Smart Cities in 11th Malaysia Plan (2016–2020)

Last year, Malaysia has published the 11th Malaysia Plan. The information regarding “Smart Cities” described in the document is still at very high-level. As stated, most probably it will be discussed further in 11th Plan period.

“During the Eleventh Plan, a framework will be developed to prioritise areas of focus in the development of smart cities. A fundamental initiative to realise the migration to smart cities will be the development of smart communities.”

Our company is fortunate enough to have started our journey towards building smart solutions as shown in No. 16 & 18 (see Page 7–32 of 11th Malaysia Plan)

Interestingly, the majority of the smart city services are either to reduce costs or to increase operational efficiency. The city’s mission should not be really in “making more revenue” via smart city solutions but rather providing better services to the citizens.

However, there is must be a balance between reducing costs of operations and making new revenue streams so that cities can become more self-sustainable. The city should allocate smart city funds to pay for these solutions (just like in many other countries such as UK, India, USA, Australia, etc.) or use an OPEX-based (pay via savings) business model. In return, more people willing to stay and work in the cities which will further spur the economy in the long term.

I would recommend that cities or government budget funds for pilot trials too. Without trials, we will not be able to experience how complex is the process of developing smart cities. Frameworks are insufficient to move forward. Experiencing what’s happening on the ground is the best way to understand the pain points and finally will be able to resolve the levels bureaucracy, factors impacting decision-making process, governance, business models, etc.

We need governance mechanisms at local councils, city and national levels which decouple the political cycles from the technological ones, and thus facilitate a proper uptake of smartness. Due to the political cycles of every five years and if the timing is unfortunate, this can leave you with only a 20% sales window opportunity. Can smart city business thrive under these conditions?

We need governance mechanisms at local councils, city and national levels which decouple the political cycles from the technological ones, and thus facilitate a proper uptake of smartness.

Recently, on June 29, 2016, Selangor State joined the ranks of other Smart Cities initiatives in Malaysia such as Iskandar Malaysia, Cyberjaya, Malacca by launching their Smart Selangor Lab Phase 1.

The Lab discussed four different cores (domain) to generate pilot projects based on the Smart Selangor concept. The four domains were ‘Smart Governance’, ‘Smart Development’, ‘Smart Digital Infrastructure’ and ‘Smart Waste Management’.

Besides these four domains, there will be eight additional domains to be discussed, making it a total of 12 domains.

These include ‘Smart Education’, ‘Smart Energy’, ‘Smart Water Management’, ‘Smart Agro’, ‘Smart Transport and Mobility’, ‘Smart Safety and Security’, ‘Smart Disaster Management’ and ‘Smart Healthcare’.

Just imagine — what if you know how much waste generated, how much crime has reduced, how much carbon footprint per square kilometer and what’s the happiness index of the city, etc

Personally, I felt “Smart Governance” is key to the development of any Smart Cities and the primary factor would be “transparency.” Without clear indication what is meant by transparency, many data regarding cities will not be able to exploit for further usage and will remain as “closed-data.” Of course, data will give insights that might be hard to swallow. To take a step forward, cities need to accept their weaknesses and shouldn’t be in the state of denial. Get the current City’s indicator before starting any new projects. This way, citizens, and cities will be able to track their performance in a transparent manner.

Just imagine — what if you know how much waste generated, how much crime has reduced, how much carbon footprint per square kilometer and what’s the happiness index of the city, etc. Display that in a big billboard in the middle of the city. Any takers?