IBM to enable Gurgaon and Chennai as Smarter Cities

IBM announced Gurgaon and Chennai as the two cities in India to be awarded with IBM Smarter Cities Challenge Grant for 2013. This grant provides the city with access to IBM's top experts to analyze and recommend ways that will enable Gurgaon and Chennai to become even better places to live and work.
Launched in 2011, the IBM Smarter Cities Challenge is a three-year, 100-city, US$50 million competitive grant program.
The winning cities proposed innovative projects and areas of focus for IBM experts. These included strategies that address: economic and workforce development,social services, sustainability,electric vehicle use, and solar power generation on an upgraded power grid, capital budget planning - enabling citizens to request expenditures, while analyzing their potential impact, urban planning.

In 2012, IBM provided expert counsel to 33 cities worldwide who had earned IBM Smarter Cities Challenge grants.These included engagements in Pune and Ahmedabad as well.
As part of the Grant, Pune Municipal Corporation plans to work with IBM to provide better healthcare for its citizens. The project will involve a blueprint for setting up a surveillance system for tracking epidemics. Past data will be collated on several parameters and through the use of predictive analysis it will be possible to forecast when an epidemic is expected. This will enable preventive solutions to be implemented. A team of volunteers/ scientists from IBM's India Software Lab will conduct a pilot as well as provide technical support to the project.
Earlier this month, an IBM team also worked with the community in Ahmedabad on issues related to traffic and citizen services.
In year-one and two of the Smarter Cities Challenge, IBM completed work in 62 cities globally, deploying nearly 400 of its most talented experts who delivered concrete and measurable results to winning cities.
The need to use innovative approaches that address civic challenges has never been greater. According to the United Nations, in 2008 more than half the world's population began living in cities for the first time. These population centers are more economically powerful, politically influential, and technologically advanced than at any time in history However, they also struggle with increased demand for services, along with budgetary and operational challenges.