AI metering and surveillance to dominate smart city market to 2026, boosted by new applications

Smart utility metering for power, gas and water, and video surveillance will remain by far the largest smart city segment, representing 87 per cent of the total number of smart city connections by 2026. This is according to new analysis by ABI Research. While metering is mainly focused on usage monitoring, savings and efficient operation of utility networks, video surveillance is no longer just about security and crime detection and prevention, ABI Research's Smart Cities market data report finds. Video surveillance is increasingly enabling new applications like urban tolling and the monitoring of low-emission zones to reduce air pollution, mainly in Europe. These systems use licence plate recognition to identify older vehicles banned from entering the zone.