Technology is Central to Smart City
From building the right infrastructure to providing connected networks, service providers are seeing a golden opportunity in every phase of smart city development. Naturally, major players are upping the ante and gearing up to cash in on the boom.
For a city to be smart and connected, the first requirement is for a new-age broadband infrastructure which would include cable, optical fiber, and wireles network. It should have the capacity to meet the network usage requirements of entire populace of the city. With an increasing number of devices getting connected to the Internet, termed Internet of Things and in the wake of ever-increasing use of mobile applications, having a best in class broadband infrastructure would enable citizens to access smart city applications as per their requirements.
Vineet Kshirsagar, Senior Director & Group Head Businesses, Oracle believes, “An important step would be to make sure that smart devices and sensors are embedded in the infrastructure of the city. These devices would provide the city administration with the real time data, alerts, and analytics along with a rich experience to the citizens. This collective intelligence would also assist in connecting the citizens of the city and the city administration. The rea-time data and analytics would be critical for health, judicial, police, fire, and many more administrative departments thus keeping crimes and public grievances at bay.”
Another important step would be the development of smart urban areas, which would use ICT technologies in an innovative manner to benefit the environment and economy. These areas offer Wi-Fi spots, charging points for electric cars, buildings with smart cooling/heating systems, and information kiosks.
Plethora of Opportunities
With the buzz for smart cities gaining traction, it has opened up abundance of opportunities for technology players and service providers to develop technologies that are able to satisfy the evolving requirements of the stakeholders involved.
“Right from providing and setting up the right infrastructure for last mile connectivity, providing the right technology to enable better governance and access to services; and ensuring that all components for the decided solution work seamlessly, there is an opportunity at every stage,” agrees Raman Bountra, Business Leader, Government Sales, Dell India.
Echoing similar sentiments, Rajeev Saxena, Director sales, India Public Sector, Commercial and Saarc, NetApp Marketing & Services says, “Smart city ecosystem has a host of opportunities, to start with installation of sensors and dashboard that will help reduce energy while managing waste collection, analytics to measure carbon footprint, and