3 Catalan start-ups to take part in Kyoto Smart Cities expo

Three Catalan start-ups have been selected to travel to Kyoto in Japan in order to take part in the 2018 edition of the Smart City Expo in October.

Social Coin, Tunnll and Eliport will showcase their businesses at the international event dedicated to smart cities.

These companies have been chosen as they make the most of leading technologies in order to provide solutions to everyday life.

Different visions

Social Coin, founded in 2013, bases its activity on helping organizations identify and find solutions for the needs of the people they integrate with the objective of creating more empathetic societies.

According to its CEO, Ivan Caballero, "artificial intelligence technology identifies the most relevant concerns of the population and mobilizes people to carry out different types of actions with a reward for their participation." Up until now, it has promoted more than 50,000 positive actions in more than 100 countries.

Tunnll, on the other hand, aims to bring solutions to mobility in cities with a next-generation transport intelligence system. CEO Kirill Blazhko believes Japan is the key place to offer its service.

"Although big cities like Tokyo have very efficient train and bus services in urban centers where the majority of the Japanese population live, the waiting time for public transport can be more than 15 minutes," he said.

Meanwhile, Eliport Robotics is dedicated to making self-loading and unloading robots at the end of a transport chain. The robots move through pedestrian areas and are the solution to the last section of product delivery to shops and other locations.

For CEO Dmitry Skorinko, Japan is also a strategic country as they have developed robotics and other technologies more than other countries, and people are more likely to use and incorporate new technologies in their daily lives.

According to a statement made by the Barcelona City Council, the selection criteria was based on the possibility of internationalization and potential of growth.  

Catalan participation

The participation of the Barcelona companies in Kyoto forms part of an exchange of start-ups between both cities. The Smart Cities expo takes place on October 4 and 5.

In September, the Catalan capital will receive five Japanese businesses in order for them to get to know the local entrepreneur eco-system and take part in events and presentations.