Asia govts face tough balance between welfare, 'smart city' initiatives

SMU-TCS iCity Lab Executive Director Teo Chin Seng spoke at the SAP's Urban Matters initiative introduction on Thursday and said that “for Asian governments, social duties and welfare needs were top-of-mind concerns and will continue to be so for the next 10 years. This mindset might differ with other markets in the West, where tech implementations are considered beneficial and there is less of a tension in embarking on such initiatives.” iCity Lab is a joint initiative between SMU and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), in which the latter pumped in S$6 million to lay the foundation for the research and development of cloud-based IT offerings for intelligent cities in Asia and other regions.