Cisco signs MoU with Government of Telangana to boost education and local innovation, foster entrepreneurship, and accelerate economic competitiveness and citizen engagement in the state
Cisco has announced a series of strategic initiatives to help accelerate the digital transformation of Telangana. Digital disruption is a reality and is transforming every country, state and city.
A digitized state aims to drive GDP growth, create jobs and foster innovation, enhance education, stimulate entrepreneurship, accelerate business innovation, develop economic cluster initiatives, and support infrastructure. Toward that end, Cisco and the Government of Telangana have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), which includes the Digital Zone smart city project in Hyderabad, establishing an Internet of Things (IoT) Innovation Hub and a Living Lab near Hi-Tech City in Hyderabad, a Center of Excellence and Living Lab in T–Hub premises, the largest building in India to be entirely dedicated to entrepreneurship, remote education in 10 schools in Karimnagar, and deploying digital solutions at the historical landmark monument of Hyderabad, the Qutubshahi tombs.
The MoU between Cisco and the Government of Telangana was signed today as part of the IT Sectoral Policy Launch event in Hi-Tech City in Hyderabad, in the presence of the Honorable Minister of IT E&C, MA&UD, Industries & Commerce, Mines& Geology, Public Enterprises and NRI Affairs Sri K. T Rama Rao, other government dignitaries; and Dinesh Malkani, President, Cisco India and SAARC.
Partnership with Government of Telangana to deploy Digital Zone Project
As part of the Digital Zone project, Cisco will deploy City Digital Platform (CDP) in the 2.2 km area near Hi-Tech City in Hyderabad, including smart Wi-Fi, smart parking, smart lighting, traffic analytics at key junctions, Remote Expert for Government Services (REGS), smart environmental sensors, smart waste management, and a smart control center to monitor and manage the city with greater efficiency and effectiveness.
In the Digital Zone project, Cisco will collaborate with local ecosystem solution providers to build a scalable model for the effective rollout of city services across the state of Telangana. This project will utilize Cisco’s global expertise and intellectual property in the areas of IoT, mobile technology and applications, cloud computing, data analytics, social media, energy, and lighting solutions. Cisco will also engage with ecosystem partners in the state to develop new applications specifically for Indian smart cities and collaborate with the state for its upcoming smart cities in Telangana.
Boost Research and Local Innovation in Telangana
Cisco will set up a Centre of Excellence (CoE) and a Living Lab on the T-Hub premises to foster regional innovation, and will enable partners and startups to build solutions around IoT and cyber security and engage in rapid prototyping. This will also act as a platform to bring startups, accelerators, developers, researchers, ecosystem partners and the venture community together to showcase possibilities of the Internet of Things. In the CoE, Cisco would showcase its global smart cities platform, “City Digital Platform (CDP),” which can integrate various smart city services onto a unified platform along with Cisco Collaboration solutions and Cisco Mobility Services Engine.
The Cisco CoE will be hosted in the IIIT campus in T-Hub, which is part of the state-of-the-art 70,000-square-foot building called Catalyst, the largest building in India to be entirely dedicated to entrepreneurship. T-Hub’s mission is to catalyze the growth of Hyderabad into one of the most vibrant startup communities in the world.
Delivering Remote Education in Telangana
The vision of the state government of Telangana is to bring the best education to all the students across the state and bring in the best of faculty remotely to every school in the state. Toward that, the Government of Telangana will collaborate with Cisco to help deliver remote interactive education bringing in benefits of virtual expert learning.
Cisco will set up virtual video-based classrooms in 10 remote schools in Karimnagar district for inter-school learning. The solution will connect the district school to the remote schools for the sharing of faculty. Cisco will deploy the solution to connect these schools over HD-quality video conferencing to share the faculty across the connected schools. The solution will also enable digital sharing of content, live streaming, recording, creation of a repository and accessing the content on demand.
Partnership with Government of Telangana to digitize historical Qutubshahi tombs – in Hyderabad
As part of the digital blueprint of the state of Telangana, Cisco will collaborate with the government on developing smart city infrastructure in Telangana to transform itself into a digital state of the future. Cisco will digitize one of the most important landmarks and monuments of Hyderabad – the Qutubshahi tombs close to the Golconda Fort. Cisco will deploy digital solutions to enhance the experience of visitors to the Qutubshahi tombs and boost tourism in the state. Cisco will also deploy public Wi-Fi, surveillance, smart lighting and smart parking solutions to provide visitors and citizens details of each of the monuments in the area. The solutions will cover 3 acres of the monument site.
Dinesh Malkani, President, Cisco India and SAARC, said, ‘“Digitization will be key to how cities, communities and countries maintain global competitiveness, increase GDP growth, foster innovation and create new jobs. The government’s vision to transform Telangana into a digital state is visionary and will create huge opportunities for the state, its citizens and the nation. We are thrilled to partner with the government of Telangana and are committed to help make Telangana a truly digital state in India.”
