Jennifer Sanders, Executive Director, North Texas Innovation Alliance; Cofounder, National Smart Coalitions Partnership.
Cities everywhere are at a crossroads. From congestion to infrastructure strain and connectivity access, urban leaders face challenges that can’t wait for incremental change. Yet the most powerful solutions don’t always originate within city limits—or even national borders. Increasingly, I’ve noticed the ideas shaping the future of mobility, sustainability and governance come from global startups seeking real-world opportunities to scale.
In the United States, this presents both a challenge and an opportunity: how to find and attract international innovation, adapt it to local contexts and scale it across regions. Cities that figure out ways to effectively support business growth could improve public services and unlock powerful engines of economic impact, competitiveness and, yes, tax base.
A New Approach: The Competition Model
My organization and our partners created a competition that brought global startups into U.S. city ecosystems, connecting them with partners, pilot opportunities and investment channels.
The initiative received submissions from 16 countries, spanning traffic management, pedestrian safety, curbside optimization and heat island mitigation. The winner has already secured a first pilot, expanded into new cities, forged direct partnerships and begun exploring sectors like healthcare—a ripple effect of entering the U.S. market through a structured gateway.
For cities, I’ve found this model solves two challenges simultaneously: It streamlines the overwhelming influx of emerging technologies while offering startups the chance to prove their value in real-world conditions.
A few key learnings on what drives success in approaching this model: Build a supportive infrastructure that ensures a smooth landing and provides needed insight and resources to plant roots. The human capital and mindshare investments are equally—if not more—critical than financial capital.
The U.S. market is not apples-to-apples with other global regions, and educating foreign companies on navigating those at the front-end brings a higher probability of success and aligned expectations. As an example, public sector contract cycles can be longer than other regions; if revenue cycles aren’t planned accordingly, it can leave unexpected liquidity gaps impacting long-term viability.
This is where leveraging best-minds and cross-sector partnerships is so critical, and where economic development entities are so important. Relationships among the corporate ecosystem bring knowledge of local businesses’ current and future needs, ensuring productive introductions on both sides of the table. Ensure embedded buy-in in both the government and private sector community before initiating these efforts.
Learning From Global Leaders
The U.S. is not alone in pursuing global innovation. Around the world, cities are finding inventive ways to attract and scale international solutions.
Barcelona has long been a pioneer, using global events as a convening platform and the city as a testbed to deploy new projects. Singapore has built regulatory sandboxes that allow foreign companies to test emerging technologies, which can help accelerate their path to market. Dublin, Ireland, created the Smart Dublin initiative, which aims to “future-proof the Dublin region by trialing and scaling innovative solutions to a wide range of local challenges.”
Meanwhile, Denver, Colorado, has emerged as a U.S. hub for smart city tech startups, with partnerships and support for companies to develop solutions in a variety of sectors. And Dubai and Riyadh have leaned into investment-backed approaches, creating smart city projects funded by public capital that attract global players at scale.
I think the common denominator across these examples is intentionality: creating clear pathways for international businesses to enter, test and grow.
Strategies To Attract Global Innovators
So what can U.S. cities and regions do to replicate and scale these successes? Four strategies stand out:
1. Streamlined Entry Points: Simplify visas, procurement and permitting processes for global startups. In my experience, regulatory clarity is one of the strongest magnets for innovators.
2. Cross-Sector Incentives: Encourage partnerships that bring together governments, corporations, academia and investors, ensuring that innovation pipelines are financially and strategically supported.
3. Localized Pilots, Scalable Models: Build structured pathways for international companies to test solutions in one city, then scale across a regional or national network.
4. Economic Development Corporations As Conveners: Leverage their ability to bridge public needs and private opportunity, positioning cities not only as testing grounds but as gateways to broader U.S. markets.
The Role Of The Private Sector
Private-sector engagement and the investment community are critical to making these pipelines sustainable. Businesses stand to benefit enormously from structured global innovation efforts—but only if they move beyond sponsorship to active co-investment.
1. Investment Opportunity: Corporations that engage early with international startups can gain first-mover advantages, securing access to technologies before competitors.
2. Corporate Innovation Strategies: By aligning R&D efforts with city pilot programs, companies can accelerate commercialization while reducing risk.
3. Market Development: Partnering with startups allows corporates to co-develop solutions tailored for U.S. markets and export them globally.
4. Shared Value: Smarter cities mean more efficient logistics, reduced environmental risk and more resilient infrastructure—all of which directly benefit the private sector.
In other words, corporations don’t just benefit indirectly from smarter cities; they can and should play a direct role in shaping them.
Building Smarter Cities Together
Cities that want to lead should actively position themselves as gateways for international startups, adopting proven models—and bring a willingness to test new ones—while learning from cities like Dublin and Barcelona.
The call to action is clear: For cities, create structured, transparent pipelines that attract and scale global ideas. For the private sector, move beyond passive support to strategic co-investment that turns pilots into market-ready solutions. For startups worldwide, consider U.S. cities as launchpads for growth and platforms for global impact.
The benefits are not theoretical. They are tangible, measurable and urgent: new jobs, stronger economies and more resilient, sustainable urban environments. If U.S. cities embrace this mindset, they won’t just keep pace with global peers—they’ll set the standard for the cities of the future.
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