Understanding Role of Mobile Apps in Smart City Services

With the advent of new generation technologies and information driven “intelligent solutions”, Smart City Projects are underway in many parts of the globe. Country level guidelines and implementation approaches may differ but key components of smart city solutions are same. In particular, urban mobility solutions and smart infrastructure services such as smart waste management are gaining momentum with the involvement of local municipal bodies and government institutions. This paper aims at reviewing and summarizing some of the developments in Urban mobility, smart waste management and smart retail solutions that are being implemented in various cities. Use of mobile apps, congestion pricing, interconnected mass transit systems are fostering growth of urban mobility adoption rapidly. In similar lines Smart Waste Management solutions are also moving beyond simple sensor based waste collection binds to integrated waste recovery and disposal systems driven by ICT applications, through management of data on all levels by all stakeholders. Lastly, success in the retail industry is all about timing, precision. innovative software applications, wireless devices ePOS Stations are giving rise to growing Smart Retail solutions across different value chain. Given the above premise, an attempt is made to envisage three key components of smart city solutions and the growing trends in the coming years.