This year, 50% of APEJC cities and states in Asia Pacific (excluding Japan and China) will pilot GenAI to improve efficacy in community outreach and customer service, procurement, staff recruitment and training, and software development, according to a new IDC FutureScape report.
The overarching theme of this year’s predictions was the substantial impact of AI on shaping investments and transformations across Asia Pacific’s smart cities and communities.
According to the IDC Future Enterprise Resiliency and Spending Survey in September 2023, 49% of the region’s government agencies indicated they were already investing in or testing GenAI proof of concepts (POC). Although this lags the overall market trends, these trends indicate half of the agencies will be commencing pilots by early to mid-2024.
Although there are many disruptive factors in Asia Pacific’s subnational governments, there are several key levers of change that shape these predictions. These include digital citizen experience, building the next generation of digital skills, and creating balanced regulatory frameworks and policies that provide assurance without stifling innovation.
Underscoring all these trends and predictions is the drive for ensuring cyber-resilience and digital sovereignty to address the volatile geopolitical risks cities will face over the next five years. These factors are becoming increasingly important for CIOs and city leaders to stay updated on all evolving trends and how each one will impact the success of civic initiatives.
IDC’s predictions highlight that AI is going to play a significant role enabling secure and effective delivery of digital change. In the near-term (2024-2026), the focus for AI will be on data preparation and providing contextualized citizen experience, while in the longer term (2027 onwards) it will shape how local governments confront the onslaught of cybersecurity risks generated through the technology.
Other AI-driven predictions for the region include:
- Unified Data Models: Only 15% of APEJC’s medium-sized and large cities by 2024 will make data model changes required in their back-office application landscapes to prepare data for AI, advanced analytics, and collective decision making.
- Contextualised Government Interactions: To improve constituent engagement, by 2025, 40% of large cities in APEJC will pilot online journeys using voice and text conversations leveraging real-time contextual AI tools.
- GenAI as a Bad Actor: By 2027, cyberattacks and crimes caused by weaponised GenAI will impact 90% of local and regional governments driving adoption of new human-centered cybersecurity and public safety approaches.
“The rollout of the pilot phase for GenAI across the APEJC City Governments represents a strategic step towards harnessing AI for enhanced efficiency, service delivery, and development across multiple domains. Nevertheless, thoughtful consideration of potential challenges and responsible implementation is crucial to ensure success and maximize the benefits of this technology,” says Ravikant Sharma, senior manager: government insights at IDC Asia/Pacific.
The other trends that local government leaders in Asia Pacific must pay attention to are:
- Non-terrestrial networks to bridge the digital divide: With as-a-service models extending to space in multiple orbits, by 2025, 20% of states and provinces in APEJC will use satellite-based internet connectivity to bridge the digital divide and reach rural areas.
- Hybrid Cloud to Protect sensitive information: By 2025, 60% of subnational governments will deploy hybrid cloud to protect sensitive information while deploying multicloud for valued services, application development, and edge data integration.
- Extracting New Network Value: By 2025, 50% of local governments will struggle to realise benefits from new networking investments, from fiber to 5G, and will look to professional services firms to help drive utilization and value.
- Spatial Computing for Urban Planning and Emergency Management: By 2027, 25% of states, provinces, and large cities will deploy spatial computing to create immersive 3D models and digital twins to support environmental and urban planning and emergency management.
- Workforce Strategies to enhance employee experience: By 2028, 40% of major cities will upgrade back- and front-office technologies to improve employee experiences and recruit and retain workers with critical skills in major software and cloud platforms.
- Open Standards and Frameworks for smart transportation and climate action: By 2028, 60% of major cities will collaborate via regional ecosystems to standardize on ICT frameworks, leading vendors to adopt open standards and open APIs especially for smart transportation and climate action.
“This year’s predictions are a reflection of the very dynamic time in the local government sector across Asia Pacific. Policymakers are under immense pressure to balance strong regulatory guidance with the aspirations of a thriving digital economy,” says Louise Francis, head of public sector research, IDC Asia/Pacific.