The Future of Open Smart City Platforms

Data is the cornerstone of any smart city approach. Pure informational smart cities approaches entirely rely on data captured through crowdsourcing information from social media, through active citizen participation, or, passively, via capturing data from mobile sensors in smartphones and connected cars. Data remains a key element for more advanced approaches based on the sharing paradigm whereby data-centric smartphone applications allow unlocking underutilized physical assets and resources such as vehicles, home grids, and accommodation. And even for the end game of dedicated technology embedded in a physical smart city infrastructure, data analytics is critical for demand-response optimization.

Data is also the biggest challenge for the smart city ecosystem. Capturing, aggregating, and leveraging data from a wide range of disparate systems, solutions, and platforms in a scalable, cost-effective, and timely way requires optimized designs based on key requirements linked to interoperability. Deriving value from smart city data can only happen by breaking through the fragmentation barriers of isolated systems optimized for and targeted at dedicated verticals and/or technologies. This represents the biggest IoT challenge yet to be solved.

The FIWARE platform consists of a rich set of public and royalty-free application program interfaces (APIs) enabling the development and implementation of services across verticals. Open-source reference implementations of each FIWARE component are made available publicly. The community built around FIWARE consists of technology suppliers, developers, and wider ecosystem players with more than 1,000 startups and 89 cities involved. Smart city development tools include the FIWARE Lab, the FIWARE Accelerator Programme, and a network of FIWARE iHubs. While FIWARE originated in Europe, with roots in the Future Internet Public-Private Partnership (FI-PPP) project of the EU, it has global ambitions through theFIWARE Mundus Programme. Main players supporting FIWARE include Telefónica, ATOS Engineering, NEC, Orange, and the city of Vienna.  

The BIG IoT initiative is squarely focused on interoperability through the definition of a unified web API for IoT platforms (BIG IoT API) in line with the W3C Web of Things group standards. The BIG IoT marketplace and ecosystem connects vendors and players from across all smart city IoT segments. Smart city IoT scenarios are tested in Barcelona, Berlin/Wolfsburg, and the region of Piedmont. The Barcelona pilot involves the deployment of embedded traffic detectors and parking spot sensors, as well as air quality sensors in connected SEAT vehicles. 

Smart cities can be built holistically or incrementally through specific projects. Incremental approaches, which might be limited to specific verticals like energy or transportation, demonstrate value and return of investment (ROI) to attract funding for additional deployments in the next phase. Holistic approaches, on the other hand, first aim to put in place a foundational platform for connectivity, IT, and data sharing. This is where open data platforms are needed to allow optimization of resources across verticals by adopting harmonized, standardized approaches through platforms like BIG IoT, API, and FIWARE. The main disadvantage of holistic approaches is the requirement of high upfront investments before real-life services can demonstrate ROI. On the other hand, implementing open platforms after the fact, tying together already existing standalone proprietary solutions, might turn out to be even more expensive. In any case, initiatives like FIWARE and BIG IoT are aimed at leveraging open-source community efforts, allowing cities embracing open platform approaches at a much-reduced cost.