Awards announced for region’s ‘smart city initiatives’

Australia, South Korea, Hong Kong and China had two wins each and Malaysia, Taiwan and Thailand one apiece, organiser IDC Asia/Pacific said on Monday.
The awards, now in their third year, cover all countries and territories in the region excluding Japan.
There are 14 categories, but this year “18 projects were named as the best in the region as we saw intensified competition in four categories and where a tie was declared”, it said. 
These categories were Administration, Education, Land Use and Environmental Management, and Smart Buildings.
“Projects in the past year have exhibited strong national-development focus with an increasing citizen-centric personalisation combined with ‘low-investment, high-impact’ agendas, all in hopes of attracting the right mix of manpower and lucrative foreign direct investments,” said Gerald Wang, head of IDC Government and Education Insights Asia Pacific.
“This socioeconomic shift towards creating more localised and quality smart-city ecosystems is notably influenced by new international and regional trade dynamics,” he said. 
“The failure of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement and China’s increased efforts to boost its global leadership with endeavours such as the Belt and Road Initiative will continue to shape commerce and innovation drive in the region.”
IDC Government Insights undertook a rigorous six-phase benchmarking exercise to determine the top projects. These included cataloguing the key projects by IDC analysts, assessment by an International Advisory Council (each worth 25 per cent of the overall score) and online voting to determine public opinion (50 per cent).