Ideas, articles and reports on how universities can shape a new and better wave of smart cities
From 2018–2019 I led an eight country research project looking at how universities can shape ‘smart cities’, funded by the British Council. The final report, Smart places – how universities are shaping a new wave of smart cities, was launched in Berlin at the Going Global 2019 conference.
A summary article in The Conversation has been read over 32,000 times. The research has been featured in the media from The i newspaper and Fast Company magazine to City Metric and Yahoo News, and I was interviewed about the findings on Singapore radio.
I’ve also written extensively about smart cities on this site – see below – including reflections on how some of my thinking has evolved since the report.
- Read the main report here
- Read the summary article here, and an opinion piece on Nottingham in The i newspaper here
- Listen to my interview on CNA938 and read posts on the blog about smart cities below
- Slides and audio from my presentation at Going Global 2019 are available here
- Get in contact to discuss more.
Smart cities research summary: Channel News Asia radio interview
Posts on smart cities

Vertical farming, coronavirus and self-sufficient cities
Preparing for future cross-border challenges

New smart city dimensions: authoritarian regimes and technology giants
Cutting out the middleman. And communities and civil society and the public sector…

Smart cities are a quiet revolution
Opinion piece published in today’s i newspaper

New wave of smart cities has arrived – and they’re nothing like science fiction
Smart cities are more likely to be defined by quieter upgrades to existing infrastructure and new partnerships that better represent residents.

Universities and smart cities session at Going Global 2019
A recording of the smart cities session at Going Global 2019 in Berlin is now available online, including my presentation of the report findings, panel discussion and questions from the audience. You can also find my (admittedly minimalist) slides at the above link. In related news, University World News kindly re-published my summary of my […]

Smart places – how universities are shaping a new wave of smart cities
Smart city activities with universities at the heart are growing across Europe, but challenges remain

Avoiding blunders, splintering and exclusion in smart cities
Any social or cultural disconnect can have serious consequences for city planning

University campuses can be a testbed for smart cities
By seeing campuses as ‘cities in microcosm’ the development of smart infrastructure can lead to closer working between universities and local leaders

How universities can help ‘smart cities’ become transformative (and why leapfrogging is difficult)
Cities are constantly in states of flow, and can easily be locked into patterns of behaviour that over time can have serious consequences