Over the past decades, we've seen Seoul vigorously embrace all the buzzwords that passed by: 'ubiquitous', 'smart', 'big data', 'AI'.... you name it ('quantum' probably already in the pipe). For this early adopters' capital, impossible to pass for a laggard, even if that means wasting fortunes on soon-to-be-obsolete campaigns. And that's not pure marketing: you can feel it when you're traveling to a supposedly leading country, and have to do without the thousand things that make life easier here.
So no one should be surprised to see Seoul reach the 10th spot in the BCG's Intelligent Cities Index*. With a score of 76, it clearly lags behind number 1 London (85), but dwarfs cities like Paris (31st at 68) or Tokyo (35th at 63). 'Leading' in Strategy and Ways of working, and 'accelerating' in Outcomes, Adoption, and Enablers, Seoul confirms its 'all in' approach compared to more cautious rivals such as Paris.
Of course, we all know that all is not well in a city where the guy who delivers your fresh package minutes after you ordered it can't even afford the gas he used for the ride, in a city where seniors can't order a taxi or get a table at a restaurant because their phone is not smart enough or because they're too intelligent to depend on it for everything. Besides, let's not forget that just miles away from this online paradise lies a nation of hackers...
If data for data's sake doesn't make sense, making sense of data is of the essence. Since last winter and the inauguration of MIT's Senseable City Seoul at the Seoul AI Foundation, I've been looking forward to seeing how it will leverage the considerable volume of information this city produces to help us better grasp how our society evolves and interacts. Not with a police state mindset, but a vision that blends tech, art, and mayby even a bit of fun.
Seoul Village 2026
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* see bcg.com/publications/2026/how-ai-is-shaping-intelligent-cities. And while we're at new rankings, Seoul reached the top spot at the Quacquarelli Symonds's QS Best Student Cities 2027, followed by Tokyo and London (axes of comparison: University Rankings, Student Mix, Desirability, Employer Activity, Affordability, and Student View).
IG post (20260203 - https://www.instagram.com/p/DUS9pCyD6RV/): "#SenseableCitySeoul officially inaugurated today - making sense of our cityscape with MIT's #SenseableCityLab and #Seoul's #SeoulAIFoundation. Can't wait to see how #CarloRatti, Diego Morra, and researchers from different horizons will apprehend this shapeshifter of a city."
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