Bristol built its smart-city reputation on a company rather than a department. In 2015 the city council and the University of Bristol set up Bristol Is Open, a joint venture running a city-scale programmable network testbed — a fibre ring, a software-defined network and a wireless mesh that later carried 5G and IoT trials. The joint venture lasted about three years; the council then took sole ownership, closed out the remaining projects, and now describes the company as dormant, though it remains on the Companies House register.

All 1 project in Bristol

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Compare with other cities

• 🇸🇪 Stockholm: Stokab: Stockholm's Municipal Open-Access Dark Fibre Network City-owned fibre as a durable leasable asset since 1994, against a testbed built as a time-limited research venture.
• 🇮🇪 Dublin: Smart Docklands Council-backed connectivity testbeds of the same era: Dublin narrowed to one district and a neutral-host model, Bristol went city-scale and dissolved the vehicle.
• 🇬🇧 Manchester: CityVerve IoT Smart City Demonstrator The direct sibling: both UK national-programme demonstrators of the same cohort, ended on schedule — CityVerve's domain went to a gambling site, Bristol's company survives as a non-trading shell.
• 🇬🇧 Glasgow: Glasgow Operations Centre The third of the UK demonstrator cohort, and the contrast: Glasgow's build outlived its programme as a staffed service, Bristol's did not.

Official strategy and sources