Description

Co-organised by ITU, the European Commission and OASC, and supported by StandICT.eu 2029, the 2nd Citiverse Assembly convenes cities, governments, industry, standards bodies, research and academia to strengthen global collaboration on the citiverse. The Assembly will share experiences from ongoing citiverse and local digital twin projects worldwide, present flagship deliverables of the Global Initiative on Virtual Worlds and AI – Discovering the Citiverse and promote greater alignment across standards and implementation efforts.

The programme will address fragmentation, support people-centred approaches and explore practical pathways for collaborative citiverse standardisation.

Target Audience

Participation is open to the ITU Member States, Sector Members, Associates, Academia and to any individual from a country that is a member of the ITU and who wishes to contribute to the work. This includes individuals who are also members of international, regional and national organisations. Participation is free of charge.

Venue

International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Headquarters

Place des Nations, 1211 Geneva 20, Switzerland

Programme

11:00 – 11:10 Opening Ceremony

  • Seizo Onoe, Director, Telecommunication Standardization Bureau, ITU
  • Helen Köpman, Deputy Head of Unit, European Commission 
  • Karl-Filip Coenegrachts, Chair of the Board of Directors and Executive Director, Open & Agile Smart Cities & Cities (OASC)
  • Sameer Chauhan, Director, United Nations International Computing Centre (UNICC)


11:10 – 12:00 Citiverse Projects: A Global Snapshot

This session will provide an opportunity to get an overview of ongoing key projects on local digital twins and the citiverse worldwide, led by research institutions, industry, academia, and cities. It will highlight how use cases can help define the required building blocks for citiverse development.

Moderator: Silvana Muscella, Strategic Advisor, StandICT.eu 2029 & CEO, Trust-IT Services

Speakers:

  • Maria Giuffrida, Senior Research Analyst, StandICT.eu 2029 and TerraDT
  • Kyoung Jae Sun, Senior Researcher, Standards Research Division, ETRI
  • Corné Helmons, Advisor Digital Twin, GeoBIM and Standardisation Municipality of Rotterdam, The Netherlands
  • Jan Wester, Director, European Digital Infrastructure Consortia (EDIC) on Local Digital Twins and CitiVERSE

Questions & Ans​wers​

12:00-12:50 From Fragmentation to Interoperability in the Citiverse

This session will discuss ongoing standardization efforts and explore ways to address fragmentation in citiverse development, with a view to advancing coherent, interoperable global standards.

Moderator: ​Martin Brynskov, Founding Board Director and Standardisation Lead, OASC

Speakers:

  • Hyoung Jun Kim, Chair, ITU-T Study Group 20 “IoT, digital twins, and smart sustainable cities and communities” 
  • Torbjörn Lahrin, ISO/IEC JTC1 CG2 “Strategic Coordination Group on Metaverse”
  • Christoph Runde, Chair, Technical Working Group on Virtual Worlds, StandICT.eu

Questions & Ans​wers​

12:50-13:00 Keynote

Okan Geray, Chair, Steering Committee, Global Initiative on AI and Virtual Worlds – Discovering the Citiverse

13:00 – 14:00 Lunch

14:00- 14:30 The Citiverse in Action: From Vision to Delivery

This session will present the Global Initiative on AI and Virtual Worlds – Discovering the Citiverse and selected flagship deliverables. By aligning strategic vision, technical foundations, and accessibility by design, it will demonstrate how the Initiative is accelerating interoperability and real-world adoption of the Citiverse worldwide.

Moderator: Paula Llobet Vilarrasa, Vice-chair, Executive Committee, Global Initiative on AI and Virtual Worlds – Discovering the Citiverse

Speakers:

  • Teppo Rantanen, Leader of the Strategic Guidance Track, Global Initiative on AI and Virtual Worlds – Discovering the Citiverse
  • Christina Yan Zhang, Leader of Evaluation and Assessment Track, Global Initiative on AI and Virtual Worlds – Discovering the Citiverse
  • Anish Sethi, Co-leader of Pillar 2 – Connecting Cities with the Virtual and Real Worlds, Global Initiative on AI and Virtual Worlds – Discovering the Citiverse

Questions & Ans​wers​

14:30 – 15:00 Connecting Efforts: Pathways to Collaborative Citiverse Standardization

This session will explore how closer alignment of standards efforts and stronger links between projects and initiatives can support cities in adopting interoperable, people-centred Citiverse solutions. It will consider priority areas for joint action, including collaborative standards development and cooperation mechanisms to support global standardization.

Moderators: Helen Köpman, Deputy Head of Unit, European Commission and Cristina Bueti, ITU Focal Point on AI-powered Virtual Worlds

15:00-15:10 Closing Ceremony

  • Helen Köpman, Deputy Head of Unit, European Commission
  • Karl-Filip Coenegrachts, Chair of the Board of Directors and Executive Director, Open & Agile Smart Cities & Communities (OASC)
  • Cristina Bueti, ITU Focal Point on AI-powered Virtual Worlds 
REGISTER HERE