Expanded and relocated “Seoul Smart City Center” opens to public

[Smart City Today]

Seoul Smart City Center, a comprehensive base that supports Seoul citizens and smart city companies interested in utilizing digital technology, opened on September 1.

The Seoul Smart City Center was established to contribute to the creation of a Seoul-type smart city as a space to provide digital technology utilization infrastructure to Seoul citizens and to support business creation.

In particular, the Seoul Smart City Center has been moved from Guro Digital Complex to Sangam with the expansion in size and improvement in its functions.

Previously, the center supported mainly IoT-centered consulting for digital product and service upgrading, idea design, processing, and production, but now it is expanding to include the development of solutions through spatial information, data utilization, evaluation of the usability of digital devices, and services for digital weak, and discovery of practical cooperation projects overseas.

The Seoul Smart City Center was established by the Seoul Metropolitan Government in 2017 based on the 'Ordinance on the Establishment of Internet City for Things in Seoul'. It started as the 'Seoul IoT Center' and was operated for the purpose of finding urban problem-solving services, commercialization support, and market entry support in connection with the project to spread the Internet of Things.
In accordance with the Seoul Smart City Basic Plan in 2019, the name was changed to Seoul Smart City Center for specific support, and the project was transferred to the Seoul Digital Foundation's unique business in 2020 and has been operating to today.

The newly opened Seoul Smart City Center consists of seven independent spaces: Digital Twin Lab, Digital Inclusive Lab, Coworking Space, Global Cooperation Office, SDF Studio, Education Room, and Networking Lounge.

▶Digital Twin Lab is a space where you can develop and demonstrate services and contents using Seoul spatial information data. However, the Seoul Metropolitan Government's open limited spatial information data can only be used by those who have made a reservation at the Seoul Smart City Center website and cannot take the date out of the place for security reasons.

In addition to space for spatial information data utilization, digital twin wrap also has various experience contents to promote the understanding of AR and VR of ordinary citizens.

▶Digital Inclusive Lab is a space that supports the improvement of usability of various digital devices and services such as kiosks and homepages for 'accompanying with digital-weak people'.

It has 29 kinds of devices such as an eye tracker, brain wave measuring device, and kiosk.

In particular, it analyzes the spot where the user's gaze stays the most through the eye tracker, and combines the brain wave measurement value (stress index, etc.) when using a specific menu through the brain wave meter to derive a direction for improving the service function.

The Seoul Digital Foundation is also actively promoting exchanges and cooperation with overseas cities that pursue smart cities in the global cooperation office. Specifically, the cross-examination between Seoul and overseas cities will be expanded sequentially from this year.

For example, it has signed a business agreement with Medtech, a start-up organization in the bio-health field in Montreal, and is promoting cross-examination between Seoul and Montreal, which select innovative solutions and apply them to cities.

In the next year, it is preparing to expand the cross-examination scale, and practical discussions with the UK, Saudi Arabia, and Finland are continuing. The foundation will draw concrete directions at the Smart CityExpo World Congress (SCEWC) held in Barcelona.

In addition, the Seoul Smart City Center will host the 'Smart City Seoul Forum' every month.

Anyone, including ordinary citizens, experts, and related organizations, can attend. The theme will be related to smart cities, digital technology, etc., and networking activities will be promoted.

The first and second forums were held in July (direction of AI development after Covid19) and August (Metaverse ethics), respectively. The forums related to digital inclusion will be held sequentially in the last week of September in October.

“It is a rebirth into a new space where both base and function changes have occurred,” said Kang Yo-sik, chairman of the Seoul Digital Foundation. “We will operate it so that Seoul can develop into a meaningful space where sustainable growth can be achieved with global smart cities.”