Professor Jason Pomeroy

Founding Principal

Pomeroy Studio; Fellow, University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.

Prof. Jason Pomeroy is an award-winning architect, academic, author and TV presenter, regarded as one of the world’s thought leaders in sustainable design. He is the Founder of Singapore-based Pomeroy Studio, Pomeroy Technology and Pomeroy Academy: sustainable urbanism, architecture, design, research and education firms. His career has included critically-acclaimed green cities, buildings and landscapes: from the microscale of the first zero-carbon house in Asia, to the macroscale of Indonesia’s ‘Silicon Valley’. Pomeroy has authored ‘Hardware, Software, Heartware: digital twinning for more sustainable built environments’ (2023), ‘Cities of Opportunities: connecting culture and innovation’ (2020), ‘Pod Off-Grid: explorations into low energy waterborne communities’ (2016), ‘The Skycourt and Skygarden: greening the urban habitat’ (2014) and ‘Idea House: future tropical living today’ (2011). He continues to raise cultural awareness of cities through his TV series ‘Smart Cities 2.0’, ‘City Time Traveller’, ‘Futuropolis’ and ‘City Redesign’. He gained Bachelor and Master degrees from the Canterbury School of Architecture and the University of Cambridge, and a PhD from the University of Westminster. He is a Fellow of the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.

Programmes

Hardware, Software, Heartware: The Human Layer of the Smart City

FUTURE CITIES

According to the urbanist Jane Jacobs, leafing through a thick, classified directory (like the ‘yellow pages’) was concrete proof of a thriving, complex ecosystem of people and their businesses, located in different parts of a city. Whilst the physical ‘yellow pages’ is becoming redundant in the transition from analogue to digital systems, the term ‘smart’ has become an increasingly-used addition to ‘city’, and seeks to reflect the role Information Communication Technology plays in offering social and economic benefits to cities and their citizens.

Day 1

Scaling Smart Cities

FUTURE CITIES

Balancing hardware, software and heartware is one thing in a single showcase district or pilot precinct. Scaling that balance across an entire city, let alone an industrial corridor or regional growth zone, is another challenge entirely. Smart city concepts across the region frequently launch as successful localized wins: a digital command centre here, a smart transit hub there. The harder task is replicating, integrating and expanding those wins city-wide, without losing the human-centred design that made them work in the first place. This session explores how to bridge the gap between high-level urban strategy and ground-level execution at scale. Bringing together national smart city strategists, municipal government leaders and master infrastructure developers, the panel tackles the structural, financial and technological realities of scaling up. How do local councils modernize legacy civic infrastructure without disrupting services? How do private developers integrate smart grids, mobility and sustainable design into mega-builds while keeping citizens, not just systems, at the centre? And how do national policy frameworks align public and private capital so heartware isn’t the first thing sacrificed when a pilot goes citywide?

Day 1

Scaling Innovation Ecosystems for a Borderless Economy. Earth Orbit and Beyond

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