Connecting cities across the Baltic Sea: Project METACITIES

Published on 08.12.2023

Written by Henry Patzig & Mauro Bellone, FinEst Centre for Smart Cities

In the dynamic landscape of urban innovation, the 10-months long METACITIES project emerges as a catalyst for accelerating, consolidating, and aligning existing MetaCity and Smart City initiatives across partner regions. The goal is ambitious: to build the world’s leading connected MetaCity Region across the Baltic Sea.

Project METACITIES kick-off event takes place on December 12, 2023 in Oulu, Finland.

A glimpse into MetaCity

MetaCity is a novel smart city and urban innovation concept, focusing on open innovation which is supported and encouraged by digital environments and social networks. MetaCity is responding to and leveraging on the post-pandemic transition to virtual cooperation and virtual urban services.

With roots in regional policy planning in Oulu Region and Latvia, MetaCity extends the horizon of ICT-oriented Smart City development to encompass broader regional innovation capabilities, including service and social innovations.

Main objectives of METACITIES project:

  1. The main objective is to speed up, consolidate, align and leverage the existing MetaCity and Smart City initiatives of the partner regions, and through this, build the world’s leading connected MetaCity Region across the Baltic Sea.
  2. Strengthening ecosystem collaboration: The project seeks to strengthen collaboration between MetaCity Regions in the Baltic Sea, creating a fertile ground for collaborative opportunities..
  3. Creating a joint action plan for Baltic Sea MetaCity Regions and decide the action plan details in interaction with regional funding decision-making. 

FinEst Centre’s role is to strengthen the Baltic Sea Region (BSR) cross-border collaboration:

  • Identifying the needs and ideas to advance the ability and willingness for collaboration in MetaCity theme, both between the organisations in the partner regions, and wider in the area.
  • To connect to existing BSR networks.
  • FinEst Centre will connect with the managers of funding programs in the BSR and important BSR networks to make them aware of the MetaCity joint action program, its plans for deployment, and funding needs. This helps create the best framework and speeds up the program’s deployment right after the project ends.

To enhance ecosystem dialogue and promote learning, FinEst Centre will organize and implement Living Labs in each region.

These labs will be spaces for collaborative idea generation and planning of potential actions, support programs, tools, and various forms of assistance tailored to each region.

Following the outcomes of the Living Labs and the feedback from stakeholders, FinEst Centre will create a MetaCity Opportunities Catalogue. This catalogue will involve the detailed elaboration of each identified program and project idea, presenting it in a tangible textual and document format suitable for potential inclusion in the joint action plan.

Project partners:

  • EIT DIGITAL Belgium (Coordinator)
  • City of Oulu, Finland
  • Electronic Communications Office of Latvia
  • Luleå University of Technology Sweden
  • EdTech Hub Ventures Poland
  • University of Oulu Finland

Funding Agency: European Commission (Horizon Europe, European Innovation Ecosystem)

Budget: 500,000 euros total (49,656 euros TalTech)

More info

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