Smart

 Digital transformation is a cross-cutting priority for City of Turku and region of Southwest Finland. Turku’s flagship project Smart and Wise Turku aims to help the city to prepare for climate change and the challenges brought by urbanisation and ageing population with the use of digitalisation and the data it produces. Southwest Finland has a strong ICT cluster and the region is Finland’s most significant hub for health technology and life sciences. 

Smart and Wise

Smart and Wise Turku is one of Turku’s flagship projects that combines the strategic goal of regional carbon neutrality in 2029 with the Smart City concept.

Essential enablers of this are digitalisation and the data it has accumulated. Digitalisation enables the production of services untied to time and location, and an increase in the productivity of the city’s own operations (Smart City). By creating conditions for the citizens and companies to utilise the data, the city enables economically, socially and environmentally sustainable growth that supports well-being (Wise City).

Smart and Wise focal points include:

  • resource wisdom and carbon neutrality,
  • customership and service management,
  • prevention of social exclusion,
  • safety and security,
  • traffic and mobility, and
  • urban design.

By cooperating with the universities, companies, and other interest groups, Turku creates new business possibilities. Along with the fast progressing technological development, the goal is to implement operating models which encourage all groups of population to contribute to the society and the development of its services.

Open data

Turku and Southwest Finland aim to be front-runners in data-based business development. To promote access to open data Turku is working together with regional, national and international (Open and Agile Smart Cities) networks. Southwest Finland’s regional open data platform Lounaistieto collects regional open data, visualizes spatial data in the map service and provides statistical data of the region.

R&I and business ecosystem

Southwest Finland also supports the cooperation of academia, businesses and public sector. The region has a strong ICT cluster, combining artificial intelligence, robotics and automation. Furthermore, Turku region is the strongest health expertise cluster in Finland, pioneering in pharmaceutical and diagnostics industry as well as health technology and life sciences.

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