Living Lab’s first economic model was for the Singapore Grand Prix in 2012. In 2025 we became a software platform: government-grade intelligence for the visitor economy
Tourism economic data for research. Living Lab connects event, accommodation, aviation, price, and visitor-movement signals, geotags them to a place and period, and documents the pipeline well enough that a team outside the original one can reproduce it. Reference data is published by the OECD.
An attributable result for a bounded past event, policy change, or intervention: gross change through counterfactual, displacement, and leakage, documented to a citable standard. The method fixed at the version the study cited. A later refinement creates a new version rather than altering the one already in print.
A demand vector or scenario set for a place, market, or time horizon, with method and uncertainty stated for citation. Origin, route, timing, stay, price, and purpose, with the boundary between observed, modelled, and inferred values kept visible. Demand137 for the forecasting strand; Signal137 for the attribution strand; one versioned evidence base under both.
| Product | Your question | You get | What it changes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Both | Can we cite the methodology in a peer-reviewed publication? | A version number, a suggested citation, and a stated date on every method | A result built on it can be checked as a journal expects |
| Both | Can findings be reproduced later, or does the method change under a published result? | A method version is fixed once used in a published output | A later refinement is a new version, dated, not a silent update |
| Both | What access do we get to the underlying data, and on what terms? | Aggregated, geotagged output behind an anonymisation boundary set with the source | Terms an ethics committee can assess before the project starts |
| Both | How do we compare outcomes across cases or periods? | Shared variable definitions applied consistently across geography and time | One taxonomy across a study rather than reconciling ad hoc ones afterwards |
| Both | Should we build a multi-year programme on this rather than one-off commissions? | A versioned data dictionary and method note stable enough to cite across projects | A citable source for a programme rather than a single study |
| Signal137 | What did that event or policy change actually cause? | Gross change through counterfactual, displacement, and leakage to attributable effect | The attribution claim in the paper rests on a documented method |
| Demand137 | What does demand look like for this place over this horizon? | A demand vector or scenario comparison, with method and uncertainty stated | The forecast claim in the paper rests on a documented method |
| Both | How is research ethics handled? | Governance, retention, and anonymisation agreed before any data moves, in a form compatible with institutional review | A data-management plan agreed as part of scoping |
| Both | What does a collaboration look like, and what does it cost? | Commissioned research, data access, or joint research, scoped to the question, geography, and timeframe | Cost scoped with the design, not quoted from a rate card |
| Both | Who holds the data, and where? | Aggregated and governed; never individual-level data outside the agreed boundary | The evidence is publishable without exposing anyone |
A hotel, a resort, or a mixed-use scheme fails underwriting when a single route, a single annual event, or a single source market turns out to be carrying more of the demand case than the committee realised. The dependency is the risk, and it can be measured before signature.
A race track, an arena, a stadium: each is built for a peak it reaches a few dozen times a year. The gap between peak and off-peak operational need is the commercial challenge behind every sports-anchored development, and the reason mixed use is the answer rather than the fashion.
Manchester United’s proposed stadium is a Ā£2bn, 100,000-seat ground by Foster + Partners, with a target opening of 2030-31. The club and the regeneration case cite Ā£7.3bn a year for the economy and 92,000 jobs. Those are the promoters’ projections. Here is what to test before believing them.
The owners of the Bulls and the Blackhawks are putting a reported US$7bn into 55 acres around the United Center: housing, a music hall, a hotel, retail, a park. The arena already hosts more than 200 events a year. The question a developer should ask is what the other 165 nights are worth.
We turn messy event and tourism data into decisions that help communities grow. Bring curiosity and rigour. We will hand you questions nobody has answered yet.
Get the latest from the Fabrik newsroom
