Ecosystèmes technologiques de la Smart Région en Wallonie

Abstract

Wallonia is the region of southern Belgium, divided into five provinces comprising 262 municipalities of varying sizes for a total of more than 3.6 million inhabitants (Walstat, 2018) and spread over an area of 16,901 km² (Iweps, 2020). By way of comparison, Berlin has almost as many inhabitants as Wallonia for an area 17 times smaller. So, when we talk about "Smart City" approaches in this type of large metropolis like Berlin, it is legitimate to wonder about their applicability in Wallonia. Indeed, given the particularity of the Walloon territory and its administrative structure, the "Smart City" solutions of large metropolises are not immediately applicable to Wallonia. Moreover, the disparity between municipalities is another factor to be taken into account. Although some larger Walloon municipalities such as Liège or Charleroi can more easily undertake popular "Smart" initiatives, adapting them to the small municipalities of the territory, with less than 10,000 inhabitants and living in a rural context is not as straightforward. In this paper, you will first find a comparative analysis of recommendations in the context of a company and a government. This analysis was conducted to establish if these recommendations are in place in the digital strategy of Wallonia: “Digital Wallonia”. An analysis of trending technologies was also conducted based on Gartner’s Hype Cycle, to identify the ones to prioritize in the near future. Based on these technologies, an inventory of the supply and demand in Wallonia was put together. The supply represents the different companies active in Wallonia in the digital sector. For the demand, it is based on the winning projects of the call for projects “Smart Region Territoire intelligent” of Digital Wallonia. The projects are run by the municipalities within the Walloon territory. All these different parts are put together to shed some insight on the situation in Wallonia.