An actionable roadmap for building cities back smarter, greener, and aligned with changing citizen needs
The pandemic is accelerating the need for urban transformation, creating extraordinary opportunities for your company. As urban leaders think beyond the pandemic, they will require your support for their plans to rebuild their cities to meet the shifting expectations of citizens, stimulate economic recovery, and ensure future resiliency, security, and sustainability.
To provide urban leaders with an actionable roadmap for building back their cities in these unprecedented times, ThoughtLab, in conjunction with Hatch, is launching its fourth multi-client urban research program, Building a Future-Ready City. This program brings together top city government, business, and academic leaders to examine the most effective investments and solutions for meeting the social, environment, and economic imperatives of operating in a radically different, post-pandemic world.
The pandemic has forever changed the expectations and behaviors of citizens and businesses, requiring cities to build back smarter, safer, and greener—with the agility and built environment to address shifting needs and future disruptions. The most successful metro areas will be those that have concrete blueprints for morphing into future-ready, carbon-neutral cities, drawing on innovative technologies, new sources of financing, and public-private partnerships. Our ground-breaking research program will provide cities with the evidence-based roadmap they need to address the challenges they face.
"Third-party independent research like this project conducted by ThoughtLab are important information sources local government stakeholders can look to for guidance, for best practices, for encouragement, and for inspiration."
- Kevin Taylor, Segment Development Manager, Smart Cities - Americas, Axis Communications
Our research team will survey 200 cities and 2,000 citizens around the world
We will analyze and compare the best practices, investment plans, digital strategies, and performance results of 200 worldwide cities striving to become more sustainable, resilient, and future ready. To enable us to benchmark urban areas with similar characteristics, we will gather survey and statistical data on cities that are diverse by location, population size, income level, density, economic development, and other critical factors. In addition, to assess the alignment between government plans and citizen needs, we will survey 2,000 citizens and gather additional citizen data directly from cities to assess changing living, working, and traveling behaviors, as well as shifting service requirements and levels of trust.
This rigorous research methodology will allow us to provide action plans tailored to different types of cities geared to evolving citizen needs, attitudes, and behaviors.
Our mixed methods research approach
ThoughtLab is building a coalition of urban experts across cities, government, businesses, academics, and associations. Building a Future-Ready City will provide urban service providers and consultants with valuable market intelligence on the main areas of investment for cities as they emerge from the pandemic. Our research will enable companies to design successful go-to-market plans aligned to the needs of a diverse set of cities around the world.
"A future-ready city in a post-pandemic world is one that embraces stakeholder and community engagement, innovation, and technology to cultivate a thriving and enduring community. These cities will be advanced in using smart technology and data to accelerate progress on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, improve our collective resilience, and transition to a zero-carbon economy. ThoughtLab’s research will help shed light on the path ahead for cities."
- Chris Castro, Director of the Office of Sustainability and Resilience for the City of Orlando
Latest insights
Building a Future-Ready City
As cities around the world continue to reel from the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and other disruptions, their highest priority has become to ensure a safe, resilient, and economically stable future for their residents. This has heightened the urgency for cities to become future-ready —smart, sustainable, secure, and fully aligned with changing citizen and business needs.
Global Study Will Provide Urban Leaders With an Evidence-Based Roadmap for Making Their Cities More Sustainable, Resilient, Inclusive, and Future-Ready
ThoughtLab, a leading global research firm, has joined forces with a broad coalition of business, government, and academic leaders to launch its fourth urban research program, Building a Future-Ready City. This ground-breaking study, conducted together with Hatch, a global engineering company, will examine how cities around the world plan to reinvent their urban environments to meet the post-pandemic expectations of citizens and other stakeholders, and to address their increasing needs for resiliency, sustainability, inclusiveness, and economic development.
Understanding city challenges that inform marketing communications
Lou Celi, discusses his firm’s ground-breaking research into how cities around the world are rethinking their plans for today’s riskier, digital-first world.
Smart Cities World: ThoughtLab launches future cities research programme
The research firm is working with a coalition of business, government, and academic leaders, including SmartCitiesWorld, on the study of 200 cities, which will probe their strategies, investments and plans for becoming future-ready.
Cities on the front line in the Russia-Ukraine crisis
By Louis Celi, CEO, ThoughtLab Russia’s invasion of Ukraine highlights a depressing fact about cities and war: cities often take the brunt of attacks and bear the greatest financial and human cost. Two-thirds of Ukraine’s population of 44 million people lived in cities before the conflict began. Millions of them have fled their homes, and hundreds have been killed. The cost to Ukrainian civilian property and infrastructure already surpasses $100 billion.
Sponsors and partners
Sponsors
Advisors
City Leaders
Academic Experts
Media & Association Partners
Bayan Konirbayev
Chief Digital Officer Almaty City, Kazakhstan
Miquel Rodriguez Planas
Commissioner Barcelona City Council
Dr. Peter Pirnejad
City Manager, Los Altos Hills, CA
Chris Castro
Director of Sustainability and Resilience, Orlando, FL
Clay Pearson
City Manager, Pearland, TX
Emily Yates
Chief Innovation Officer, SEPTA
Darron Taylor
Operational Lead, City of Ottawa
Gianluca Galletto
Managing Director, Technology & Innovation Partnerships
New York Housing Authority (Personal Capacity)
Oyvind Tanum
Head of Smart City Trondheim, Norway
Aram Chaparyan
City Manager, Torrance, CA
Danny Santana
Assistant City Manager, Torrance, CA
Borg Tham
Deputy Director, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Singapore
Jamie Cudden
Smart City Program Manager, Dublin
Peter Nöu
Smart City Pilots & Partnerships
Uppsala, Sweden
Jayant Kohale
Business Advisor
Mumbai
Julia Thompson
Smart Cities Data & Planning Consultant, London
In Dong Cho
Metropolitan Government First Vice Mayor, Seoul, South Korea
Edson Gomez
CIO, Bucaramanga, Colombia
Gia Biagi
Commissioner, Chicago Department of Transporation
Nicole Raimundo
CIO, Cary City, NC
Mike Grigsby
Director Innovation and Technology Sioux Falls, SD
Bill Cashmore
Deputy Mayor Auckland
Sharmila Muhkerjee
Executive VP, Planning and Development, Capital Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Austin, TX
Benjamin Branham
Chief Communications Officer Port Authority of New York and New Jersey
Bob Leek
Smart Mobility, Parking Enterprise & Mobility Services, Clark County, NV
Jason JonMichael Assistant Director Smart Mobility, City of Austin
Karen Lightman
Executive Director
Metro21: Smart Cities Institute,
Carnegie Mellon University
Joan E. Ricart
Professor IESE Business School
Eugenie Birch
Professor, The Penn Institute for Urban Research
Kyung-Hwan Kim
Professor of Economics Sogang University
Frank Zerunyan
Professor, University of Southern California, Sol Price School of Public Policy
Prof. Greg Clark
CBE FAcSS, Group Advisor, Future Cities & New Industries, HSBC
Henry Liu
Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Michigan; M-City
Jian Liu
Professor of Urban Planning & Design, Tsinghua University Tianjin, China
Dr. Yu Qi
Associate Professor Nankai University; Tianjin, China
John Rome
Deputy CIO for Partnerships, Cloud Innovation Center, Arizona State University
Ryan Hendrix
General Manager, Cloud Innovation Center, Arizona State University
Diana Bowman
Co-Director, Center for Smart Cities and Regions, School for the Future of Innovation in Society, Arizona State University
Fengyu Li
VP of the Institute of Urban Design and Innovation at CAFA, China
Prof. Maosheng Lai
Peking University of China
Dr. Sanjay Modak Assistant Professor Graduate Programs and Research Department
RIT of Dubai
Philip Bane
Managing Director Smart Cities Council
Chris Cooke
Chief Executive Officer Smart Cities World
Kari Eik
Secretary General, United Cities
Tony Silva
General Manager, Public Sector Edelman
Yi Wang
Head of Global Development Program, Anbound
Ulrich Ahle
Chief Executive Officer FIWARE
Chungha Cha
Co-founder and Chief Technical Officer, Reimagining Cities LLC
Nicolas Buchoud
Founding Principal Renaissance Urbaine
Sameh Naguib Whaba
Global Director, Urban, Disaster Risk Management, Resilience and Land Global Practice, World Bank
Jim Haskins
Director of Community Engagement Open Sustainability Collaborative
Jeff Merritt
Head of Urban Transformation World Economic Forum
Michelle James
Vice President, Strategic Industry Programs, CTIA
Anita Chen
Deputy Secretary General GO SMART
Pablo Marmissolle Daugerre
Chief of Staff, United Cities and Local Governments
Jennifer Sanders
Executive Director Dallas Innovation Alliance
Anurag Anthony
Chief Technology Officer Urban Management Centre
About the Program
ThoughtLab will work with sponsors to provide cities with an evidence-based roadmap for becoming a future-ready city and leader in climate action. Drawing on insights from our global analysis and best practices of leading cities, we will create a complete action plan that urban leaders can use to benchmark their strategies for building a future-ready 4.0 city.
Preliminary Program Timeline
Relevant Thought Leadership Work
Building a Future Ready City is the fourth program in a series of ground-breaking multi-client studies ThoughtLab has produced on smart cities trends.
Smart City Solutions for a Riskier World
ThoughtLab, in collaboration with a global coalition of business, government, and academic leaders has aimed at providing city decision-makers with an evidence-based roadmap to building the smart city of the future.
Building a Hyperconnected City
ThoughtLab gathered benchmarking data from 100 cities, conducted in-depth interviews with city leaders, and drew on valuable input from a cross industry coalition of leading firms and research organizations. This study provides an in-depth evidence-based roadmap that cities can use to become vibrant, hyperconnected urban centers of the future.
This report showcases how 10 cities across regions, population sizes, and economic maturity are achieving the SDGs. It spotlights challenges and provides valuable insights for their peers.
Smarter Cities 2025
ThoughtLab teamed up with a coalition of organizations with urban and technology expertise to conduct ground-breaking research into the impact of smart city solutions on urban performance. Our research identified 10 smart city pillars that work together to drive benefits to local stakeholders.
Contact Us
For more information on how you can join our coalition as an advisory board member or a sponsor for Building a Future-Ready City, contact us today.
Lou Celi
Chief Executive Officer
ThoughtLab
917.459.4614
louceli@thoughtlabgroup.com
Barry Rutizer
Corporate Director
ThoughtLab
917.251.4190
barryrutizer@thoughtlabgroup.com
Michael Geach
Director of Business Development
ThoughtLab
646.334.7022
michaelgeach@thoughtlabgroup.com