Ben Whitaker | The journey to smarter cities
The journey to smarter cities: decision processes, procuring new services & the false unicorn of "one"
Ben Whitaker | The journey to smarter cities
16 Jan 2019, 17:00 – 18:00
Technology might be a great enabler of smart cities, but governments haven't got a great record of successfully procuring new IT or new ideas. The talk examines some of the first hand experiences of deploying new ideas into state run transit agencies around the world, some of the clashes between procurement process and innovation, and some observations on approaches that can reduce project risk and enhance the chances of successful deployment of innovative new solutions to smart cities. Topics raised will include "Outcome Based Procurement", SaaS, public sector project life expectancy, scope creep, and death-march projects. Attendees should finish the session with some insight into how to sell their ideas into the public sector, or alternately how to aid public sector teams to procure innovation and smarter technology.
Ben Whitaker
Co-Founder
Masabi
Ben Whitaker M.Eng. M.A. (Cantab), was a founder of the public transit ticketing innovator Masabi.com, acting as CEO for the first 14 years, and is now their Head of Innovation. Masabi has grown to serve over 40 transit agencies around the globe from Australia to Alaska including deployments in New York, LA, London, France, Spain and Italy delivered by over 100 employees in 4 countries. Ben received an Industry Contribution award from the transit industry for setting national ticketing standards in the UK, persuading a conservative industry to try new technologies, successfully introducing new services that have risen to over 75% adoption in some deployments, saving agencies $100's of millions of dollars, saving time for riders and increasing public transit usage. Ben has founded 4 companies, has experience of developing new digital and physical products, raising investment, selling into private and government clients, taking companies international, recruiting and growing teams. Ben is also a Non-Executive Director of the on-demand coach startup getaSnap.com and thanks to the Royal Society is an Entrepreneur in Residence at UCL assisting staff and students to get their ideas into the physical world.