In a global world, simply providing basic necessities like education, infrastructure and resources is not enough. To lead the next generation, cities must enable - and drive – innovation in their communities, providing creative solutions to urban problems that will improve the quality of life and economic opportunities for their citizens. How to accomplish was the topic of the 2016 Strategic Innovation Summit: Smart Cities Europe, where top leaders convened in Dublin, Ireland to discuss strategies that will lead their cities into the future.

The 2016 Strategic Innovation Summit: Smart Cities Europe was an initiative of the Technology and Entrepreneurship Center at Harvard. The event was designed to gather senior public officials, leading academics and thought leaders in order to help them implement strategies and programs that will enable their cities to be leaders in innovation. This Summit, held in Dublin, Ireland, provided an unprecedented opportunity to learn from and network with the world’s leading city innovators, Harvard Fellows and researchers, and select executives from the technology and start-up community.

The Summit explored the critical needs required to drive innovation in the community.  We took a deep dive into questions concerning infrastructure, education, community involvement and economic programs. Most importantly, the Summit addressed the critical leadership attributes needed to choose a mix of collaborative strategies, governance models, and technologies that will help you make your community ready for the future.

During the Summit, we focused our learning, discussion and best practices exchange around identifying the key enablers to growing an innovation economy. Participants learned from informative case studies using the Harvard Case method as well as engaging keynote speakers and peer-to-peer problem-solving sessions designed to help them evaluate their current state and develop a plan to make their community an innovation leader for the future.