A report by market research company Grand View Research says the global Smart Cities market will hit $1,423 billion in 2020, nearly triple the global market size of $568 billion in 2013.

This increase is due to the rapidly expanding population, speedy urbanization and industrialization.

Smart Cities are designed and built to cater to a plethora of challenges and issues – including water management, energy management, urban mobility, street lighting and safety of the citizens.

High growth is expected to occur in the Smart City market with an estimated annualized 13.6 % rise each year between 2014 and 2020.

One significant reason Smart Cities initiatives are being considered is to reduce the dependency on non-renewable resources for energy.

The most current technologies garnering headlines today are critical in the development of Smart Cities, including cloud computing, wireless communication, sensor networks and data analytics.

Smart security has a price tag of a potential $77.2 billion, due to increased cyber-theft. This segment of the market is expected to see large gains of 14.8% annually from 2014 to 2020.

With the increasing need for integration of intelligent systems and communication infrastructure, industrial automation has projected gains sitting at a 14.4% annual growth rate.

The research report said the largest single segment will be smart transportation, covering 16.1% of the market in 2013.

Increasing interest in transportation solutions including managing tickets, guidance systems, parking management, and managing traffic is expected to amplify the Smart City market demand.

Smart transportation is expected to grow at a projected growth of 15.2% annually over the next few years.