possible set of use cases We further posit that the policy and technical work done within the European member states can serve as a reference model for Similar work that will be undertaken worldwide The use of open source and open standards further underpins a key component of our current zeitgeist The need to move through digital transformation in a manner that ensures that technology addresses concerns of privacy and citizen sovereignty via open Auditable and transparent technology solutions while also ensuring that the solutions that are chosen meet the ongoing needs of Policy makers and civic planners who need to control their own destinies and choose the right solutions for their constituents now But will also require these solutions to evolve scale and adapt depending on the future needs of citizens We further note that it's not just the technical promises of open-source software and open standards that will benefit Europeans But the development processes and social learnings from the decades of work done to co-create these software and standards Within the open-source software and open standards communities We can discover and take in a wealth of knowledge about how to work together across borders political perspectives and cultural norms and as we continue our work to digitally transform citizen services in a rapid fashion Which as we all understand has been made all the more rapid by the pandemic The principles that underpin open communities are all the more vital to our ongoing work transparency Security and audibility Repurposing and sharing in order to scale up and scale out and also the need to meet constituents where they are in order to negotiate The best possible outcomes for everyone You'll learn in more detail from our esteemed panelists today that open source is already everywhere in the smart city arena So it may seem surprising to focus so deeply on the role of open source and open standards in smart cities But our discussion today is not just about the value of these as technical solutions It is also our intention to focus on how open source and open standards contribute to positive externalities for local and national economies Our kind hosts open forum Europe have in collaboration with the new blind with new blind from the Fraunhofer ISI Conducted a study to get some numbers around these positive externalities And these final results were presented at OFE's open-source policy summit in February But to briefly recap some highlights Research indicates that the economic value of open-source software on the EU economy Is estimated to be between 65 and 95 billion euros in 2018 alone and EU countries and EU located companies made significant investments into open-source software of one billion euro in 2018 and if we consider that since this is These products are all available for reuse by both the public and private sector The estimates are that it would take 16,000 full-time developers to produce the same value of code with its requisite contributions to the GDP of Europe an increase of code contributions of 10% from these entities are estimated to generate an around additional Euro 100 billion of EU GDP per year and this increase of 10% would likely generate an additional 1,000 ICT ICT startups per year within the European Union It is with these challenges and benefits as the backdrop of our discussion where we will now begin our panel with an exploration of the general principles and technologies associated with smart cities Later, we'll move on to case studies from member states followed by open discussion amongst our panelists So we will hear first today from Mr. Thomas Scordes director of digital excellence and science infrastructure at the directorate general for communication networks content and technology Mr. Scordes joined the European Commission in 1995 and has worked in various units dealing with ICT research ICT security and trust he has been ahead of the unit of the photonics unit and the flagships unit and since March of 2017 Is a director at DG connect. Mr. Scordes. Thank you so much for joining us today. We look forward to your marks Thank you Leslie and good afternoon to all our audience It's a pleasure to be here for this event first time for me as the director responsible for the part of what we are doing in DG connect in the European Commission For the smart cities and smart communities initiative So I'm relatively new in the domain as you may understand the unit is with me only very few months now Although it's a unit that we have been running for quite some time now So you would certainly excuse me then if I'm still in this deep learning phase about what we are doing But not about what the policy areas are about which I hope I will be able to explain to our audience today So from that respect as you rightly said we did this study that we Commissioned some time ago on the area of open source Open standards, etc. And as you have very very well highlighted the We have seen with a lot of pleasure how much it has been expanding since its creation I think it's more than 20 years that I remember that we started the discussions in the union about the open source software movement And so Linux and the rest so it's a real pleasure to see now how much these Initial steps have now become a concrete initiative How much it affects now directly the European economy and the European society and it's also I would say that from a public administration perspective Although we are agnostic of course into specific technologies and specific aspects of technology We're not agnostic when we see how much this is coming in in the different areas Be it in the public administration beat in smart cities beat as you highlighted or be it in any other Area where it makes a lot of sense and I think one of the things that the study has highlighted also is That there are many use cases where the public sector at all levels Is is depending now on open source policies because it allows benefits are multiple as the study has shown So it's not only about the issue of I would say open source software But in particular it is about reducing the total cost of ownership by procuring Oss related Software it is by reducing of course or even avoiding vendor lock-in and it's also by promoting really an innovation If you wish an ecosystem where there is competition and where we see it thriving out there And I think it's very very much related also and it goes really into the direction We want to promote in the union about the european values Which are behind because this is exactly what we see coming in Not any more dependence on the big software vendors that we know very very well coming from the different areas of the Of of the world, but really a new um, I would say movement that can Facilitate our way towards all all this open transparent and other issues that you have so well highlighted This being said the study itself Is not making a very very clear link between open standards open source software and the cities which is the I would say the the topic of today Of course many cities use oss user open standards I mean the examples are numerous, so I would not like to I'll go through them But I think a little bit to reposition The whole discussion. I mean at least from my introduction perspective Then what is important here is to highlight that for us Smart cities and smart communities is part of the digital transformation The two main Priorities of this commission, which is the green deal and the digital And I think this is exactly what we can see in the smart cities of the future or even of today Is the combination of the two that would make things change in the future It is the combination. It's the digital platforms Open to a large extent that would thrive also the move or that will prepare the move to Green cities of the future. This is our target as you know to have many green cities by 2030 I will come back to that and one Essential mechanism to achieve it is really the story of the digital Platforms that are behind. It's the story of open data. It's the story of Going ahead with the principles that are all our principles that is providing equal opportunities for all And hearing what our cities are saying and hearing what our citizens are saying I think this is exactly the kind of vision that we have tried to promote In the kind of communication which we call digital decade, you know, just a few days ago Actually, it was last tuesday that we had a communication or what would be the main digital targets until 2030 And smart cities and communities are figuring there and I think the vision is a common vision for all of us So green digital there is nothing else and A digital transformation that is bringing the citizens on board because what we would like to do is the european way that is Making sure that we are working with our citizens for our citizens to promote platforms that would be, you know stimulating the kind of new services and the kind of new environmental aspects that we will see for the future I think this is some notes just for the introduction to the subject Thank you Thanks wall also pairing it with the need to to work directly hand in hand with citizens and to make sure that this is an exercise in their empowerment and enfranchisement Um, I appreciate that we're going to move on to the introductory remarks for our next panelist now And we'll come back with questions later on in the panel Uh, well welcome next to the screen. Mr. Uruk al the chief executive officer of the firework foundation Following on his extensive experience in the industrial sector including time as vice president and leader of manufacturing retail And transportation consulting and systems integration at atos germany He's now helping clients uh to digitize their oh He was helping clients to digitize their business then and then joined the firework foundation in september of 2016 He's currently serves on the board of directors of international data spaces association And it was on the board of pro step IV IP association for 16 years Before he then became an honorary member in 2019. Thank you so much for joining us today. Mr. Al we look forward to your remarks Yeah, leslie Thank you very much for inviting me to this panel a very good afternoon Uh, or a very good evening wherever you listen to us here on the world And leslie you said, uh, there is a clear trend for further urban urbanization And it is expected that by 2050 more than two-third of the world population will live in cities and um, I also agree with thomas That digitization will definitely help us to achieve the sustainable development goals not only The number 11 which is smart cities itself, but also several other of this 17 Goals in total so digital and green fit together thomas as you Definitely said and this is one of the reasons why The european commission started already 10 years ago to create in a public private partnership the five air foundation or the five air technology the five air ecosystem at that time It was called the future internet ppp a public private partnership And uh, this is the fi in five air. So the future internet where and as I said it started Back in 2011 And at that time it was not clear That it will create Really one of europe's largest open source ecosystems Um for the first two years open source was not given and then the commission decided in 2013 That the results of this program and in total Roughly 500 million euro were spent into this ppp of public funding of private funding in there and That was a moment in time when some large companies left this ppp Because at that time they were not ready for open source three large european companies and one American headquartered company which was involved With european operations into this ppp and i don't want to mention these names Now because they definitely changed their position On open source and some of them are heavily supporting now the creation of open source And to bring all this Investment and the technology into a sustainable future the fiverr foundation was created four years ago end of 2016 headquartered in berlin and I had the honor to Take over the responsibility for the fiverr ecosystem which was created by the commission And is now self-sustainable and back in in march 2017 so exactly four years ago We had an event in brussels The fiverr open day and i took over the baton from from pierce o'danu who who was So far driving this initiative and promise. I think pierce is a colleague of your in the in the directorate age, I think yeah And since that the fiverr foundation Was really growing With a global presence and in the meantime In the domain of smart cities fiverr is the globally leading open source technologies Are more than 200 cities In more than 30 countries are creating their smart cities based on fiverr technology So what is fiverr? It is pure open source technology. We as foundation we are providing open source Software building blocks. We are not providing complete five smart city solutions So from for example, no smart city platforms No smart parking solutions smart waste management We are just providing the ingredients to build such solutions Which are built either by the end users directly if they have sufficient know-how capacity and competence Or by partners out of the ecosystem, which are using this software building blocks Which are using the standard architecture which are using the standard apis and These apis and this one api which was developed in the fiverr ecosystem It is called next generation service interface n gsi It became in the meantime, not only a defecto standard It became a formal standard standardized by etsy, which is one of the three global three european standardization bodies And it is now the standard for data management within smart cities So and the fourth and final Ingredient we are providing Are standard data models Here we joined forces with a global organization called tm forum To initiate the creation of smart and standard data models in the meantime more than 300 different areas where we have created the standards A lot of them in smart cities, but also in agriculture and energy and industry To further increase the replicability of smart solutions and This Helps us To avoid the so-called vendor lock-in effect for the end users By using open source based solutions, but also open standards open interfaces open data models Open source in this combination It is possible to provide the lowest cost of ownership and also to avoid a vendor lock-in effect If you Two more minutes two or three more minutes. Let's be would that be okay? Yeah I will find my mute button absolutely two more minutes would be perfectly fine. Thank you. Please continue Okay, and let me let me tell you a story From india india started When prime minister moody was elected for the first time in 2014 with the 100 smart cities program Investing several billion u.s. Dollar or transferred to rupees, but that figure would be even higher Into this program A lot of global consulting companies help the cities to create their smart city strategy to bring first tenders to the market Guided the implementation of first projects and two years ago The indian government identified each city has built its own silo The wheel has been invented several times and there are only very little synergies between this 100 smart cities Knowing that there are another 4,300 big cities in india, you know india is three times bigger than europe They decided two years ago to change strategy And started the implementation of what is now called the india urban data exchange platform using five air standard apis using five air originally five air Data models now this iodx program joined the smart data models initiative And also using open source technology partly from five air but also from other open source communities And on february 23rd of this year. So Yeah, three weeks ago The minister for housing and urban affairs and the minister for technology Both publicly announced the availability of this standard smart city platform for india It has been rolled out already to the first ten pilot cities And here india is defining not only open source as a basis for their smart cities, but also Open apis and open Data models and we have a sister organization a close partner organization called the open and agile smart cities And here these two elements are called mim one and mim two the minimum interoperability mechanism and i'm just coming out of the smart cities working group within gaya x this is Headed by slovenia by the ict academy of the chamber of commerce in slovenia and Also in slovenia this mim one and mim two has now been adopted and This is my vision For the adoption of open source technology also in europe For smart cities not only to have it based on open source But using also open standards for interfaces open standards for data models To further increase the replicability of solutions and to be able to exchange know-how and solutions and To avoid the vandalok in effect and all of this based in the future on gaya x so a federated cloud Based on european values This is a picture vision who will work on during the next years And this will definitely help us. I'm pretty sure about this Thank you Thank you so much that was the best extra two minutes We have ever had on any panel that i've ever participated in And i really appreciate you bringing uh to the discussion not just the importance of open source software and open standards But also open data models to make sure that all of the information that these systems are producing is is widely applicable and usable across Many to plot problem areas and breaking down those silos that Stop these kinds of smart city deployments from actually taking place We'll move on to our next panelist and come back to you during the questions at the conclusion of the panel Thank you And we welcome next mr. Peter gertzack the secretary of the minute and ministry of public administration at the government of slovenia Mr. Gershack has a background in industry at companies such as oracle ibm and three gen Where he gained expertise and insight in areas such as cloud computing data science artificial intelligence Cyber security and enterprise blockchain He has also served as a member of the supervisory board at the lubiana university incubator until 2020 And joined the ministry of public administration as state secretary and icet solutions expert on the 20th of april 2020 Thank you so much for joining us today. Mr. Gershack. We're looking forward to your remarks Thanks for inviting me Leslie and everybody um, do you hear me? Yes, okay. Good. So, um Ladies and gentlemen dear participants of the webinar. It's an honor for me to participate at today's event Which addresses very very important issues of digitalization and uh, smart cities Uh, so we all know that for a while the sustainable cities and communities are now Only solution from containing and reducing the alarming and environmental and socioeconomic Consequences that urbanization will have for our planet as my previous uh, our previous speaker said how many people will live in a In a very near future in the cities. This is staggering Numbers, so we have to work on that and smart cities are actually The answer to that So the fact is that widespread use of digital technologies makes the cities and communities smart and more efficient With connected intelligent systems They actually contribute to economic activities improve cities and satisfaction uh with public services Enhanced public security safety It improves the sustainable environmental management Uh, et cetera, et cetera. I don't need to to to count this. Yeah, so in a nutshell The substantially improve the quality of our lives and that's actually important to us. Yeah as a user So allow me now to make a helicopter view on the european union and uh, and slovenia So a global look at the smart cities And communities make this clear that the european union puts Human well-being at the at the very top at the actually at the center. Yeah, and this is this is great for us. Yeah And as you might know in 2016 The european commission issued a document blueprint for cities and regions And it's a launchpad for digital transformation Yeah, and the blueprint sets the concepts of how to establish an ecosystem of smart cities Since it touches all segments of the research sector economy human resources competences to infrastructure and and capital So various associations has been established such as open agile smart cities And et cetera and also projects, uh, like uh, wi-fi for europe and fiverr ensure a high level of privacy protection and civil liberties so Now a few words about uh, uh, slovenia We are one of the most dispersed and sparsely populated countries In european union with mainly rural environment With this kind of disparate population it is harder to make cities and villages smarter However, it is our goal to make our communities smart just as well We believe that it's government's uh, duty to build the ecosystem of partners and to provide a framework for development Set standards and main guidelines within which stakeholders can develop smart solutions Last year we made an analysis on the country level of digitalization of our municipalities We found out that most investments were in the management of infrastructure and energy efficiency of buildings Municipalities use different types of smart meters the water level sensors water consumption sensors traffic measurements, et cetera with simple applications logic, yeah so this kind of examples are bound everywhere, especially in the major cities where introduction of smart city concepts and uh Individual style of solutions began to to develop Um, even though these stakeholders have been including digitalization into their operations and infrastructure management optimization communication with users and citizens for some time now the analysis of The state of digitalization of our municipalities mentioned earlier Helped us to recognize the biggest inhibitor to future digitalization of municipalities And this is exactly the lack of integrated solutions. So there are silences. Yeah You would probably agree with me that the smart Yeah smart is an integrating silo solutions in these days. Yeah integrating silo solutions their data Where they resides where are generated into in silo solutions to integrate this And put smart logic on top of these silo's And this actually makes cities villages communities municipalities, whatever we name it smart Um, you can imagine that a tourist comes to Slovenia and has to download their the application In each municipality in order to get key information. That's that's not how it should be. Yeah, so we realize this fact Um, and we wanted the Slovenia municipalities to unify their solutions In terms of data opening and also interoperability Uh, that's why this february, uh, our ministry ministry of public administration Published an invitation, uh to tender, uh for the consortium of municipalities And the aim of the tender Is to give the municipalities an opportunity to use advanced digital technologies And establish smart ecosystems and smart solutions in the areas of the infrastructure So we defined six areas actually Uh infrastructure care for environment. So in green health transport culture sport tourism and security so Within this unified approach, we want to ensure the inter interoperability as I already mentioned of the solutions And the use of the same data model and and open started standards So within this tender, we are also facilitating the smart cities solutions ecosystem We would like that companies which are looking to partner with municipalities to develop their smart solutions Together with municipalities. Yeah and Then and to these companies the opportunity is given of getting the reference projects Which then can help them to get business also elsewhere in other countries or in other municipalities or in other with other companies or cities or whatever. Yeah so Smart solutions created by the municipalities will consume data and that's the second point here But at the same time, uh, we'll also yeah produce the data, but at the same time, we would like that companies um that also this sorry the also this, um Smart solutions and the municipalities are sending this data Maybe aggregated or not To to our servers where we will expose them via fever via context broker As an open data. So that this ecosystem can even benefit more and create even, um smarter solutions on top of the this data um, so Similar solution, but it But we can say it is more Static day state static Data we already have in place if we say that this data will be more fluid. Yeah And this what we have in place is the is called Slovenian open data hub Which integrates business state and innovation companies In facilitating to produce new innovative solutions. So there you can find different data sets where you can Take and you and create whatever smart algorithms and logic on top of this um, and I'm saying it's static static because They are not changed frequently every day Yeah, but they are these sets of data which are regularly changed and updated But with smart city solutions, we would like that this flow data is happening, you know Actually more or less on the fly into our servers um so, um in In the in the perspective in the look forward, um, what what we are planning so this will this, um, we are planning to to to Go forward with our work on on smart cities and communities To put funds into recovery and the resilience facility And also to new cohesion fund So where we are actually intending to co-finance smart cities in terms of Yeah, facilitating solutions um smart solutions, um There will be quite substantial amount of grants and repealed repayable funds for these solutions But of course, you know, this is in in a final stage. We know for rrf. It is in final stages somewhere this This first half of the year to be approved and for to cohesion fund also in in in the next Probably quarters. Yeah um So probably You would agree with me that a solution whatever smart it is It cannot help citizens if they are not ready to accept and use it So all stakeholders needs to be involved into digitalization process and um For me since I also know a little bit about design thinking I think that especially important Are the end users which they need to be all the time with when developing a solution um And we need to create the the the best possible user experience for for them um so I can um Less than do we still have two minutes or or no Yes, absolutely. Please continue. So then I will just uh guide you very very briefly through the initiative which Slovenia is taking into into smart cities area Uh, and that's it's we are we have three consortiums Which are supported by intelligent cities? challenge They are preparing a long-term strategy for digitalization of municipalities Then the second point is this public tender. I I mentioned for these are demonstration projects For the establishment of smart cities and communities And then we are planning in rrf. We are planning the monetization of this Of this demonstration project. Yeah Uh, then the third one is actually the national declaration for accelerating digital transformation of towns villages and communities into the sustainable smart smart society And that's actually we have Slovenia digital coalition Uh, which is working with uh on Slovenia national declaration And actually the objective is what I mentioned accelerating the the transformation of cities religious and communities Then we have I mentioned already open data hub, which we are aiming to to to to um enlarge it with this uh liquid On the fly flow of data from smart city solutions And open data hub actually is the Is the Three main actors are here. So state government Companies and and innovative innovation. So academy and so on Then Yeah We have agreement on joint efforts to standardize content data models. This is local We already have standard based on Slovenia level. For example in voices, which is like 15 years already and it's it's great um Yeah, then I mentioned fiber Platform building blocks like content broker context broker um, then we um Are using OAC data models and what Ulrich mentioned. Yes, we support meme one and meme two Uh, or minimum uh interoperability mechanisms. So that's that's the main Areas where where we are working and of course we are Planning to extend this in the future because we think that smart cities smart community is very it's the future actually, yeah so ladies and gentlemen, I firmly believe that the States can participate and in development of smart cities By encouraging investments co-financing with grants repayable funds The ecosystem and with the infusion of some degree of coordination between regions municipalities and cities I thank you very much. There will be also questions in the future and I wish you a thoughtful Discussion. Thank you back to your last day. Thank you so much We really appreciate your remarks And I particularly appreciate your touching on the points of the need for there to be collaboration and co-creation between the folks Who are creating smart city solutions not just with the municipalities that they're creating them for but with the end users Of the assistance to keep their needs at the front of mind. Thank you so much We'll get back to you during the question period later on in the panel And folks we're going to now turn to our Final panelist mr. Pedro viana who is head of the digital transformation department at the administrative modernization agency ip Portugal Mr. Viana has a background in business and startups has co-authored a book on digital transformation And has worked in digital procurement at the national public procurement agency Thank you so much for joining us today. Mr. Viana who may be hiding in the wings of our fabulous video conferencing platform I'll just give him a moment to join if my fine friends with ofe who are Staffing can let me know in the chat. Hi, Pedro. It's good to see that you're there I'll be happy to wait for you to join me Hi, this is astro from ofe. I don't know if you can hear me. I can thank you Yeah, okay perfect Just one second. We seem to have a little bit of a connection issue. It seemed to work again It worked earlier. So so just a minute and we should sort this out Yep, well, absolutely be patient. Unfortunately folks. I have not prepared any excellent Humorous filler material for the inevitable Technical glitch, but it doesn't matter because here is to pay to join us. Hello, mr. Viana. Thank you so much for joining us thank you very much for for for being on this event For being invited to share and I I think open source is about sharing and building upon what exists and improving the solutions that are in place so Having said that It's very hard to build upon the excellent intervention interventions for my colleagues Without without repeating the The major topics, but I'll try to to give something new and innovative Point of view, but in reality, I think Being the last It has the advantage perhaps I can sum up a little bit. So we All of us have been there and we invested in some kind of smart cities before We found out that these are not the smart cities that we aim for and And now we are looking to smart cities that are not only digital that are also for citizens That are also respecting environmental and sustainable values And and this is one of the things that I find I find it's it's common on the the previous speeches and The other thing is that we have to share and In this regard this is Much what we are trying to do here in in portion We have learned that putting money Would create silos. We have these silos these smart cities. We have smart cities that are Very developed other ones that are only a promise and several levels of Capacity for implementing smart cities, but our vision is that we have to put in place A way to not only create smart cities The silos but to create smart regions smart nation a smart nation We believe in Portugal that the future will bring us more We bring us for more for Government or Government services that are provided by the local authorities In proximity knowing the difficult difficulties on the populations or the challenges they have had so We find that Hema the administrative modernization Agency although it's a central entity from public center We find that is very important to provide the building blocks we developed for the central public sector also to the to the local administration and being able to provide a seamless services where the The the citizen or the business doesn't have to know Who is providing the service or it's not having very different User experiences when doing getting the services. So this is the reason we are now Doing a new strategy a new plan for the few following years uh where This part of the values the sustainability the sharing Will be will take main main stage Okay, and where we can build these smart nations not because Sometimes we will find that the smart city is a very nice concept. But for instance When we are talking about big cities At least in Portugal big cities are surrounded by other cities That are also big cities and if you don't share information that the flows processes Will not be able to take advantage on on on the On this transformation on this smart and in this regard we are like Peter said before we are investing very much in interoperability creating interoperable cities Where information where services can flow not only inside the cities, but also among the other the cities and Where data from one city can be very helpful for instance as open data or not open data to the other city for instance There is an example in Portugal the city I live in it's a city where Uh, we have mainly businesses But people live elsewhere But these people that live elsewhere they travel every day to this So, uh, not having information on always the traffic All are the Weather conditions if there is any problem with the with the road infrastructure or with transportation it can Play a very big role on managing the city So, uh, what will happen today, you know, it's almost a What will happen as a miracle today because something else anything will happen on these cities that are working together So and and this is the the the reason we are Enforcing or trying to promote because we cannot enforce from the point or point of view of the public sector center public sector We cannot enforce a local administration to use the same building blocks But we are trying to promote the usage of this same building blocks creating these Workflows that will work for them and will work also Not only between cities, but between cities and the government and central government uh, and This is the the challenge because in the past we put together Common rules norms Standards that are mandatory for everyone We have different kinds of Addition some of these municipalities use the norms the same not other They don't use and what we have to do now is to to make sure that we are speaking We are inter interoperable and this is the challenge the main challenge We have for for the future in Portugal and that we are aiming to tackle with this new strategy for the following years Excellent. Thank you so much. We appreciate their remarks Um, I'd like to take this opportunity to invite all of our panelists uh back on screen so that we can go through some time for q&a please And we'll just give a moment for that to happen Welcome back Ulrich Welcome back Thomas And I believe we're just waiting for a moment on peter And there we go. Welcome back peter Gentlemen, thank you again for all of your uh remarks today and for sharing your wisdoms and perspectives I'm just going to go ahead and jump into Some questions for each of you But I would love it if anyone on the panel would like to to share their thoughts and experience after the main questioner provides their remarks Um, so if we could start with you, please, um, mr. Squartus. How do smart cities fit into the eu recovery budget plan? well, uh from I think we had already some very good examples that were provided by uh peter today How they fit they are one of the I would say areas where would like really The the member states to invest Don't forget that the level of investment that we are foreseeing is six hundred and seventy something billion euros over the next Five and a half to six years until end 2026 as part of this resilience and recovery package 20% on digital 37% or close to 40% on green you combine both and you have already a huge way of Ideas that you can put in place for moving into the area of smart cities and communities so, uh, frankly While we are promoting the field and I think we have many cities that are part of the different movements that we have in europe the level of investment we see right now in the Packages that we have received so far is a little bit lower than what I would have expected So it is an issue for us Maybe if I can say it like this we see that in the north we don't have too much uh too many investments on Smart cities and communities today Maybe because they are a little bit more developed than in the south or indeed many of the uh plans Include the smart cities and communities. We've heard from Slovenia. I'm pretty sure that Portugal is preparing also something which is very very concrete I know about about my country in Greece that indeed we have exactly Similar discussions as some of the issues that have been highlighted here The same applies for cyprus. So you see that the south is now mobilizing itself a little bit more than the north But i'm pretty sure that the reality is that here we have to have a very good way of exchanging best practices And best practices are existing everywhere today in europe So my point is somehow different here. It's that we have cities that are laggards that have not even started You know going into the area of smart cities So convincing mayors convincing cities that this is the future is not a big deal But giving them concrete plans on how to do it from a to z. This is the challenge The second category of cities we have is cities that have started playing with the notions of smart cities and With the notion of data and interoperability Open standards. I think the speakers have already mentioned But they need now more concrete ways of moving ahead And this is what we are more or less preparing now a little bit is how can we help all collectively, you know From a european perspective help these cities move into their green procurements into their procurements of digital platforms in the future And the third perspective is of course all the more advanced cities I think they exist everywhere around And I think that the big trend there is not just open data interoperability, etc I think they moved beyond that and we see that the future is about These are kinds of digital twins. We call them local digital twins Interoperable digital twins that are powered by AI that are powered by open data approaches And where we can combine many of those to be able to create a picture A modeling and simulation picture of how our green cities would look like and this is exactly one of the areas where we would like The the member states to move so by replicating good examples everywhere by interconnecting Data by interconnecting Platforms that we are developing by creating a toolbox if you wish where of existing services that they can reuse Rather than create the starting again from scratch the Indian example that Urech mentions Is exactly I would say the good example not to replicate in Europe So and this is exactly the field where we would like the cities and our member states to move So probably with some more than demo projects in one or two areas One to big cities that could start from and then we could replicate those examples everywhere So that's a little bit the idea And I would like also to come to another thing In rrfs that we see right now actually we see the same also on the Regional funds because this is the other essential element where many budget Many funds would come and again we heard it coming also from the Slovenian colleague I think what is absolutely fundamental here is To have the citizens as part initiative I would not consider them just you know end users But citizens that need to co-design with the developers from the very beginning the kinds of platforms They want to see you know that they understand from the very beginning. Where do we go? How do we go there and how can citizens be part of this co-design approach to develop not only the open platform But to develop also the services the digital twins if you wish that they would like to see for the future of these green And digital cities So these are the fundamental I would say challenges that we want to see in the rrf plans and in the Regional plans and cohesion plans for the next six seven years Leslie may I add a view from a bit more northern part of europe? Please do And germany is not really northern europe but Looking at germany And that this is really strange because germany is one of the leading countries when it comes to digitization of manufacturing processes, you know industry photo zero has been invented in germany But when it comes to digitization of public processes and there's this famous daisy report from the commission Germany is actually on position 22 of the european countries and there are not too many countries behind germany so There are and especially southern european countries, but also countries like finland and and estonia They are five years ahead of germany when it comes to digitization of public processes when it comes to smart cities And this was identified by the german government And they put out of the german recovery fund which was already released in june of last year Another 500 million euro into the smart cities program in germany, which is called smart cities made in germany So it is clear germany has to speed up when it comes to smart cities but the programs are in place and And germany is really learning also from other countries and the german cities are learning from cities in other more advanced countries when it comes to digitization of of cities Thank you Would anyone else like to make remarks on this topic? Okay, um, then i'm going to jump to a question actually from our audience particularly since it came up in the Mr. Scordes's remarks on digital twins Uh, the audience members are interested in knowing of some examples of how digital can be used to make smart cities more green And i'm happy for anyone to answer that although i may call on olrich for this one as our fire expert Maybe um to give you an example and this is also one of the most used Solutions based on an open data platform in cities or based on a smart city platform Not only for fire, but also for other technologies be it open source or be a closed source and that's smart parking and in a lot of european cities Um up to 30 percent of the inner city traffic is traffic searching for free parking lots And if we are able to use digital solutions To guide the driver to his or her Not to guide the driver to his or her target destination And then ask the driver to look for free parking space around but directly To guide the person to the next to the closest free parking lot According to the preferences of the person cheapest parking shortest way Or shortest distance to my target destination Then we can avoid a lot of this traffic searching for uh free parking lots avoid a lot of air pollution, which is created and waste of time and waste of energy When driving through the city searching for free parking lots and another example To make cities greener is the topic of smart lighting a very popular vertical solution because changing from traditional lamps to led as such Is saving 70 percent of the energy energy consumption and then making street lights Even intelligent being able to dim down and only shine bright when the light is required So for example a street light is identifying a bicycle which is passing by Shining up telling the next street light already. Hey, there's a bicycle coming. Please shine up And when the light is not required It dims down again and serves saves another 15 percent of energy and these are two simple examples And there are dozens of others how digitization could help to make cities greener Thank you For anyone else I can compliment maybe for a couple of others. I think I fully agree with uri. I mean, I remember that in 2008 2009 we were working already In the in the union to provide good examples of smart lighting And and at that moment we were at the very beginning. Unfortunately, europe lost the battle of the LEDs produced in europe as you know, perfectly well And most of the solutions are now coming from sub part in some cheaper countries in the far east or elsewhere. So And this is really a pity. But nevertheless, I fully agree that this is the way to go and we need now to multiply these good examples Just to give a couple of others. Of course the notion of smart breeds and and smart buildings Renovating massively our cities from the point of view of buildings would help by moving really to much more energy preservation And understanding that massively how it can be done with an intelligent way is an important issue Just to give you an example when we built a digital twin of a building This is something that exists since several years now But when you integrate in this digital twin of a building also The different models which are about waste management, which are about Materials you use what you're about construction issues, etc. Etc. You can stimulate simulate actually how much of the energy that you are producing in the building becomes You know wasted and you can then think about refurbishing buildings Of course by introducing also the notion of producing energy at the building level and therefore managing that energy For the building purposes. So these are some Small examples of where we will certainly go Just at the level of a building you can imagine now at the level of whole city Where you need to do something similar and you need to find out how you can do that massively And with the level of investments that we need to think about Another issue which is absolutely very important also is understanding traffic pollution Understanding. I mean Ulrich said it a little bit, but it goes about the managing the traffic In the city and in the peripheries of the city you can think about where can you create new routes? Where do you want to deviate where would be the areas where you have very polluted areas? And therefore you have to green them in one way or another Where would you transform your planning of the city to be able to create a new, you know Areas where it needs to become more green, etc. And what would be the consequences? On the side on the life of the cities on the traffic of the cities, etc All these are things new things new elements that are coming up Relatively quickly and we want to see in the next 10 years. So as part of greening our city's environment, you know Just to mention a few Excellent. Thank you so much um if we You gentlemen don't mind I'd like to change gears a bit away from sort of the the technical and implementation details of some of our smart city Opportunities and and shift back to remarks on policy In particular this question is from mr. Gershak As uh, Slovenia is entering into the EU presidency. Can you tell us more about how smart cities will play in into the agenda? Okay, thank you. Do you hear me? Absolutely. I need to check. I will not speak Uh in vain. Okay. Yeah. Thanks for the question. Uh, we are really we will take presidency from Of portugal colleagues. Yeah in the second half of the year. Yeah and um So what what we learned from this? analysis we did last year Actually two years ago. No last year um Municipalities and smart cities in Slovenia. They don't introduce digitalization systematically and they often lack strategy long-term strategy short-term strategy And that's actually reduces the the potential for digitalization. Yeah um, so Because of that reason, we will put emphasis During the presidency on promoting the corporation at the regional levels And at the level of municipalities, uh, within similar challenges and similar digital maturity To have to to enable this knowledge Flow knowledge transfer and with the some international with some conferences We will try also to get this knowledge transfer Uh from different countries to different countries. Yeah um So we will also during the presidency we will also highlight Uh, uh, digitalization with special emphasis on artificial intelligence. We all know we all know that the AI is actually fundamental to create a logic for the SWART. Yeah um we are Right now working on the digital digital twin of the state um Where we very well, there are there are quite a few problems with getting the data even even if the data are aggregated. Yeah they still are not Anonymization we know it's it's past. It's pseudonymization now So there are quite a big concerns then About that from the aggregated that data we could get to the real persons. Yeah So this is a main challenge. I would say we are tackling here But we have some sets of data where we could predict And create a digital twin in some certain areas of for the for the for the for the country. Yeah What state? um so and also topics like, um Introduction of the advanced technology into the society and the transition to gigabit society will be also important for for the presidency cyber security um So we are planning the several events You know during this covet 19 pandemic Mostly virtual but some hybrid as well um and artificial intelligence will be like, uh, you know red tape during the the and smart cities during the this event uh, so In in uh, july it is quite early during the presidency. It will it will be july 8 um, we will hold conference On the eu as a community of people With focus on cross-border corporation um, which is not so much digital. Yeah, but the the second Stream will be smart cities and communities Um, and this will be pure virtual event. Yeah Okay So then in september in september will name september month of artificial intelligence um, maybe you know that Slovenia has the largest number AI scientists per capita on the world Uh, so we are quite In small country. We are quite in the topic of AI. So we would like to boost it. Yeah And make even more awareness about it of course with uh with uh with uh Aspects also of ethics and human rights on on on AI. Yeah, but there will be several events and activities are organized through Slovenia on AI We will organize this uh, also the showroom Uh, showcasing the latest innovative technologies and uh And at the same time also create a network opportunities for the stakeholder. Hopefully, you know, this showroom. It's it. I mean, it will be Uh, not virtual but physical. Yeah, so we will hopefully we will have During for the cop due to covet some Possibilities to to to invite people and people who come Uh, and yes, we are planning to showcase this digital twin in in in september Of of country of Slovenia. So, um, the main AI event Will be the high level conference on 14 and 15th of september And it will be hybrid This what we want want to be hybrid because high level People will will hopefully will come on site Uh, so, um, this we believe that this conference will represent an excellent opportunity to engage and discuss, you know Cross-border in the international community on the open questions related to to to AI Um, so and in december, we will organize as well, uh, two high level conferences on the government Where also smart cities will be part of it and on interability Yeah, interoperability and the cio network, uh, meeting so both planned as as hybrid So i'm kindly inviting all of you If you have any chances either Virtual or on site to come and be part of this conferences They will be publicized via Slovenian government web pages and also via european european commission web pages So thanks then, uh, Leslie back to you. Yeah, and thank you for that kind invitation. I uh, I feel in my diary has gotten much more full for the rest of the year now The cleanest beautiful country Leslie may I pick up one word from peter? Yes, please you said in one stream? smart cities and communities and this is Very important for me. Some people are talking about smart cities and regions And although we said at the beginning that Two third of the people in the future will live in urban areas There's still one third of the people living in rural areas And these people living in rural areas also have the right for digital solutions Now i'm myself living in a village of 2000 people close to a bigger city And also for people living in in villages It is important and that's why i'm supporting a group of people Who are trying to change the world of smart cities using in the future smart communities And communities integrating cities and rural areas And uh, I think it is important for us always to include People living in rural areas when talking about digitization for people Thank you already can if I may Reply, yeah As I mentioned, uh, Slovenia is uh, mostly rural area, you know Ljubljana is biggest town with 300, uh, thousand people, for example Yeah And this is especially important what you mentioned for for Slovenia And the people living in the in the villages Yeah, and small towns. Yeah, thanks And if I may also We we tend to forget that Uh when we move to these digital advanced digital infrastructures is not only for cities So the internet of the future so providing gigabit You know bandwidth, etc. It's not only for cities. It really is for smart communities. I cannot agree more with with Actually with Ulrich on this so it is there where we are heading towards we should not create In this digital decade that we announced a new sort of divide between Cities and communities. It's absolutely necessary that we move all together to be able to cover widely, uh So the not only from an internet perspective, but from modern technology perspective All these cities and communities at the same time and to not leave anybody out of it Otherwise we would have really, uh, I think missed or lost the opportunity of doing something at this level And it's not only about smart actually It's really about basic infrastructures that need to be Promoted everywhere in every area in every region in Every corner of europe actually It's a very good remark. Yeah, and there's there's an interesting Survey of the german bitcom. It's the organization of german telco and it companies um Asking people where they would like to live if Home office would be also possible in the future once corona is gone and 35 of 35 percent of the people and a lot of young people Said I would move into the green area So into the the rural area away from the city if I could work from home continuously And for this we need a solid digital infrastructure Agreed Thank you very much for your remarks gentlemen. Uh, I would like to Transition to a question that came in uh from chat directly for mr. Raviana um The question is urbanization is closely related to the three dimensions of sustainable development economic societal and environmental And all of these effects are city planning strategies In your opinion, what will be the main or major shifts in the context of the covet 19 pandemic? Uh, absolutely agree with the I think this this is one of the Subjects that we don't know how will be the post covet But there are lots of good things that we learned And we perhaps we can take advantage of And I hope covet It's a pandemic, but it's not a lost opportunity opportunity for perhaps thinking the way we were doing things before And uh, and and this can change Uh, the city planning and urbanization very much and And the way we can we can relate today Perhaps i'm in portugal I don't know where you are in the world, but we are having this conversation and sharing thoughts Uh, can it's for me its work, of course And i'm working with you creating something better and This this was a thing that uh, was not possible before And uh, of course, these means were available But for instance, my team is distributed for in portugal I have a part of the team in the north and a part of the team the team in lisbon the capital and uh What this pandemic Shows the show this is that the team that was on the north now it's a lot more participative And included on the work That we are doing so we are In reality taking lots of benefits from the team that Uh, we were meeting once a week to twice a week Having to uh, having to Travel go going back going forward and now we are more productive right taking more advantage of their knowledge But I would like to add another thing and that's Of course, we can Make sure the infrastructure the smart is there But we also have, uh Another challenges and the challenges they are For for for the society for instance people that don't know how to use digital people that Know how to use digital, but they are afraid to interact with the government because sometimes they are very Important things that will have a very big impact on their lives And this is a thing that's also we have to to take in consideration planning How we are providing digital services while we are thinking smart cities And one of the things that we are doing in portugal for several years because we have these very big advantages of having an older population that was not Didn't study the lot and is not aware or not that doesn't have the means sometimes for using digital services We put in place in the last year's uh network of 1000 Citizen spots it is a place where Anyone can go and uh get digital assisted assisted digital services with a citizenship mediator that ensures that the the the seniors The less educated are able and the ones that don't have means for having it or communications in the home Have access to digital services and can do the service Without of someone and and in some of them and this is a partnership between the cities the look the the regions the communities And for instance this in this case Central governments ensuring that everyone is able to take advantage of this Transformation and this is the thing that are also we have to take in consideration alongside also with regard Problems regarding accessibility and usability of digital services Well said accessibility is a is a near and dear topic to my heart. Thank you very much for that To our kind friends at ofe I think we have time for one more question But if I could get a confirmation in chat that we have time for one more that would be wonderful And while i'm waiting for you we do excellent. That was rapid Okay, so then I think the final question that I would like to pose is Mr. Ali given your global perspective on smart cities through the fireware initiative Can you talk to us a little bit about what you think is of are the global? Outlook for smart cities and perhaps also some comments on how Uh, the global outlook for smart cities may also play a part in discussions of EU policy I think the the example I gave on Uh from india is a very good example and this is this was just an example Um, we have several several similar. Sorry similar initiatives in japan for example We have starting activities in the u.s. And here definitely redhead, which is one of the Partners of this program and making this event Reality is definitely Helping us also in in the u.s. And there was one question the chat how the the partnership of fire and redhead Works redhead joined us quite recently last year identifying the the potential of Um The open source technology in the fire ecosystem the standards which were created and here we are also transferring it to To the u.s. But the main the main two elements From my perspective and these are more and more recognized on the global scale are what is called in in uh in this open and agile smart cities community Min one standard apis min two standard data models and these are the main levers to create Reusability of solutions be it open source or be it closed source And finally to avoid that the wheel is invented several times and Finally to spend also public funding and public money Most efficiently Thank you. Mr. Grosciak. Mr. Vianna. Do you have anything that you would like to add to that? Let's go No, no, I I fully agree. It's uh, it's a major preoccupation on on the purchase government is that What we are doing can be shared can be replicated can be can we can scale and make available to others and and mostly Because there are different levels Not only on center of government, but also on local and communities on on all to do technology smart and It's it's a great pleasure pleasure that I see that the the the guiding Practices on smart cities They of course they are the strong presence from the big cities in Portugal and big communities, but they are competing with other cities and communities that are Less developed for apps not the best work, but they want to attract People they want to provide best better services and for effects. I think these cities are leading this This way. So it's I think that We have to co-create this This evolution with citizens with central local government with businesses and entrepreneurs and I would like to reinforce this is we have to co-create because Last version of smart cities was Not perhaps co-created and I think for success We want to listen to everyone and input the input and making sure the city is serving the people the businesses that are living on on this community Thank you if may I add I would Come and the the pedra mentioned digital divide and those who are digitally excluded um and Maybe just to share we have in Slovenia. We have project called symbiosis And these are volunteers uh, actually, uh, we can say grant children are teaching Digital skills elderly people and they are volunteering. So I think this is a great example how we can in a nice way breach this digital divide And we we you know, we can create whatever kind of smart solutions If people will not be able to use it then it's it's a waste of money. It's a waste of time. So that would be kind of my That we have to really take care for the for the end users Great Thank you gentlemen very much for joining us and sharing All of your wisdom and your perspectives and your lived experience and the experiences of of your homelands Um kind friends from open forum Europe I'm sure you probably have some closing housekeeping remarks that you would like to make so I'll go ahead and return the floor to aster And uh, thank you all for joining us today And there will be a video of the event later if you would like to recommend it to your friends to watch Thank you. Thank you very much. Bye. Bye. Hi aster Hi, I think I accidentally muted Uh, one of the panelists instead of unmuting myself. Can you hear me now? We can hear you. Okay. That's nice. Well, thank you everyone Um, thank you all panelists and thank you Leslie for moderating um Yeah, so so, uh, this was as I said the first installment of our series Uh on policy. So we will have and communicate to all of you Uh, um further invitations. I think the next one is going to be uh, where I know for a fact that the next one is going to be on open source program offices in Uh, um outside of the private sector. So covering governments, uh universities and NGOs as a vehicle to really achieve open source policy goals at scale. So of course a lot of overlap to to cities and and public administrations as well You know with that we will communicate everything and we will also give you of course a link Of the recording and share it with everyone. So for now, thank you very much for attending and again Thank you all of you who participated in the panel. I hope we talk soon