It’s hard to separate the future of the world from the future of cities. Cities account for more than half of the world’s population and about 80% of global GDP. BCG partners with governments and businesses to ensure that cities are designed to thrive—now and in the future.
Before COVID-19, trends in urbanization, climate change, and technology were shaping an increasingly complex landscape for cities around the world. The pandemic has accelerated preexisting trends and brought new ones to life. These trends have the potential to shape even better, more livable cities of the future; for example, by creating hyperlocal environments on the basis of mixed-use real estate, changing mobility habits, accelerating digital-first services, and spurring the move to sustainable living and resilient infrastructure.
Public and business leaders need to work together to rethink city development in light of these new trends, shifting their focus from improving systems to improving residents’ experiences.
Resident centricity will define cities of the future. This perspective puts the expectations and needs of people at the fore and guides strategy and master planning, community management, and the design of services. Residents’ positive experiences also help build resilience in the face of challenges—such as the COVID-19 pandemic—while driving advocacy and enhancing cities’ competitiveness.
Our expertise is based on an innovative, resident-centric approach that we’ve used to help city clients around the world. While residents remain at the core of our strategy and problem solving, our team is equipped to deliver a variety of solutions—such as planning for smart cities of the future—across governments, businesses, and institutions.
Examples of our cities-of-the-future consulting expertise include the following:
We have worked with leaders across more than a dozen city districts to develop unique strategies—such as creating a film and television center in one district and a culture and tourism plan in another—to meet the client’s world-class aspirations.
A city that boasts good quality of life offers opportunities for self-fulfillment and employment and attracts talent and investment. We helped our client become such a city, using a competitiveness heat map to target areas for improvement: housing, shared services, and transit. The city has become one of the greenest in the world and is more pedestrian friendly and attractive.
We began by assessing the traffic patterns unique to the metropolitan area, looking at such factors as commutes, commuter motivations, and pain points. The resulting mobility vision will ultimately allow the city to reduce single-car use, along with its attendant problems, and improve the ability of residents and visitors to navigate the city.
We have been part of ambitious megaprojects throughout the Middle East, including setting a vision for state-of-the-art cities of the future that are geared toward increasing tourism and bolstering the local economy.
BCG’s Global Center for the Future of Cities brings cutting-edge, multidisciplinary research to solve complex issues. We provide access to experts, tools, data, and insights gleaned from our extensive experience serving city clients across Asia, the Middle East, Europe, Africa, and the Americas.
The Global Center for the Future of Cities is the starting point for our robust city consulting practice. In the course of our cities-of-the-future consulting work, we tap the expertise of BCG’s specialty businesses:
This BCG not-for-profit entity works with governments, public servants, and other change makers to reimagine government. We turn ideas into action so that government works for everyone.
This corporate investment and incubation specialty business helps companies and smart cities to invent, launch, scale, and invest in startups. Our clients with a stake in the future of cities learn how to remain relevant in the age of new technology by acting like venture capitalists.
BCG Gamma’s data scientists partner with BCG consultants to help clients develop AI-powered solutions and machine-learning algorithms that our clients own and integrate into their unique technology stacks. In particular, they analyze cities’ value propositions to their residents and visitors, compare them with the cities’ competitors, and derive the satisfaction or advocacy indicators instrumental to future prosperity.
Organizations with a stake in technology and the future of cities collaborate with BCG Platinion to perfect the tech side of transformation. We assist with IT architecture design, digital transformation, risk management services, cybersecurity, and implementation management.
Rapid urbanization, increased mobility, and growing expectations have all created a need for city administrations to shift focus from infrastructure to their residents. BCG’s new comprehensive tool allows cities to assess their ability to make an effective change.
A resident-centric city can find innovative solutions to perennial problems and improve quality of life for the people who live there.
The choice comes down to adopting a uniform set of Internet of Things standards or building a cross-vertical platform that integrates different solutions.
Innovation versus privacy leads the list of challenges as cities seek to boost intelligence and insight.
As cities become larger, governments strain to meet the needs of growing populations. Technology can help, but it’s only one part of a broader solution.
