MAB

Miguel Alexandre Barreiro-Laredo

EIRA

CEO
Miguel Alexandre Barreiro-Laredo is Founder & CEO of EIRA, an Urban AI infrastructure platform conceived as a spin-off from his research as a SPURS/Humphrey Fellow at MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning. He is Associate Professor and Director of the Policy Lab at IE University and IE Business School, where he teaches courses in AI Ethics, Logic and Algorithmic Thinking, and Community Empowerment and Social Inclusion. He holds a Juris Doctor and a PhD in Social Anthropology from Panthéon–Sorbonne University, where his research focused on governance, representation, and the politics of urban and environmental transformation. With over two decades of experience at the United Nations in resilience and climate adaptation, his work centers on transforming underutilized urban assets into data-driven climate and social infrastructure. At EIRA, he leads the development of multimodal regulatory and geospatial AI systems designed to build sovereign, water-positive, and carbon-measurable cities across Europe.
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Catalyst Stage
Jun 3, 2026
11:00 AM11:30 AM

From Smart Cities to Sovereign Cities: Why Europe Needs Urban AI

Miguel Alexandre Barreiro-Laredo
Description
Europe's cities are becoming intelligent. But intelligence without sovereignty is just dependency. As urban AI systems reshape how cities manage energy, mobility, safety, and services, a critical question emerges: who controls the data, the algorithms, and the infrastructure underneath it all? This session explores why Europe must build its own urban AI layer, and what is at stake if it doesn't.
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