104 | theceomagazine.com
BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS
CONNECTIVITY
With the announcement in November 2017 that
a firm owned by Bill Gates had purchased 25,000
acres in Arizona for US$80 million to create a smart
city called Belmont, there has been a focus on new
city projects – all claiming exceptional ‘green’
credentials in addition to their ‘smart’ ones.
Belmont will include high-speed digital networks
and autonomous vehicles. A project spokesperson
explained that “envisioning future infrastructure
from scratch is far easier and more cost-efficient than
retrofitting an existing urban fabric”.
Adam Beck, Executive Director at Smart Cities
Council Australia New Zealand, agrees. “In Australia,
we have substantial greenfield projects. With a blank
canvas or clean slate, you can put in the best possible
networks from day one, and allow communities to
thrive from the very beginning,” he says.
“The core function of a smart city is to collect,
communicate and crunch data – the smart city
doesn’t work without connectivity,” continues Beck.
“New cities allow you to bring all businesses together
on a single platform.
“This enables direct lines to other businesses
on the network but, importantly, it also allows the
physical infrastructure, the buildings, to talk to
one another. This facilitates predictive analysis
and real-time optimisation for things like energy
consumption. All the infrastructure starts to act
like one organism working together.”
Songdo, a 1,500-acre smart city built on
reclaimed land 56 kilometres from South Korea’s
capital Seoul, has computers, cameras and sensors
fitted into homes, streets, traffic lights and office
spaces to help streamline and monitor things like
traffic flow and energy use.
City planners also claim that, at just 18 minutes
from Incheon International Airport, Songdo presents
an ideal location for companies newly targeting Asian
markets, and that it is only a 3.5-hour flight to a third
of the world’s population. Though still most famous
for its appearance in the music video ‘Gangnam
Style’, Songdo is one of the world’s first completely
connected cities, in every sense of the word.
However, there are some obvious downsides.
“All being on the same network makes everyone
more vulnerable, and businesses more vulnerable
to cyberattack,” explains Ian Pearson, a futurologist
with an 85 per cent accuracy rate.
One existing city not heeding this warning is the
Australian city of Adelaide. This year, it has
commenced installation of its ‘Ten Gigabit’ project
that will see all the buildings within the city’s CBD
connected to a dedicated fibre-optic network,
providing access to a range of cloud-based services
and 10Gpbs data speeds.
“Adelaide’s ‘Ten Gig’ project means businesses
will be able to operate and compete at the next level,
embracing new and innovative technologies.
Emerging industries in particular, such as the 3D
printing sector, need lightning-speed connectivity to
operate and, importantly, to attract new talent,”
notes Beck....one of the world’s first completely connected cities.Songdo in South Korea is...