– It is crucial for the public sector to incorporate new and innovative solutions to our challenges. The public sector need to do more with less funds in the future and this is one reason why we increasing our focus on innovation in our part of the city, says Robin Jägestedt, head of development at Rinkeby-Kista SDF.

Through their collaboration with Urban ICT Arena the city district administration in Rinkeby-Kista has recently joined the project Ignite Public. The goal is to find new solutions and perspectives to the administration’s challenges and needs by working with startups.

At the Ignite Smart Cities matchmaking on March 16, co-organised by Kista Science City and Urban ICT Arena, the administration held their first meetings with startups.

– We were very impressed by the quality of startups and got a lot of new ideas. If all goes well, we plan to initiate pilots at the end 2020, with one or several startups that can provide solutions to specific challenges identified in the process, Robin Jägestedt continues.

– Our city district administration is located in one of the largest innovation clusters in the world and working towards implementing some the ideas and practices that are flourishing here, seems like a natural step to us.

The programme Ignite Public matches innovative startups with public actors across Sweden and supporting the parties to initiate collaborations through coaching and process management.

The initiative builds upon Ignite Sweden’s successful model for matching startups with large corporates to create new business opportunities. But this initiative also considers the procurement regulations the public sector must adhere to.