Today Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) introduced its first initiative in India to discuss the transformational role of Wi-Fi in Connected City Deployments by bringing together close to 200 executives and experts from around the world, including Indian network operators, technology providers, senior government officials and regulators. Delhi is now the first Indian city to join the Advisory Board, has motivated & paved the way for other cities to take a positive step towards facilitating a discussion for the much awaited topic.
WBA founded the Connected City Advisory Board to help deliver the vision of Connected Cities being pursued by a growing number of cities from around the world. It provides an exclusive platform for City Managers and CIOs to knowledge-share and create best practices with their counterparts in other cities and also determine the best way to leverage public-private partnerships.
Shrikant Shenwai, CEO, WBA, mentioned that China was way ahead to India. India stands at 1 hotspot per 41.733 people, whereas, China stands at 1 hotspot per 253 people. Also, technology partners presented case studies and experiences from similar deployments around the world, including convergence of licensed and unlicensed wireless and wire-line technologies.
Ashish Khetan, Vice Chairman, Government of Delhi, said, “I would like to congratulate Wireless Broadband Alliance for launching the Connected City Advisory Board initiative which will have leading cities from around the world join together to enable the vision for Connected Cities. This provides a great platform for city managers and CIOs to share knowledge and learn from best practices. I am happy to announce that the Government of Delhi has decided to join the Connected City Advisory Board and will be working in close association with WBA and ecosystem partners to develop Connected City plans and blue prints & create public-private ecosystems for collaboration. We see this association playing a major role helping our vision for city wide Wi-Fi.”
The panel discussions focused on the findings of the presentations and engaged presenters and audiences on the next steps to be taken within India and identified major challenges that need to be addressed.
Rajan S. Mathews, Director General, COAI. “We are glad to have taken the first step towards putting the foundation stone towards a better connected future. All the players in the telecom ecosystem should come together to perpetuate the success of this initiative taken by WBA and ensure the sustained realization of the Smart Cities, connected cities vision.”
