It was busy days at the end of September’16 on Smart Cities for us. We met European Smart City experts and project creators both in Brussels and in Istanbul.
While meeting Smart Cities and Communities people in Charlemagne building, Brussels on September 23, 2016 we learned the strategies and critical points on the ‘Smart cities & communities’ topic of the 2016-2017 Horizon 2020 Work Programme ‘Cross-cutting activities’, and in particular the 2017 call from the European Commission Officers. The presentations covered the call content and the application procedure. A networking event took place in the second part of the day where several project ideas were presented.
The recording of the web stream is available:
https://webcast.ec.europa.eu/h2020-smart-cities-and-communities-info-day
It was very crowded where around 1000 people were participated from cities, universities, SMEs and other experts including EC officers. The aim was to understand the call for the Lighthouse projects and find partners and projects under the call below:
- SCC-1-2016-2017: Smart Cities and Communities lighthouse projects (total budget: €69.5 million; €12-18 million per project – indicative),
- Goal: to facilitate a transformation towards intelligent, user-driven and demand-oriented city infrastructure and services
- Scope: Develop and test innovative solutions in cities that can be later replicated or adapted to different urban district across Europe
The interesting part of this call was that the cities having lighthouse projects, cannot be part of this call whereas the follower cities in previous lighthouse projects can now be part of this call.
The most looked for expertise in the event was the replication and sustainability plans preparation where TAGES provides those services with its extensive knowledge in several smart city projects as the innovation partner.
We were just back from the Brussels and in the coming week we have participated in “CITIES of the FUTURE-H2020” International Brokerage Event in Istanbul on September 30, 2016 in Intercontinental Hotel, Istanbul.
“Cities of the Future 2016” is meant as a wider concept that encompasses cities’ overall energy and resource efficiency with profound economic, social and environmental impacts, resulting in a better quality of life. In this context ‘Green Vehicles’ play an essential role, as well as further advances in ‘Factories of the Future’ or ‘Sustainable Process Industries’, for increased resource efficiency, new markets, and new job.
This event provides a unique opportunity to connect not only with Turkish and European researchers but also with highly qualified research-performing SMEs, making this event an excellent platform to expand networks and create new partnerships for the upcoming calls in Horizon 2020.
It was really nice to meet European experts in Istanbul and try to match our ideas and expertise for future projects. Nevertheless, it was much more fruitful to meet our Turkish organizations and had time to chat on the latest developments in the projects and R&D&I environments, project results and common problems we face in our everyday lives.
This event was successful on creating partnership for future projects more than the previous event in Brussels. Strange but true! But because it was a systematically organized event the one Turkish people organized. So, we should first thank TUBITAK.
Leyla Arsan,
Istanbul October 21, 2016
