Municipal smart-city tenders pivot to data and business support
New smart-city contracts bundle crossings, energy systems and data platforms with business guides, signalling a shift to integrated digital services in municipalities.
New smart-city contracts bundle crossings, energy systems and data platforms with business guides, signalling a shift to integrated digital services in municipalities.
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On 30th December 2025, Dimos Chersonisou published a contract notice for a wide-ranging smart-city package that brings together smart pedestrian crossings, energy management tools, a municipal business guide, cemetery and kindergarten management systems, and a centralised data platform to reshape how the municipality organises everyday services.
Under the contract titled Digital Transformation for Hersonissos, the municipality plans to procure and implement “various technological applications” aimed at enhancing urban management and functionality. Rather than targeting a single department, the notice pulls together several core municipal functions in one procurement.
The scope spans:
Smart pedestrian crossings put street safety and accessibility at the centre of the upgrade, while energy management systems are intended to give the municipality tighter control over how it uses power. Grouping these alongside softer elements such as a business guide shows that the project is as much about economic and service information as it is about physical infrastructure.
The municipal business guide is the clearest outward-facing piece of the Hersonissos package. The notice does not detail its design, but a guide of this kind is likely to function as a structured digital directory or support tool for local enterprises. Its presence in a contract otherwise focused on internal operations suggests that the municipality wants its new digital infrastructure to promote local economic activity as well as manage assets.
Back-office reform is also prominent. Dedicated applications for cemetery management and for running kindergartens point towards a systematic move away from paper-based records and stand-alone tools. The centralised data management system is designed to link these domains, creating a single information layer that can support cross-department planning and, potentially, new services in future.
The Hersonissos notice is one of a series of municipal digital transformation projects that took shape across multiple municipalities in 2025, many of them combining similar elements into bundled procurements.
In July 2025, Dimos Dirfyon-Messapion launched Digital Transformation Initiatives, a project aimed at improving administrative organisation, coordination, energy saving and interoperability, and explicitly including smart pedestrian crossings and a smart municipal library. In the same month, Dimos Ierapetras set out a Smart City programme in Digital Transformation for Ierapetra, combining smart pedestrian crossings, traffic management, energy systems and a centralised data platform to deliver sustainable mobility and energy efficiency.
Several municipalities explicitly frame their projects around “residents, visitors, and businesses”. Dimos Zakynthou’s Digital Transformation for Zakynthos, Dimos Iasmou’s Digital Transformation for Iasmos and Dimos Almyrou’s Digital Transformation for Almyros all describe the goal as improving urban management and service quality for this mix of users. Hersonissos’s blend of smart crossings, management platforms and a business guide fits neatly within this service-oriented framing.
Other authorities are experimenting with similar building blocks but adding their own twists. Dimos Xylokastrou-Evrostinis’ Digital Transformation Initiatives in August 2025 couples smart pedestrian crossings and a cemetery management system with electronic ticketing for events, cybersecurity measures and public performance indicators. Dimos Trifylias’ Digital Transformation for Municipality combines smart pedestrian crossings and digital traffic management with a smart city guide, cemetery management and a digital platform for open markets.
Dimos Ilioupolis’ August 2025 contract Digital Transformation Actions stretches this template further, adding smart waste bins, traffic office organisation, electronic payment management, telemedicine for vulnerable groups and electronic invoicing to the now-familiar mix of smart crossings and energy management. Later in the year, projects in Kastoria, Lavreotiki, Lamieon and Eretria all followed the same logic, specifying broader suites of smart-city tools linked by unified or centralised platforms.
Within this model, the Hersonissos business guide is part of a wider emphasis on how residents and visitors discover municipal services and local offers online. While the guide’s structure is not specified, placing it alongside traffic, energy and management platforms is a clear sign that information about businesses is being treated as core digital infrastructure rather than an add-on.
Dimos Gortynas’ Digital Transformation for Gortyna underlines the point by combining a Smart City Guide with a digital platform for vulnerable groups, an electronic payment management system and electronic invoicing. Dimos Spartis’ Digital Transformation for Sparta couples a city guide with platforms for managing kindergartens and vulnerable groups, urban space management and cemetery management, plus an electronic budget consultation system.
These examples show that, across municipalities, digital transformation is not confined to back-office workflows. Guides, consultation tools and other user-facing applications are becoming standard features of smart-city contracts, shaping the way people encounter local services and spaces. Hersonissos’s business guide and kindergarten platforms sit squarely within that trend.
The centralised data management system at the heart of the Hersonissos contract is key to how its different applications are expected to interoperate. By specifying a single platform, the municipality is signalling that smart crossings, energy tools, business directories and management systems should share a common information backbone.
Similar ideas run through other procurements. Ierapetra’s contract calls for a centralised data platform beneath its mobility and energy systems. Kastoria’s refers to a unified management platform linking smart parking, waste, traffic, cemetery management and cultural heritage. Lavreotiki’s notice includes a centralised data management platform to support smart public transport stops, pedestrian crossings, risk management and library digitisation, while Dimos Mytilinis’ Digital Transformation for Mytilene adds a central management platform alongside smart crossings, smart waste bins and cyberattack protection infrastructure.
Security and financial processes are being bundled into this same architecture. Dimos Xylokastrou-Evrostinis explicitly mentions cybersecurity measures; Argostoliou and Kastoria refer to cybersecurity infrastructure or cyber protection; and Mytilene includes cyberattack protection infrastructure. Gortyna’s electronic payment management and electronic invoicing, Sparta’s electronic budget consultation and Syros’s support for electronic billing show how these platforms are also being used to modernise how municipalities handle money and report on performance.
For local government IT, this points towards a more integrated, data-driven model: one in which field devices, citizen services, financial systems and security tools are procured as parts of a coherent environment rather than as isolated projects. Hersonissos’s combination of applications and a centralised data system is a clear expression of that direction.
The Hersonissos notice does not set out detailed implementation phases, but the breadth of systems covered in a single contract raises practical questions about coordination across departments and suppliers. How quickly the municipality can move from procurement to reliable, joined-up services will be central to the project’s perceived success.
Across many municipalities, a cluster of similar procurements in 2025 has effectively defined a catalogue of smart-city components: smart crossings, energy management, city and business guides, platforms for vulnerable groups, cultural heritage digitisation, electronic payments and unified data platforms. For residents and local businesses in Hersonissos, the impact of joining that club will be felt in small, concrete ways – from how they find information in the municipal business guide to how smoothly new digital tools support everyday interactions with the council.
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