International workshop in smarty city: Control and automation perspectives [conference report]

The International Workshop on Smart City: Control and Automation Perspectives was held at the Zhejiang Hotel in Hangzhou, China, on August 27-29, 2013. The workshop featured 12 presentations delivered by prominent researchers. Prof. Venkat Venkatasubramanian, codirector of the Center for the Management of Systemic Risk, Columbia University, United States, presented an overview of challenges facing the city and provided a control-theoretic framework for the management of systemic risk. Prof. Fei-Yue Wang, director of the State Key Laboratory of Management and Control for Complex Systems, Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences, proposed the 'ACP-based parallel control and management approach,' essentially a data-driven approach for modeling, analysis, and decision making, as a new mechanism for conducting operations of the smart city as a complex system that deeply involves intricate issues of both engineering and social dimensions.