From electric cars and renewable energy to cloud computing and AI, technology helps city dwellers work smarter, live healthier, and conserve resources. Cities such as Copenhagen, Detroit, and Tel Aviv are already successfully using technology to achieve these goals. But it's not enough.
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City officials want more than examples of technological solutions: they need an evidence-based roadmap to making their cities safe, sustainable, and resilient. A roadmap that includes lessons learned from the current pandemic, centered on the social imperatives that matter most, and based on objective quantitative analysis that shows which investments work best.

Our 2020 study, Smart City Solutions for a Riskier World, examines how more than 170 cities around the world are harnessing technology to drive resilience, sustainability, and citizen-centricity. Our urban economists and experts have assessed the social, environmental, and economic impact of investments in smart technologies—and the solutions and strategies that work best. We have worked with a coalition of corporate, academic, and government leaders to drive this research initiative.

BUILDING A SMART CITIES 4.0 ROADMAP

Our upcoming study, Building a Smart Cities 4.0 Roadmap, will provide urban leaders with a complete action plan for meeting the challenges ahead. With cities still reeling from the pandemic, their highest priority now is to ensure a safe, sustainable, resilient, and prosperous future—but it is also their biggest challenge. To build back better, urban leaders need an actionable roadmap and financing plan for becoming a Smart City 4.0.