BY 2050, urban areas will be home to 75 per cent of the world's population. It's little wonder then that cities are in a race to become "smart", partly by using technology to tackle problems commonly associated with rapid urbanisation, such as environmental degradation. Some have set modest goals, such as smart parking lot management to ease congestion in city centres. Others are aiming higher; they want to use technology to transform the way they provide services to their people. Singapore belongs to this category. As Yaacob Ibrahim, Minister for Communications and Information, said recently, Singapore aims to be not just a smart city but a Smart Nation, one that uses technology to transform the quality of life in the country.

The picturesque Jurong Lake District is the test bed for 15 "smart" solutions that will be rolled out islandwide once they are validated. The framework for these solutions comprises sensors, video cameras and above-ground boxes that house a range of data-gathering devices. The data will result in benefits such as real-time traffic-signal phasing that responds to vehicular and pedestrian traffic volume and smart queuing which directs taxis to stands with more people waiting, and also helps to prevent illegal parking. It would also help monitor energy consumption, potentially turning every structure into a "green" building. Advances in sensors and networks are allowing the collection of unprecedented amounts of data - so-called "big data". In turn, smart analytics is providing actionable information in real time that makes services such as those being tested in Jurong feasible. Under its Open Data initiative, the government has released more than 8,000 datasets and since 2011, companies have created more than 130 apps with such data.

Singapore is in the process of creating a Smart Nation Platform (SNP) which will help to boost the country's hard infrastructure by building an operating system into which public agencies would be plugged, to access essential sensor data. SNP will ensure that the data is protected and managed before it's shared. The government is also in the process of identifying open standards which can be used to share data that would allow seamless connectivity.