Artigo publicado no International Journal of Tourism Cities

O Projeto SmartMetropolis teve publicado o artigo Mobile Tourist Guide Supporting a Smart City Initiative: A Brazilian Case Study no International Journal of Tourism Cities, discorrendo sobre os avanços do projeto na linha de smart tourism.

Todos os que fazem o Projeto SmartMetropolis parabenizam aos autores listados abaixo pelo trabalho realizado e pela publicação alcançada:

• Andréa Cacho, do Departamento de Turismo da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brasil
• Prof. Luiz Mendes-Filho, do Departamento de Turismo da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brasil
• Daniela Estaregue, do Departamento de Design da Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, Brasil
• Brunna Moura, do Departamento de Artes da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brasil
• Prof. Nélio Cacho, do Departamento de Informática e Matemática Aplicada da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brasil
• Prof. Frederico Lopes, do Instituto Metrópole Digital da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Brasil
• Prof. Cristiano Alves, do Departmento de Design da Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, Brazil

Abaixo o abstract do artigo:

Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to describe a smart city initiative presenting a mobile tourist guide developed for Natal, Brazil.

Design/methodology/approach
– This study has employed an exploratory case study approach to gain more knowledge about a smart city initiative and a mobile tourist guide in Brazil. The city of Natal was selected for this case study since it was one of the host cities during the FIFA World Cup 2014. The collected data for this research came from government (e.g. Natal Smart City plan), academic sources (e.g. Metropole Digital Institute (IMD)), and tourists’ information from the mobile tourist guide application.

Findings
– The smart city initiative of Natal, and the mobile tourist guide (named Find Natal) responsible for collecting, processing, sharing, storing and analysing the tourist behaviour were detailed in the paper. The Smart City Consortium in Natal is developing an interoperable and distributed infrastructure that is advancing the state-of-the-art in information and communication technologies (ICT) for planning and managing smart cities. The IMD implemented an application, which aims to enhance the traveller’s experience through software programs designed to leverage the infrastructure mechanisms behind the city. The data gathered by the application was analysed to show how it was used during the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

Originality/value
– The results show a developed ICT initiative in a Latin American country. This study offers a starting point for destinations willing to implement and deploy a smart city initiative.