There is a lot of political football with Smart City in the press lately. It is hard to speak accurately about the prospects of Smart City unless you know: 1) the IT industry (not just the products, but the industry); 2) Dubai Holdings and its companies Dubai Internet City, Dubai Media City and Dubai Knowledge Village, and 3) Malta, of course.

Unlike the theory posited that Smart City is a residential real estate project in disguise, it is quite clear that Dubai Holdings really wants to launch global clones of its very successful technology ­centres.

It is also very clear from that start that Malta expected all the sales and marketing to come from the Dubai end. That’s different than washing your hands of the job because you’ve contracted it to someone else – any IT channel manager who expects sales from an appointed IT reseller knows this.

The lack of success in sales and marketing at Smart City comes from a learning curve, where Dubai Holdings has to learn about both Malta and the global IT industry. Unlike Dubai, where the location itself drew multinationals, Malta requires a very different approach to attract a very different segment of the IT industry. It won’t work as a simple corporate real estate project because Malta by itself doesn’t have the gravity to pull IT companies into its orbit. But there are other ways.

The original vision may have been too much ‘build-it-and-they-shall-come’. But building an internationally attractive IT centre... well, that should be an achievable vision. Information Technology is a large industry with many layers and with many needs: it doesn’t have to be filled with Tier 1 multinationals to be a success. Just interesting tech providers.

As long as Dubai Holdings has the will to succeed, it does have the corporate resources to fulfil the vision of Smart City. The only thing that could sap that corporate will would be a hostile or counter-productive environment.

The only thing that could motivate those resources (past their extent motivation of fulfilling their own international vision – which doesn’t necessarily have to include Malta, does it?) would be a positive environment founded more on a can-do attitude. Or better yet: we must do.

Smart City has constructed the first building of a quality complex. Instead of accusations and complaints, it is as obvious as the power-on button on your notebook that Malta’s IT industry should rally to help make Smart City work. Perhaps Malta’s most international IT companies should be invited on a committee that volunteers to support Smart City, that offers a perspective from inside Malta and the IT industry, and that leverages whatever collective international resources are available.

It is in everybody’s best interest to support such a project that could improve Malta’s efforts in so many other areas of general business that IT supports. Think financial services, gaming, healthcare and more... Instead, too many people think they can drink from a trough that they haven’t bothered to help fill up first.

Here’s a little ‘political’ advice borrowed from JFK: Ask not what Smart City can do for you, but what you can do for Smart City.