Paolo Gerli

Biography

Paolo joined Napier University Business School in March 2021, as a Lecturer of Digital Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

He holds a PhD in Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Strategy from Northumbria University, where he has also been as a Lecturer of Digital Enterprise from 2018 to 2021. Prior to joining academia, Paolo worked as a regulatory analyst for both private and public organisations in the Italian telecommunications sector.

His professional background reflects in his research, which revolves around business strategies and public policies for the digital transformation of the economy and society. His scholarly work has particularly focused on the development of smart places for the digital transformation of urban and rural communities. Paolo has also contributed to several consultancy projects exploring the governance of smart cities, and is now working on the World Smart City Outlook, which will inform the UN-Habitat Guidelines on People-Centered Smart Cities.

Since 2016, Paolo's research has been published in peer-reviewed journals and presented at international conferences. In 2019, he was among the recipients of the Pacific Telecommunications Council Young Scholar Programme, an award for early-career researchers of ICT markets and policies.

Esteem

Advisory panels and expert committees or witness

  • Contribution to a JRC policy report on data intermediaries
  • Academic Consultant (Governance of Smart City Projects), United Nations
  • Academic Consultant (Governance of Smart City Projects), CAF - the Development Bank of Latin America
  • RSA close session for ECRs meeting with the EU Commissioner on Regional Cohesion
  • EIP- Agri seminar on Multi-level strategies for digitising agriculture and rural areas

 

Conference Organising Activity

  • International Telecommunications Society European Conference

 

Fellowships and Awards

  • Richard Beresford Bursary - Enterprise Educators UK
  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
  • Pacific Telecommunications Council Young Scholar Program
  • ITS PhD seminar - travel grant

 

Invited Speaker

  • Invited Talk at the 3rd International Forum on Urban-Rural Linkages (UN Habitat and People’s Government of Songyang County, China).
  • Invited talk at the UN-Habitat Expert Group Meeting : Recovering Territorial Balance by Strengthening Urban-Rural Linkages
  • Invited talk at the UN-Habitat Community of Practice on Harnessing the Power of Connected Communities through Urban-Rural Linkages
  • Invited talk at Theorizing AI Workshop - Luiss University, Rome
  • Invited talk at Technological Forecasting Social Change Workshop on Post-pandemic Smart Cities, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, Singapore
  • Keynote at Smart City Expo: Global study on smart city governance
  • Guest Lecture on Rural Digital Entrepreneurship for the Bandung Institute of Technology
  • Guest Lecture on the regulation of electronic communications, Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (Milan)
  • Invited talk at Agriconnect, the Italian Convention on Digital Agriculture

 

Media Activity

  • North Edinburgh News: Edinburgh Napier researchers launch ‘smart city playbook’ for United Nations
  • The Scotsman: Smart thinking that deploys digital technology can make our cities fit for the future
  • UK Authority: Edinburgh Napier University develops smart city playbook
  • Future Scot: New global smart cities playbook developed by researchers in Edinburgh
  • Project Scotland: Edinburgh Napier University creates smart city ‘playbook’ for UN
  • Smart Cities World: UN and Napier collaborate on smart city governance playbook
  • Smart places: Why getting the governance right is vital to project success
  • Wired UK: Faster Home Broadband Should Be Enshrined in Law
  • Wired UK: The race to get the UK using fibre optic broadband is speeding up
  • Wired UK: The Conservatives’ own research shows why Labour’s broadband plan makes perfect sense
  • Pacific Telecommunications Council Blog: Digital in rural areas
  • ISP Review: New UK Research Paper on Delivering Faster Rural Broadband
  • Agriconnect: superare il divario digitale nelle zone rurali; agire in tempi rapidi
  • Agriconnect 2017: banda ultra larga nelle aree rurali

 

Membership of Professional Body

  • Member of the European Regional Science Association
  • Member of the Regional Study Association
  • Member and Social Media Manager of the International Telecommunications Society

 

Public/Community Engagement

  • Oor Smart Ceeties: public engagement workshops on the digital future of Scottish cities

 

Reviewing

  • Reviewer for Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Nature)
  • Reviewer for Information Policy
  • Book reviewer for Sage
  • Reviewer for Universal Access in the Information Society
  • Reviewer for Journal of Urban Technology
  • Reviewer for Regional Studies
  • Reviewer for Habitat International
  • Reviewer for Public Policy and Administration
  • Reviewer for Technology Analysis & Strategic Management
  • Reviewer for Technological Forecasting and Social Change
  • Reviewer for Government Information Quarterly
  • Reviewer for Information Polity
  • Book reviewer for Springer
  • Reviewer for Digital Policy, Regulation and Governance
  • Reviewer for Telecommunications Policy

 

Date


14 results

Friends or enemies? Unraveling niche-regime interactions in grassroots digital innovations

Journal Article
Gerli, P., Mora, L., Zhang, J., & Sancino, A. (2024)
Friends or enemies? Unraveling niche-regime interactions in grassroots digital innovations. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 202, Article 123342. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2024.123342
During the COVID-19 pandemic, grassroots digital innovations (GDIs) have gained traction as innovation niches, providing an alternative to the prevailing mainstream regime dom...

Managing smart city governance: A playbook for local and regional governments

Report
Beckers, D., Gerli, P., Mora, L., Thabit, S., & Tonnarelli, F. (2023)
Managing smart city governance: A playbook for local and regional governments. Nairobi, Kenya: United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat
This playbook and its recommendations are primarily aimed at municipal governments and their political leaders, local administrators, and public officials who are involved in ...

The impact of Brexit on the digitisation of rural areas in the UK

Book Chapter
Gerli, P., & Whalley, J. (2022)
The impact of Brexit on the digitisation of rural areas in the UK. In A. Attorp, S. Heron, & R. McAreavey (Eds.), Rural Governance in the UK (162-179). London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003200208-9
This chapter discusses new policymaking scenarios in rural broadband and digital services that have opened now that the UK is no longer subject to the EU regulatory framework ...

The hidden power of emotions: How psychological factors influence skill development in smart technology adoption

Journal Article
Gerli, P., Clement, J., Esposito, G., Mora, L., & Crutzen, N. (2022)
The hidden power of emotions: How psychological factors influence skill development in smart technology adoption. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 180, Article 121721. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2022.121721
Working within the theoretical framework set by the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) literature, this paper clarifies how psychological factors (emotions, attitudes, beliefs,...

What makes a smart village smart? A review of the literature

Journal Article
Gerli, P., Navio Marco, J., & Whalley, J. (2022)
What makes a smart village smart? A review of the literature. Transforming government: people, process and policy, 16(3), 292-304. https://doi.org/10.1108/tg-07-2021-0126
Smart villages (SVs) have lately attracted considerable attention, but what does the term mean? This literature review aims to explore its ambiguous nature and to identify mai...

The Multilevel Governance of State Aid for Broadband Diffusion: Evidence from Three European Countries

Journal Article
Gerli, P., Navio-Marco, J., & Whalley, J. (in press)
The Multilevel Governance of State Aid for Broadband Diffusion: Evidence from Three European Countries. International Journal of Public Administration, https://doi.org/10.1080/01900692.2021.1993904
This paper explores multilevel governance (MLG) in the context of state aid programmes for the diffusion of broadband in the European Union. By comparing three EU Member State...

Municipal 5G bans during the Covid-19 pandemic: the case of Italy

Journal Article
Gerli, P. (2021)
Municipal 5G bans during the Covid-19 pandemic: the case of Italy. Digital Policy, Regulation and Governance, 23(6), 553-573. https://doi.org/10.1108/dprg-07-2020-0091
Purpose Several sources have reported an increase in the opposition to the fifth-generation (5G) amongst local communities following the outbreak of Covid-19. In Italy, more t...

Fibre to the countryside: A comparison of public and community initiatives tackling the rural digital divide in the UK

Journal Article
Gerli, P., & Whalley, J. (2021)
Fibre to the countryside: A comparison of public and community initiatives tackling the rural digital divide in the UK. Telecommunications Policy, 45(10), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.telpol.2021.102222
Although digitisation offers numerous opportunities for rural areas, they still lag behind cities in terms of access and adoption of Internet-based services. This divide is th...

Beyond contact-tracing: The public value of eHealth application in a pandemic

Journal Article
Gerli, P., Arakpogun, E. O., Elsahn, Z., Olan, F., & Prime, K. S. (2021)
Beyond contact-tracing: The public value of eHealth application in a pandemic. Government Information Quarterly, 38(3), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2021.101581
This study adopts a public value perspective to examine the eHealth services deployed by national and regional governments to contain the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic, incl...

The rising importance of the "Smart territory" concept: definition and implications

Journal Article
Navío-Marco, J., Rodrigo-Moya, B., & Gerli, P. (2020)
The rising importance of the "Smart territory" concept: definition and implications. Land Use Policy, 99, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2020.105003
The “Smart territory” concept emerges strongly not only as an extension of the smart city concept but also in opposition to it. The “smartization” of cities can produce a digi...

Pre-Napier Funded Projects

  • ESRC Accelerating Business Collaboration
  • Consultancy for Telus inc. on the benefits of rural digital transformation