Kurrant at Smart City Expo World Congress 2026: the Smart D€AL, three panels and 19 interviews

From 3 to 5 November, our booth at Smart City Expo World Congress in Barcelona was full of energy, good conversations and people building the cities of tomorrow. Over three days we hosted the Smart D€AL, three live panels and 19 interviews with city leaders and innovators from Europe and the United States.

The conversations at Pavilion 3, Booth D151, covered everything we do at Kurrant: advisory work with companies looking to grow, innovation partnerships between startups, corporates and cities, M&A discussions across the smart city and IoT market, and venture investment in the startups we back. Our media team was there too: reporter and producer Emma Lozano Doogan hosted the stage and interviewed the people shaping tomorrow’s cities.

The Smart D€AL 2026: every finalist leaves with a next step

FireTracking won the €10,000 grant, and all six finalists left Barcelona with at least one investor or partner who wants to keep talking. The Smart D€AL is Kurrant’s startup competition. On Tuesday 3 November, six finalists pitched live on our stage, and the results were revealed at the awards ceremony on Wednesday 4 November.

• FireTrackingAI forest fire detection from tower cameras, with an alarm in under three minutes.Jean-Simon Chaudier, CEO and Co-founderfiretracking.io ↗
• FlyPix AIThe spatial intelligence layer for cities, monitoring physical assets from satellite and aerial imagery.Dr. Sergey Sukhanov, CEO and Co-founderflypix.ai ↗
• Mobility-MetrixA data and AI platform giving cities and transport authorities a multimodal view of mobility.Laurent Briant, CEO and Co-foundermobility-metrix.com ↗
• SaferPlacesAn AI digital twin that helps cities, utilities and insurers anticipate floods.Francesca Renzi, COOsaferplaces.co ↗
• ScenexusA predictive digital twin to test mobility, climate and land-use scenarios.Jeroen Borst, CEO and Founderscenexus.com ↗
• TrailslightStreetlamps that become sound-sensing devices, adapting their dimming to recognised events.Fabio Cavallari, Co-founder and CMOtrailslight.it ↗

The jury brought together industry and investors: Steve Currie (CEO of Lucy Controls, Lucy Group, our main sponsor), Pauline Blanquart (Investment Manager, BNP Paribas Solar Impulse Venture Fund), Etienne Montangé (VC Investor, Bpifrance), Thomas Beaugendre (Investment Manager, DEMEA), Matteo Consonni (Investment and Portfolio Manager, EIT Urban Mobility) and Philipp Kolobkov (Principal, Plug and Play).

• 🎉 €10,000 grant, by jury consensus 🏆
• Commercial partnership (pilot) with
• Continuing the conversation with
• Continuing the conversation with
• Continuing the conversation with
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As Antoine Kassis reminded the room, the Smart D€AL is about more than the grant: investment and collaboration can bring far more. Three of the four startups in Kurrant’s own portfolio first came to us as Smart D€AL candidates.

Three live panels on our stage

Emma Lozano Doogan moderated three panels at the booth, from satellites to streetlights.

From Space to Streets (Tuesday 3 November). How satellite data and AI help cities tackle urban heat, flooding, green spaces and infrastructure. The panellists work together on Space for Cities, an EU-funded project testing five satellite-based solutions across 15 European cities: Valeria Catalano (EUSPA), Renske Martijnse-Hartikka (Forum Virium Helsinki), Eleonora Stragliotto (Latitudo 40) and Alex Gluhak (OASC).

Scaling smart streetlighting safely in times of AI (Wednesday 4 November). How cities and utilities can scale smart lighting while staying secure, reliable and future-proof. With Julia Arneri-Borghese (Paradox Engineering), Valerio Vadacchino (CiviSmart) and Filip Smets (Fluvius), whose network in Flanders counts 1.2 million light points. Watch the panel highlights.

Making sense of city lighting data (Wednesday 4 November). How lighting standards drive interoperability, and what certified products and a shared tender template mean for cities. With Jonathan Catchpole (Zhaga Consortium), José Sanchis (TALQ Consortium) and Paul Drosihn (DALI Alliance).

19 interviews, 24 voices

Over three days, Emma sat down with mayors, city innovation leads, agencies, investors and companies from Europe and the United States. Each conversation became a Kurrant x SCEWC interview. Hover over a cover to pause, click to watch.

Adaptive lighting for inclusive citiesAleksander Rajch, PSNMBenjamin Sternkopf, Berlin SenateCristian Canton, Barcelona Supercomputing CenterHadrien Therond, ChargeUp EuropeLuuc Dekkers, City of RotterdamAdaptive lighting for inclusive citiesAleksander Rajch, PSNMBenjamin Sternkopf, Berlin SenateCristian Canton, Barcelona Supercomputing CenterHadrien Therond, ChargeUp EuropeLuuc Dekkers, City of Rotterdam

Rita Rinaldo, European Space AgencyKristine Bull Sletholt, City of StockholmJosé de la Uz, Las RozasJennifer Sanders, North Texas Innovation AllianceScaling smart streetlighting safely in times of AIHamid Nikvan, City of North Miami BeachRita Rinaldo, European Space AgencyKristine Bull Sletholt, City of StockholmJosé de la Uz, Las RozasJennifer Sanders, North Texas Innovation AllianceScaling smart streetlighting safely in times of AIHamid Nikvan, City of North Miami Beach

Watch all the interviews and panels

Thank you

Thank you to every guest, panellist, finalist and juror, to Lucy Group for sponsoring the Smart D€AL, and to everyone who stopped by the booth. The interviews and panels are being published one by one on our Smart City Expo World Congress 2026 page and on our LinkedIn page.

If you met us in Barcelona, or wish you had, let’s keep the conversation going: contact our team.