Enterprise software manufacturer SAP has announced the launch of its “Urban Matters” initiative, a new programme meant to enhance the lives of citizens, remote efficiencies in African cities.
SAP’s Urban Matters initiative – which follows IBM’s Smarter Cities – was launched at the recent “Cities of the Future” in Cape Town, The event focused on how innovative technology can be leveraged to make cities and municipalities more effective – and improve the lives of citizens.
“With the global focus on Africa, governments across the continent are relying on innovative technology to help them prepare for issues associated with rapid urbanisation,” commented Pfungwa Serima, CEO SAP Africa. “We have been working with city, state and local governments in Africa and many other cities across the world to transform and innovate since the nineties, SAP Urban Matters intensifies our the importance of our urban focus and defines how we will support best run cities in the future.”
In 2010, Africa’s urban population was approximately 36%, but this number is projected to rapidly increase to 50 per cent and 60 per cent by 2030 and 2050, respectively. As Africa is becoming increasingly urbanised with millions of people migrating to all major hubs, there is clearly a pressing need for governments and municipalities to efficiently deal with this enormous influx and all other related issues.
To address these challenges, the SAP Urban Matters initiative focuses on helping urban governments deliver the citizen-centric services and efficiencies needed to be best-run cities.
The initiative involves 3 themes: helping to improve urban liveability and create an inclusive, safer, greener and cleaner city; transforming city governments to become open, efficient and effective and efficient as well as driving economic prosperity in cities through better management of city finances, improving tax collection, helping small businesses to grow and making the city more attractive for investment, skills development and innovation.
The SAP Urban Matters solution portfolio offers a broad range of solutions for improving transportation, governance and to make the city safer and more secure. Other than Cape Town, several other municipalities in South Africa are already successfully running SAP solutions like SAP ERP Human Capital Management and SAP Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) Integration for Utilities software.
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