University campuses as testbeds of smart urban innovation

Universities are emerging as influential actors in the co-production of smart cities. Academic researchers provide expertise on the technical, economic, and social aspects of smart technologies and networks. They also have the ability to evaluate and assess the performance of smart interventions (Cocchia and Dameri, 2016). In addition, they liaise with the general public to communicate the broader benefits of smart urban development and to engage the public through smart city co-creation (Evans et al., 2015; Voytenko et al., 2016; Martin, Evans and Karvonen, 2018). As such, universities play multiple roles in the “quadruple helix” of knowledge-based, data-intensive urban development, alongside the public and private sectors, as well as civil society.