What is Smart City Oulu

Sup­port­ing Oulu 2026 – Euro­pean Cap­i­tal of Cul­ture through Dig­i­tal­iza­tion

Oulu will be the Euro­pean Cap­i­tal of Cul­ture in 2026. Dig­i­tal­iza­tion serves both as an enabler of new kinds of cul­tur­al experiences and as a tool that allows these experiences to be enjoyed in a more mul­ti-loca­tion­al, acces­si­ble, and envi­ron­men­tal­ly friend­ly way.

FabC­i­ty Oulu, STEAM, and the Learn­ing Stream for a Sus­tain­able Future

After join­ing the inter­na­tion­al FabC­i­ty net­work in 2023, Oulu has a great oppor­tu­ni­ty to pro­mote STEAM ped­a­gogy and the goals of the Learn­ing Stream for a Sus­tain­able Future on a glob­al scale. In return, we can adopt best prac­tices from the FabC­i­ty net­work relat­ed to the cir­cu­lar econ­o­my and dis­trib­uted man­u­fac­tur­ing.

Oulu­AI – Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence as a Dri­ver of Human-Cen­tered Dig­i­tal­iza­tion

AI solu­tions have a wide-rang­ing impact on process­es, and they also raise many impor­tant ques­tions: ethics, data secu­ri­ty, user train­ing, and the shared devel­op­ment of exper­tise.

OuluTest­Bed – The City as a Test­ing Plat­form for Busi­ness­es to Pro­mote Inno­va­tion

Exper­i­men­tal activ­i­ties offer low-thresh­old test­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for new ser­vices and prod­ucts to busi­ness­es in the Oulu region. They also enable col­lab­o­ra­tion between com­pa­nies, research insti­tu­tions, and the work­force, there­by boost­ing the vital­i­ty of the region.

Sup­port­ing Oulu’s Goal of Car­bon Neu­tral­i­ty by 2035

Oulu is active­ly pro­mot­ing the dig­i­tal triple tran­si­tion (sus­tain­able, fair dig­i­tal­iza­tion). A key focus is the devel­op­ment of mea­sur­able and ver­i­fi­able low-car­bon solu­tions. Dig­i­tal­iza­tion pro­vides sup­port­ive tools for sus­tain­abil­i­ty goals, enabling bet­ter data col­lec­tion, visu­al­iza­tion, and deci­sion-mak­ing.

Human-Cen­tered Dig­i­tal­iza­tion, Inclu­sion, and Sus­tain­able Urban Pol­i­cy Through Data

Dig­i­tal inclu­sion pro­vides an equi­table plat­form for smooth inter­ac­tion between the city and its res­i­dents. It also ensures that oper­a­tions take into account data secu­ri­ty, usabil­i­ty, and acces­si­bil­i­ty.

Meta­verse – Com­bin­ing the Vir­tu­al and Real Worlds

The meta­verse is a fusion of vir­tu­al and real worlds (such as dig­i­tal twins) and is con­sid­ered the next stage in the evo­lu­tion of the inter­net. There are var­i­ous exam­ples of how the meta­verse can be uti­lized. Dig­i­tal twins can be used in edu­ca­tion to improve qual­i­ty and facil­i­tate learn­ing from mis­takes. They can also be applied to the main­te­nance and devel­op­ment of indus­tri­al process­es. With the help of vir­tu­al real­i­ty glass­es, it is pos­si­ble to iden­ti­fy an indi­vid­u­al’s func­tion­al chal­lenges and sup­port needs. The range of appli­ca­tions is vast and con­stant­ly grow­ing. With­in the City of Oulu group, dig­i­tal twins have been and are being test­ed for var­i­ous pur­pos­es. The goal is to dis­cov­er new, more effi­cient, and impact­ful ways of oper­at­ing.

Busi­ness relat­ed to the meta­verse is expect­ed to grow explo­sive­ly over the next ten years. Accord­ing to Busi­ness Fin­land, by 2035 Finland’s share of the glob­al addi­tion­al rev­enue gen­er­at­ed by the meta­verse is esti­mat­ed to be 30 bil­lion euros. Cur­rent­ly, the Oulu region’s ICT clus­ter includes around 300 com­pa­nies, with a sig­nif­i­cant por­tion of their exper­tise relat­ed to meta­verse tech­nolo­gies.