Hyderabad: Smart City Living Labs at the International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT), Hyderabad, in collaboration with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and The Smart City Mission have launched a Smart City Start-up challenge.
The program aims to support and scale enterprises that build sustainable, inclusive and innovative solutions for smart cities. The month-long program offers selected businesses an opportunity to buy smart city technology MNCs, smart city officials and the winner will receive a share-free award of Rs 10 lakh for further development.
According to Ramesh Loganathan, professor, co-innovation and head of research / innovation outreach, The Smart City Living Lab is an effort to discover and enrich leading innovations with smart city use cases with knowledge from research. This start-up challenge will help discover innovations to enable smart cities, and the winning teams will receive capital, networking and knowledge support.
The focus areas for the challenge are water, waste, safety and security, health and energy. Any new businesses with solutions or products with smart-city use cases can apply, especially technology companies that work with products with smart-city use cases, products ready with or without customers (income is desirable), expertise to use the solution commercially and research products that market ready. The deadline for applications is 1 June.
Smart City technology can make cities more efficient and effective, which is necessary given the predicted rapid growth in urban populations over the next few decades. Living labs is about using technology and data purposefully to make better decisions and deliver a better quality of life. By connecting new businesses with those looking for smart urban solutions, the program will enhance the transformation of urban infrastructure.
Living Labs is also currently addressing the Water Challenge in collaboration with the Telangana government and the NIUM to find viable solutions to the problems facing cities in the state in terms of water quality, supply and non-revenue water.
Source: The Siasat Daily