Smart Cities

 by Esteve Almirall

Urbanpreneurs – the future of jobs.

NYC Job recoveryIf there is something that worries in Spain – beyond political corruption – this is unemployment, especially among young people.

The Spanish case has many peculiarities, the rigidity of markets, investment in public works guided mostly by short-term electoral criteria that not only detract extremely necessary resources but also generate regressive cultural habits and advocate for monopolistic ways to compete, …  Much has been written about this situation and more will be written without a doubt, elections are close and all this same year …

However, beyond the Spanish case, job creation is a big topic of discussion. Somehow, the Malthusian theories reappear every while with their message of inevitable job destruction because of technological advances – before was automation, now artificial intelligence and machine learning – together with the growing fate of population, better educated and hence with higher aspirations . However, despite the worst predictions we can witness how societies reinvent themselves after every crises employment “miraculously” recovers.

The really interesting question is therefore not whether we will survive the next reedition of the Malthusian fate – we certainly will – but how?  From where will come job creation? This is the factor that changes from crisis to crisis and the earlier that we can guess it, the better that we can influence policies for job creation that spur growth instead of spending scarce public resources supporting sectors that won’t generate a significant growth in employment.

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 by Esteve Almirall

El empleo que viene: Los Urbanpreneurs

NYC Job recovery

Si hay algo que preocupe en España – más allá de la corrupción política – es el empleo, especialmente entre los jóvenes.

El problema español es un tanto particular, obreros a los que se les acabaron las obras, clases medias sin los medios para emprender y de la clase de las clases altas visto la que está cayendo mejor ni hablar. Sin duda el caso español tiene muchas peculiaridades, la rigidez de los mercados, las inversiones inverosímiles en obra pública guiadas por criterios electorales cortoplacistas que no sólo detraen recursos extremadamente necesarios del sistema sino que generan culturas regresivas y preconizan formas de competir situadas en lo monopolístico, el amiguismo o el clan.  El caso español es sin duda particular, mucho se ha escrito sobre él y mucho más se escribirá sin duda alguna – pues elecciones hay muchas y parece que todas este año …

Más allá del caso español, la generación de empleo es un tema amplio de discusión. De alguna forma, las teorías Maltusianas reaparecen cada poco con su mensaje de la pinza insalvable entre una tecnología que destruye más y más empleo – antes automatización y ahora inteligencia artificial y machine learning – y una población cada vez mayor, más preparada y con más aspiraciones. Sin embargo, a pesar de las peores predicciones vemos como las sociedades se reinventan y también lo hace el empleo.

La pregunta realmente interesante es pues, no si vamos a sobrevivir a la enésima reedición de la teoría maltusiana de turno – que si –  sino ¿cómo? ¿De donde saldrá la generación de empleo? Este es el factor que cambia de crisis en crisis y detectarlo a tiempo permite incidir mejor en políticas que nos van a permitir crecer en vez de gastar recursos públicos apoyando sectores que suponemos van a generar empleo cuando en realidad no va a ser así.

 

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in IT & Entrepreneurship / Policies on Innovation & Smart Cities / Smart Cities 0 comments
 by Esteve Almirall

¿Por qué necesitamos Living Labs?

ENoLL-LL

Allá por el 2010 los Living Labs estaban en auge y ciudades pequeñas o grandes de todo el mundo pugnaban por disponer de uno. Como veis en el gráfico adjunto, aquello pasó, ya no es el caso. Después de cerca de 10 años de Living Labs es hora de hacer balance, pero éste no es un artículo tan ambicioso, sólo quiero aproximarme a una pregunta simple: ¿Necesitamos Living Labs?

Pero, ¿qué es eso de los Living Labs? Parecen una de esas cosas de las que todo el mundo habla pero cuestan de precisar, de concretar y no digamos de poner ejemplos de éxito. La primera impresión que nos viene a la cabeza no es desacertada: laboratorios vivientes, convertir las ciudades en laboratorios donde se experimente con nuevas cosas junto con los ciudadanos y así convertir nuestras sociedades en más innovadoras- yeah ! Sencillo ¿no?

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in Open Innovation / Policies on Innovation & Smart Cities / Smart Cities 3 comments
 by Esteve Almirall

Open Innovation & Smart Cities

 

OI in the PS - coverThis is a quite old article that Henry Chesbrough and I wrote and got published in English on September 2014 due to the interest expressed by a large number of international delegations.

Our vision is changing, because Open Innovation is a moving field, particularly in the Public Sector and Smart Cities. However the one that we presented is still in many ways completely valid.

Here you can find the whole article and following the conclusions:

Innovation and cities are two concepts that have always gone hand in hand. Geoffrey West, who for many years was the director of the well-known Santa Fe Institute, has described the positive correlation between the size of cities and their innovation capacity in terms of a power-law (Bettencourt et al., 2007). That is, a city that is 10 times larg- er is 17 times more innovative, but a city that is 50 times big- ger is 130 times more innovative.

Large cities have always been considered places that welcome subcultures (Fischer, 1995) and non-conven- tional residents (Florida, 2005).

In this article, we have described the theory that the prevalent model of innovation in cities continues to be based on a structure of providing predefined services. This model does not include elements that enable cities to reinvent themselves, which is what is sought in smart city proposals (Florida, 2010).

The reinvention of cities, which should lead us closer to smart cities, requires the reinvention of the governance of cities themselves, particularly in terms of the manage- ment of innovation. This point is further supported if we consider the reality of cities as entities that compete for talent and creativity (Florida, 2008), in a world where competition is increasingly defined by the capacity to innovate, not just by efficiency or productivity.

In the article, we have focused particularly on inter- mediaries in innovation processes, particularly public intermediaries. We centred on a specific mechanism: the use of urban space as an area for research and experi- mentation by the citizens themselves through urban labs.

The existence of intermediaries is possibly one of the most relevant characteristics of open innovation process- es. However, although open innovation is prevalent in the private sector, it is only just beginning to be intro- duced in the private sector. Urban labs will definitely undergo considerable transformation in the coming years, and shape this new scenario of open innovation in the public field.

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