The Smart Otaniemi vision is created together with companies, research institutes and the city of Espoo

At the Smart Otaniemi event on 12 October 2022, we heard about current issues in the development environment and shared views in order to create a joint vision. The event brought together the main operators of the Smart Otaniemi development environment: the City of Espoo, VTT, Aalto University and a number of pioneering companies and other operators.

Smart Otaniemi aims to be one of the leading development environments for future bound smart and sustainable urban solutions. A comprehensive plan will be created for Smart Otaniemi in autumn 2022. It includes a vision extending to 2030 and a roadmap that describes the necessary measures for achieving the vision. This event offered different actors the opportunity to bring out their views and wishes about the content of the vision and to network with other actors in the area. The speakers at the event included representatives of the City of Espoo, VTT, Aalto University, ACRE, Schneider, Nokia, Caruna, Nodeon and HSL.

The significance of collaboration was highlighted by several speakers, because no one can solve the challenges in sustainable development on their own. It is also important to invite the right operators at the right time to join in. In order to promote new ways of doing things, we must be ready to really challenge the old ones and allow people enough time to understand and adopt the new ones.

Smart Otaniemi's vision was expected to provide a clearly defined definition of the development environment and the work carried out there. Participants also wished for flexibility and as little bureaucracy as possible.  Innovation calls for rapid action, which means months rather than years. 

Participants gave praise to the quick pilots carried out by cities and would like to see more of them in the future. An important benefit of the pilots is the detection of problems, so that they can be fixed before the services are scaled up. Additionally, it is important to ensure that decision-makers have up-to-date information on new solutions so they can take them into account in legislation.

The creation of a comprehensive plan for Smart Otaniemi will continue in autumn 2022, based on the ideas discussed at the event.  The creation of the comprehensive plan is part of the Implementation Pathway for Environments that Accelerate Sustainable Growth (KETO) project.

Building a carbon-neutral society requires bold thinking and new approaches. Espoo has the ability to take up this challenge. Join us in developing future solutions in Kera, Otaniemi and Kiviruukki! The Implementation Pathway for Environments that Accelerate Sustainable Growth KETO project boosts cooperation between businesses, schools and research organisations, and creates concrete development environments that promote the green transition and digitalisation. The project is run by the City of Espoo, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Aalto University and Omnia, together with several business partners. Project is funded by European Union’s REACT-EU ERDF and is part of the European Union’s response to the covid-19 pandemic.