Data: the foundation for a better life in cities - OASC and Vastuu Group work towards meaningful data-enabled services

[BRUSSELS, Belgium, 12 May 2021] - Open & Agile Smart Cities (OASC) today announces a new agreement with Vastuu Group under OASC’s Enterprise Partnership Programme.

Vastuu Group, a Finnish organisation with a longstanding history in the construction sector, focusing on digital transformation for the built environment, is the latest OASC Enterprise partner. Under the terms of the agreement, Vastuu Group will engage with OASC’s global network of cities to introduce and further evolve innovations developed in and with Finnish cities based on OASC Minimal Interoperability Mechanisms (MIMs). OASC MIMs are based on open technical specifications and have been adopted by more than 150 cities in over 30 countries.

Vastuu Group and OASC will jointly explore how fundamental mechanisms for personal data protection, platforms of transparency and trust, and cross-domain data spaces can be taken to the next level. Such capabilities are part of the digital transformation journey of cities worldwide, that are supported by MIMs and open standards, allowing cities and communities to replicate and scale solutions globally, and enabling them to tackle grey economy issues, transact data products, track climate indicators, and ultimately orchestrate entire data ecosystems.

This vision of tomorrow is already being realised today by Vastuu Group’s Platform of Trust and MyDataShare services and also in several solutions and projects in city service network planning, fighting grey economy in the construction sector, making job hunting easier, calculating the carbon footprint, and optimising, for example, indoor conditions, water consumption, and material flows. More details will soon be available in the CITYxCITY Catalogue.

Vastuu Group was recently chosen by the City of Helsinki to be their MyData operator service provider under the first contract of its kind in the world, whereby Vastuu Group and Helsinki pave the way for generations of cities to come. Vastuu Group’s MyData solutions enable the management and decentralisation of personal data and other information gathered from individuals without creating unnecessary copies. Decentralisation of information ensures that the information is not stored in a big mass in one place, thereby decreasing the risk of information breaches, among others.

Davor Meersman, CEO of Open & Agile Smart Cities, states:

We are excited to welcome Vastuu Group into the Enterprise Partnership Programme. Vastuu Group is made up of visionaries who are not limited by the horizon we face, but are working actively to expand our collective vision of the future. In fact, as with many urban innovations coming out of Finland, there is always something to learn and to share with the wider community. We look forward to working closely with Vastuu Group for many years to come.

Lars Albäck, CEO of Vastuu Group, says:

For cities to offer human-centric and trusted services and to enhance positive economic, environmental, and societal development, they need digital and scalable data-driven solutions that use data in a trusted way. Vastuu Group originated from the need for these kinds of solutions in the built environment domain. With OASC as our key global network and partner, we can co-create these solutions together with the future-oriented cities by sharing best practices and challenges. We are happy to move forward together.