Lake Constance Smart Government Academy
Lake Constance Smart Government Academy project has started in 2019 and it is supported as an Interreg V-Programme. Its objective is the joint utilisation of the current opportunities and challenges of tomorrow’s public administration.
To reach this objective, nine cities and municipalities from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland are joining forces with four universities to set up the Lake Constance Smart Government Academy. This transnational platform interlinks experience and knowledge in order to prepare new solutions for the working and performance spheres of local authorities around Lake Constance. The academic leadership has been assigned to the Smart Government Lab at the University of St.Gallen, Switzerland.
Innovative technologies such as the internet of things, sensor systems, big data and artificial intelligence are marking a new wave of digitalisation. Successful initiatives have already been launched around Lake Constance under the heading of "Smart City". During the grant period, each University partner teams up with a selected number of cities to work on research-based projects with the goal to implement them in each of the cities. The results are shared in plain language on the platform for other – also beyond the grantees – to reuse. This provides the public sector with a great number of options through the interlinkage of data and services, the exchange of knowledge and the opportunity to learn from the experience of the other project partners.
The project is divided into four themes/work packages:
- Smart government
- Interdisciplinary digital competences
- Exploiting the inovation potential of smart technologies
- Lake Konstanz Urban data-space
More information about each work package are available here (in German and English).
Each of the nine partner cities and municipalities will make a practical contribution to the project by means of current "smart government" projects which reflect the manifold initiatives of the Lake Constance region. Each of these practical ventures is advised by an academic research institution.
As an example, the University of Konstanz and the University of St. Gallen are currently interviewing smart city managers about the strategic directions for working package 1 (smart government), as well as skills and competences necessary to implement smart services in the region and internationally for working package 3. Insights will be placed on the website in early 2020 and disseminated through our social media channels.
The fact that authorities will be able to rely on this pool of knowledge when it comes to planning and implementing smart government projects will reduce costs and allow for the exploitation of synergies.
Contact: Prof. Dr. Ines Mergel, University of Konstanz : ines.mergel@uni-konstanz.de