Google Station is moving to Smart cities in India with Pune being the first.
Google Station, the free WiFi service from the company is now moving to cities as the company plans to launch Google Station hotspots in Pune. Google has partnered with Larsen & Toubro, to bring 150 Google Station hotspots to Pune, as part of the Pune Smart City Development Corporation Limited’s Smart City project.
Google Station is a free, high-speed WiFi service that is currently available at 270 railway stations in India. Google partnered with RailTel for the Wi-Fi project and relied on Railtel’s pan-India optic fiber network which is exclusively on the railway track. The Google Station project allowed users to access high-speed internet for free at railway stations.
With the new hotspots in Pune, Google says potentially, 3 million Pune citizens will be able to access the internet for free across various locations in the city. Google says the free public WiFi will be available at public places like gardens, hospitals and police stations. Users will need a smartphone or a laptop to access the free service.
“Today marks a big step for us as we expand Google Station hotspots from railways to cities. Our aim with Google Station is to to bring fast Wi-Fi to more users in more places within India. We built Google Station to be both the highest-quality and easiest Wi-Fi service for users and the easiest for partners to deploy — and we think this makes Station a great connectivity partner for the growing number of Indian smart cities. We’re looking forward to helping people in Pune get fast, simple and secure access to everything the internet has to offer,” Vinay Goel, Product Management Director, Google Station said in a press statement.
When it comes to Google Station, the company has so far indicated that the free access to internet will continue. Google Station was first launched in 100 railway stations across India. The project was announced in December 2015. Google Station has also been extended to Indonesia.