LOTI launches dashboard that maps technology resources of local authorities

The London Office of Technology and Innovation (LOTI) has launched a report and interactive dashboard that maps technologies, contracts and skills across boroughs in the capital.

The platform, dubbed City Tools: London, was developed in partnership with Bloomberg Associates, a pro-bono municipal consulting service. It aims to make information around technology resources transparent and easily accessible, so that boroughs can identify new opportunities to collaborate and improve their IT strategies and delivery.

A research area of the platform outlines key findings and trends, describes case studies and provides recommendations for local, municipal and national government.

The research, carried out by Omid Shiraji, former CIO at Camden Council, is based on Bloomberg Associates’ Digital City Tools report, launched in 2018, which details how city governments around the world use technology to address and solve urban challenges and drive progress. It is intended as a starting point to enable the identification of opportunities, cooperation between boroughs and cost savings.

The dashboard, which will become a real-time resource, hosted and maintained by LOTI, has mapped 809 IT systems and their respective contracts, as well as skills levels for each borough as a means to drive peer training opportunities.

“Boroughs will now have much richer information about how their technology compares to their peers’, making it easier to share their knowledge and expertise with each other, and look for areas where they can work together,” said LOTI director Eddie Copeland.

LOTI was launched in June 2019, with boroughs across the capital pledging to collaborate on speeding up technology-led advances underpinning the delivery of local service provision.

Core areas of work at the centre include skills, leadership and data sharing. The member boroughs will run a programme of projects to demonstrate where the leading edge of development might be, with LOTI acting as a facilitator.