The world's first city to implement ITU's Key Performance Indicators for Smart Sustainable Cities reports the results of their experience in the newly released Smart Dubai case study. The case study charts the Smart Dubai journey from its initial planning stages through to the current status of related ICT applications, highlighting lessons learned along the way. The study offers an evaluation of Dubai's progress in meeting its smart-city objectives, evaluations undertaken using ITU's KPIs. The results of the evaluation will assist Dubai in refining its smart-city strategy, in addition they will support ITU's work to identify elements of the KPIs in need of review.

"ICTs will be key drivers in delivering smart buildings, smart water management and intelligent transport systems to 21st century cities, making them more liveable and more ecological," said ITU Secretary-General Houlin Zhao. "The lessons learned in Dubai's efforts to evolve into a smart sustainable city will be of great value to other cities because they encourage local smart-city innovation."

Dubai was the world's first city to join ITU's KPI pilot project in 2015. Singapore quickly followed suit, later followed by other cities, including Manizales (Colombia), Montevideo, Buenos Aires, Valencia, Santiago de Chile, Rimini (Italy) and Wuxi (China). The pilot project will help ITU refine the indicators with data and insights that each city gathered from their application.

The case study was launched at the Telecom Review Summit in Dubai, 13 December, and can be downloaded free of charge here. The event also hosted the signing of a new cooperation agreement between ITU and Smart Dubai, renewing the commitment to collaboration introduced by an agreement signed at the launch of the pilot project.

"Dubai must be commended for its efforts to share its smart-city experience with the international community," said Chaesub Lee, Director of ITU's Telecommunication Standardization Bureau. "The next phase of our collaboration will aim to ensure that the KPIs offer valuable assistance in measuring our progress towards the achievement of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals." 

Aisha bin Bishr, Director General of the Smart Dubai Office said, "Our partnership with ITU has been a central programme of the Smart Dubai initiative. As the world's first city to implement ITU's KPIs for Smart Sustainable Cities, we are in a strong position to contribute to the development of a global smart city index. I congratulate all our partners who have contributed to the findings in this case study, and look forward to the impact that our continuing partnership with ITU will achieve for Dubai and the world."

Noora Al Suwaidi, Head of Strategy & Policy, Smart Dubai Office and Advisory Board member of the 'United 4 Smart Sustainable Cities' initiative (U4SSC) said, "The results of this case study will be a valuable tool to assist emerging smart cities in their journeys by deriving best practices based on Dubai's accomplishments to date. We look forward to the second year of the partnership between Dubai and ITU, in which we will act on the suggestion and recommendations of this case study."

The findings of the case study will feed into the work of ITU's standardization expert group for 'Internet of Things, Smart Cities and Communities', ITU-T Study Group 20, which works to address the standardization requirements of IoT (Internet of Things) technologies and applications, with an initial focus to address urban-development challenges.

The findings will also be taken up by the U4SSC initiative, an advocacy platform established in May 2016 primarily to advocate for public policy to encourage the use of ICTs to facilitate and ease the transition to smart sustainable cities.

The U4SSC Advisory Board is refining the KPIs, building on the findings of the pilot project to finalize the KPIs in early 2017. A key element of this work will be the definition of the relevance of the KPIs to the pursuit of the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

U4SSC is supported by 16 United Nations agencies and programmes and is open to the participation of all stakeholders interested in driving smart-city innovation. Smart Dubai is co-chairing one of the three working groups of the U4SSC initiative in addition to being a member of its Advisory Board.


About Smart Dubai

Smart Dubai is anchored in the vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to make Dubai the happiest city on earth.

Collaborating with private sector and government partners, Smart Dubai is the government office charged with facilitating Dubai's citywide smart transformation, to empower, deliver and promote an efficient, seamless, safe and impactful city experience for residents and visitors.

Smart Dubai is committed to a collaborative and agile approach to Dubai's smart city transformation, empowering strategic partnerships with the public and private sector and academia to design and implement services and elevate citywide thought leadership, in line with its mission to make Dubai the happiest city on earth through technology innovation.