by Francisco

Over the past few weeks, I joined Sencity as their Expert in Residence at the NYC office. It's been an exhilarating experience to work alongside a team I've been familiar with for over two years, witnessing various stages of their growth. Steven, the CEO of Sencity, asked me to share my reasons for joining and my thoughts on their evolution from their time at the URBAN-X Accelerator (where I was also an EIR) to their current expansive presence with offices and staff across different cities and time zones in Asia and North America.

Sencity team members

Four Main Reasons:

Founders

Having observed them closely, I hold immense respect for the founders. I've seen them persevere, painstakingly creating their prototypes and coding unique experiences for early versions of products like TetraBIN, SencityOS, and SenBox. My interactions with Steven and Ivan, especially during their NYC demo day and their stint with the BMW/MINI accelerator, were always enlightening. They consistently pushed their boundaries, often disrupting their lives to traverse the globe and do what was necessary. Manufacturing hardware is a daunting task that demands meticulous planning, especially considering the extended lead times for components and the reliance on manufacturers to maintain product quality. I've always admired the team's resilience; they faced hurdles, adapted, but never capitulated.

Vision

Steven and Ivan have stuck to their vision of being a fun and interactive engagement layer for the urban space. As Steven puts it. “we want to incentivize good civic behavior like picking up trash and making it fun.”  Many cities today feel very alienating with their cold plazas and large monolithic architecture. Neighborhoods feel less like communities and more like shopping districts to sell products and services. Sencity has a vision to transform the modern city as more than buildings and people passing through it to get to work and home but as discussion points and meeting places for people to interact, socialize, relax and discover new things. For me, that was one of the reasons I worked in the game industry for many years, it enabled people to play, meet and learn more about the people they interact with. I feel that Sencity has that same vision and goal to humanize urban spaces and make a place to “delight and entertain.”

Opportunity

We are now in an era of smart cities and connected devices. Artificial Intelligence and the advance in sensors, mobile devices and wireless bandwidth have combined to make the Internet of Things, people and services a a daily and affordable reality. The combination of all these factors have created the “perfect  wave” for people to be connected with their communities, homes, objects and information. The massive data sets that we see now from sensors and giant databases means that for the first time we can have a better understanding of our environment but also ways to teach machines to act and provide solutions on new algorithms and insight. Sencity is very much in the midst of this awesome trend and in many ways has many ways to contribute to it. Being part of a new and exciting transformation for how people live and work is another reason why I think Sencity is poised to make an impact.

Social Good

Knowing both Steven and Ivan after so many months, events and locations ranging from NYC to Los Angeles, their desire to do social good for cities was always quite impressive. Although I lean more on the dystopian view of cities and the entropic decay of civilization, Steven and Ivan remain optimistic about the need to encourage people to do good and to build a society that nurtures the young and takes care of the old. Instead of a future of roads and cars, the founders want to see the city as a large sandbox playground to learn and discover. Sencity is built on an implicit belief that people are good and want to be good citizens and good neighbors. I guess I too want to be part of that desire to make the world a better place and to work with people and teams that I enjoy spending time with.  Who would not want that as well?

So there it is. I joined Sencity for the simple reason that I like and respect the people that work there and I believe in their vision to make the world a better and more delightful place.