Bringing smart cities to life around the world, Infor Inc. has been a key partner in IBM Corp.’s Smart Cities project, specifically helping with data collection and process automation in their “smart permits” project. Joe Saunders, Global Product Manager of IBM’s Smart Cities, stopped by theCUBE to talk about Smart Cities initiatives and Infor’s participation with co-hosts Jeff Kelly and Dave Vellante at this week’s Inforum 2014 conference.

The goal of IBM’s Smart Cities is to help cities do more with data, make better decisions, and raise the standard of living. According to Saunders, there’s “an awful lot of data” ranging from crime data, permit data, and data directly from citizens. IBM helps break down cities’ data silos to draw out insights and create an environment in which various departments can collaborate with each other towards a single goal.

Saunders explained his company’s alliance with Infor means both IBM and Infor sell the service and take advantage of each other’s client exposure and expansion capabilities. Saunders also called out SoftLayer as an important part of Smart Cities.

When it comes to crime data, Saunders said that often, the police force may have a general idea of where crimes occur, but it doesn’t share that information with the rest of the city. Smart Cities enables them to talk across departments and figure out how all aspects of government can work together to make the best decisions to make their city safer.

Smart Permitting with Infor

IBM worked with Infor to create “an intelligent permitting solution.” Saunder explained that when cities are deciding whether to grant a permit, whether it’s for building construction or a parade, it can take a long time to make a decision. IBM “pulls all that information into a single system.” That way, different departments can check and see whether there are events occurring, what the crime rate is, and whether’s there’s construction occurring all at once in a single system. Smart cities makes it easy to make the right decision, Saunders said.

Infor helps specifically with collecting data and automating the processes of incorporating multiple parties, reviewing, and getting approval. IBM helps the city gain insight with a single, consolidated view of their data that gives decisions context.

Read more after the video.

Why cloud and mobile are crucial to Smart Cities

Cloud technology is essential to Smart Cities functionality, said Saunders, because it enables IBM to “execute much faster” and bring value to customers. When it comes to cities, cloud enables Smart Cities to take “managing the business” off municipalities’ plate by providing services and offering business value instead of asking then to do more work,

Mobile also plays a critical role in Smart Cities because cities have a mobile work force — “people out there fixing sewers, roads, and busses,” all given access to Smart Cities’ database and communications channels via their mobile phone. Mobile also enables cities to use citizens as a source of data. Saunders explains that offering citizens a smartphone app enables them to report things, like pot holes, directly to the city.

Smart Cities help with governance

IBM also helps cities navigate the technical and political governance issues. “Sometimes,” Saunders said, “a lot of the value we bring is simply the fact that the project has started.” A comprehensive view of city data gives companies fuller knowledge of their own systems. For example, Saunders said that a client’s park system hadn’t been able to see their own water bills, which were sky-high at $10 million a year. Smart Cities gave the parks system access to that data and enabled them to find out what what going wrong. Then, it enabled the system to monitor the results of its actions and measure their effectiveness.

So far the Smart Cities initiative has had over 100 deployments across the world. There is “global demand for this capability,”Saunders said. In the future he hopes Infor’s participation in Smart Cities will expand past smart permits and into water and transportation, as Smart Cities seeks to leverage non-traditional data sources.

photo credit: Thomas Hawk via photopin cc