Innovators are honoured at Smart City UK Awards

Southwark Council has received a prestigious prize for its work on digital infrastructure.

Presented at the third annual Smart Cities UK Awards, the award recognised the council’s commitment to create a digitally-inclusive borough where residents and businesses are provided with the digital tools to live and work.

The awards, held in London, were presented by former Chair of the Smart Cities APPG and now Chief Whip, Iain Stewart MP.

Bristol was also recognised for its work on smart homes. The team at Bristol have engaged 150 homes to become ‘smart connected homes’, trialling smart appliances in order to understand possible energy savings.

It was not just local authorities who were rewarded on the night, Tricuro, a local authority trading organisation, was recognised for its ‘virtual beach’ project which utilises virtual reality to engage patients with dementia or physical impairments.

Scooping the health award, Richard Dolan, Innovation & Technology Manager at Tricuro, said: “The power of VR to connect people to human experiences is vast, and our project has been about just that – using VR and immersive technology to create meaningful human experiences that make a difference to people’s lives, that enable us to better understand the person, their life, and how we can connect that person to something that gives them a truly person-centric experience.”

Other awards on the evening went to start-up Hello Lamp Post, a citizen-facing communication tool currently installed across the world. Joining HLP was another start-up, Immense Simulations, who was recognised for policy decision-making via an online platform which drives economic and social outcomes. Commonplace scooped the data award for its work in Waltham Forest.

The evening culminated in the UK Leadership award which this year was split between Leeds City Council, represented by Stephen Blackburn, Data Manager, and the Governments Smart Tsar, Jacqui Taylor. Highly commended went to Julie Snell, CEO of Bristol is Open.

A full list of the winners from the evening can be found at https://www.smartcityukawards.co.uk/shortlist/