“For a city to offer smart services and save money, its departments have to work closely together, share their data and use a common IT infrastructure. London, for instance, has different payment systems for public transport, bicycle hire and toll roads. Such fragmentation is costly and makes it more difficult to come up with new offers (say, reducing the congestion charge for those who often hire a bicycle). But getting a city’s islands of bureaucracy to work together tends to be difficult, says Mark Cleverley of IBM, who helps governments and cities develop plans for smart systems. The problem is not just that departments often jealously protect their data, something experts call TEP, as in “turf, ego and power”. Officials also lack a common language or generally agreed criteria for a smart city—which is a big issue, too, for the many companies that are usually involved in a project. “It’s hard to build a business case if people don’t understand each other,” says Simon Giles, in charge of strategy for smart technologies at Accenture. Things are easier in Singapore. Ministries and agencies compete for reputation and resources, but they also co-operate closely on implementing master plans such as “A Lively and Liveable Singapore: Strategies for Sustainable Growth”, the city-state’s roadmap to becoming smart. That helps to explain why Singapore will probably be the first city to combine its various smart systems into a single one.”
