Robert Heinecke

From 27/10/2024 to 31/03/2025

Challenges

DATA-DRIVEN ENVIRONMENTAL RESILIENCE: Enable US communities to translate environmental data into action and enable public environmental resilience.

East Carolina University Center for IOT Engineering and Innovation

Robert Heinecke is an entrepreneur, futurist thinker and smart city expert. He is the CEO of Breeze Technologies, a German industry leader in air quality sensors, data and clean air action intelligence, which he founded in 2015. Before that, Robert worked for multiple international consultancies in strategy and digitalisation. He holds degrees in Computer Science and IT Management & Consulting. Robert is a “Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe”, “Capital 40 Under 40” and 2019 Young Green Tech Entrepreneur of the Year. He works as a Climate Pact Ambassador for the EU’s Climate Pact and advises the French NGO UrbanAI.

In the project “Data-driven Environmental Resilience”, NGI fellow Robert Heinecke conducted an in-depth market study of US east coast communities and their use of smart city applications and data with particular focus on the environmental data/air quality data field, and geographical focus on Virginia and North Carolina.

The project’s goal was therefore to lay a foundation for market expansion of the NGI fellow’s smart city startup Breeze Technologies (e.g. through a local subsidiary, creating a partner ecosystem, direct sales or similar activities) and to implement the foundation for first projects on environmental data with those communities.

The activity consisted of:

• Participation in relevant local events and conferences, e.g. All Things Open &, Smart Cities Connect
• Interviews with smart city managers and other responsible personnel for designing and implementing smart city strategies of US communities
• Background discussions with stakeholders from the smart city ecosystem, including potential partners
• Additional research into published information of smart communities in the US with particular focus on their environmental data initiatives

The NGI fellow had previous connections in the region which they were able to leverage to access the ecosystem and relevant stakeholders. Additionally, also the host organization was conducting research in this field.

Previous experience in the EU smart city ecosystem also enables the NGI fellow to draw comparisons between the US and EU ecosystems.

As a foundation for tapping into the US market, the NGI project was expected to provide relevant information about possible adaptations and changes necessary to the fellow’s products and services and their respective marketing materials.

The project’s goal was to lay the foundation for scaling European NGI innovation into the US ecosystem. Part of this goal was to gain an overview over the US east coast smart community/smart city ecosystem with particularly focus on environmental data applications. Based on the investigation results, further actions such as the possible participation in German US startup scaling programs (e.g. “Market Access USA” or similar) and possible scaling partners were to be evaluated.

Over the course of the NGI project, all project goals mentioned above were reached:

• Identified and analyzed 20 US cities and communities regarding their environmental data initiatives
• Identified 5 “high potential” cities and communities and started/intensified communications with them regarding potential joint projects
• Made several changes to communications strategy and implementation (e.g. changing wordings to better fit US market realities)
• Added requirements to the development backlog of Breeze Technologies to better fit with local requirements
• Additionally, the project delivered first successes:
  • Implemented 2 demonstration projects with local communities
  • Signed partnership agreement with a local channel partner

The fellowship was expected to advance the implementation of innovative technologies, support US market expansion (including through pilots), and support building innovation collaboration and build connections with the US ecosystem.

These goals were all reached; two pilots are underway, the innovation was presented at multiple events, one channel partnership was established and additionally research input was gained to inform US market expansion and entry.