Apps from Paris, Amsterdam and New York selected as finalists for US$5,OOO urban app contest

● Djump (Paris, France & Brussels, Belgium), Peerby (Amsterdam, The Netherlands) and Social Cyclist (New York, USA) selected as finalists for AppMyCity!, the annual contest for the world’s best new urban app
●   All three finalists invited to present their apps at the New Cities Summit in Dallas, Texas, 17-19 June
●   Winner of the US$5,000 prize to be selected by a live audience vote

Paris, France and Dallas, Texas – May 21, 2014. The New Cities Foundation announced the names of the three mobile applications in the running for the 2014 AppMyCity! contest for the world's best new urban app.

The three finalists – app developers from The Netherlands, USA, France and Belgium – will be offered a paid trip to the New Cities Summit in Dallas, Texas, June 17-19 2014.

On June 18, the three finalists will take to the main stage of the Summit, at the Winspear Opera House, to present their apps to the audience of 800 urban leaders and thinkers. The winner of the US$5,000 prize will be selected by a live audience vote and announced at the end of the day on June 18.

The AppMyCity! judging panel selected the following three apps as finalists for this year’s AppMyCity! Prize:

Djump, Paris, France and Brussels, Belgium, is a peer-to-peer car sharing service that allows drivers with a car to register, users to request a ride, and drivers to answer the call. Users can track drivers in real time and can choose to give a voluntary donation at the end of the ride. http://djump.in/

Peerby, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, is a ’marketplace liquidity hack’ which encourages neighbors to share items. Users post something they want to borrow, and neighbors will get a push notification to which they can respond in a single touch. https://peerby.com/

Social Cyclist, New York, USA, encourages bike riders to map their preferred routes, report hazardous road conditions and vote on their preferred site locations for future cycling infrastructure. The app can also give feedback on and report problems with bikesharing schemes. This aggregate data can then be used by cities to plan future infrastructure. http://socialcyclist.com/         

John Rossant, Founder and Chairman of the New Cities Foundation and AppMyCity! judge, said: “We congratulate all ten semi-finalists of AppMyCity! It was a challenge to select the three finalists from the extraordinary list of contending apps from Colombia to India. The range of apps we discovered during the selection process truly demonstrates how technology can spark innovation, creativity and connectivity in cities. We are looking forward to meeting the developers of Djump, Peerby and Social Cyclist in Dallas this June, and seeing them present their projects on stage.”

Tanguy Goretti, Co-founder & CEO of Djump, said: "With Djump we want to bring a unique social experience in a world where travelling alone is over. Our application connects passengers and drivers in real-time to let them share a ride inside the city. We hope AppMyCity! will take us to the next step and help us grow our community.”

Daan Weddepohl, CEO & Founder of Peerby, said: "The timing of this nomination is amazing! We have just created a city program that enables everyone in the world to turn their city into a sharing city. Winning this prize would help us to get the word out and make the world's cities more inclusive, fun and green."

The Social Cyclist team said: "Our team at Social Bicycles is excited to hear that Social Cyclist has been selected as a finalist for the AppMyCity! contest. Social Cyclist is great fun for individual bike riders and also a great tool for cities to organize campaigns to gather data. We're looking forward to presenting it in Dallas!”

AppMyCity! background

Applications for the AppMyCity! 2014 contest closed on April 18. 10 semi-finalists were selected by the New Cities Foundation out of a total of 93 candidates, representing over 150 cities and 26 countries.

The 10 semi-finalist apps were announced on May 6, representing ten countries and 5 continents.

The international judging panel then assessed the 10 semi-finalists and picked the three most outstanding apps from the list. The panel were required to pick the most outstanding apps that best demonstrated their capacity to improve the urban experience, connect people, and make cities more fun, fair, vibrant and sustainable places.

The seven AppMyCity! 2014 runners-up are:

• Blue Parking from Valladolid, Spain
• I Change my City from Bangalore, India
• Parqueate from Bogotá, Colombia
• RipeNearMe from Adelaide, Australia
• Mind My Business from New York, USA
• SIGA Chile from Santiago, Chile
• Switch Skate Guide from São Paulo, Brazil

To find out more visit www.appmycity.org and www.newcitiessummit2014.org

Ends

International press contact:

Marina Bradbury

Communications & Media Relations Manager

New Cities Foundation

mbradbury@newcitiesfoundation.org

+33 6 17 79 17 72

Neil Mac Lean

Press & Communications Assistant

New Cities Foundation

nmaclean@newcitiesfoundation.org

Local press contact:

Brunswick Group – Dallas

Daniel Harrison

newcities@brunswickgroup.com

+1 214 254 3790

About AppMyCity!

AppMyCity! is a competition organized by the New Cities Foundation that promotes and rewards mobile apps that improve the urban experience, connect people, and make cities more fun, fair, vibrant and sustainable places.

AppMyCity! 2014 Judging panel

The judging panel comprises the following 9 leading experts from the private, non-profit, cultural and media fields:

• Naomi Alderman, novelist, broadcaster and games designer
• Arun Bhikshesvaran, Chief Marketing Officer, Ericsson
• Esther Dyson, Chairman,  EDventure Holdings
• John Egan, CEO, Sandbox
• Di-Ann Eisnor, VP Platform and Partnership, Waze
• Jemima Kiss, Head of Technology, the Guardian
• Anil Menon, President Globalization and Smart+Connected Communities, Cisco
• Christian Noske, Senior Associate,  BMW i Ventures
• John Rossant, Founder and Chairman, New Cities Foundation

AppMyCity! is organized by the New Cities Foundation.

Media Partner:

GUARDIAN CITIES

About the New Cities Summit

Organized by the New Cities Foundation, the New Cities Summit is the premier global leadership event on the future of cities. Fostering positive urban change, the high level gathering advocates cross-sector collaboration through network building, cutting-edge forums and lively discussion. The Summit showcases and disseminates the best ideas on the future of cities and generates concrete, scalable solutions capable of being adopted and replicated across the world. Following the inaugural Summit in Paris in 2012, last year’s event was hosted in São Paulo. The New Cities Summit 2014 will be hosted in Dallas, Texas, USA, from June 17 - 19.

    www.newcitiessummit2014.org

     @newcitiesfound #ncs2014

About New Cities Foundation

The New Cities Foundation is a leading global non-profit organization with a vision to build more inclusive, dynamic and creative cities benefiting people and society. Its mission is to incubate, promote and scale urban innovations through collaborative partnerships between government, business, academia and civil society.

The New Cities Foundation hosts a number of leadership events on the most pressing urban issues, including its flagship event, the New Cities Summit, which takes place this year in Dallas, Texas, on June 17 – 19, 2014 (www.newcitiessummit2014.org). The Foundation also hosts smaller leadership events worldwide, such as Cityquest - KAEC Forum, a high level event focusing on the conception and building of new cities around the world (www.cityquest.net)

The Foundation’s applied research wing, the Urban (co)LAB, manages a number of projects including Task Forces, thought leadership activities and competitions. The Urban (co)LAB recently completed two Task Forces on Urban E-health in Rio de Janeiro and on Connected Commuting in San Jose, California. The Urban (co)LAB also manages the AppMyCity! contest for the world’s best new urban mobile app, and seeks out the most talented urban innovators for the WhatWorks series of talks hosted at the New Cities Summit.

An independent, non-profit organization, the New Cities Foundation was created in 2010 and is financed by its members and partners. Overall, its members include some of the most forward-thinking companies, universities, cities and city organizations from around the world. The New Cities Foundation’s Founding Members are Cisco and Ericsson. The Foundation is based in Geneva and its head office is in Paris.

For more information about the New Cities Foundation, please visit: