AT&T says it is helping cities become safer and more efficient. Through collaborations with other industry leaders and its Internet of Things (IoT) expertise, the operator is working to deliver solutions that address some key community challenges.
“When a city’s data is harnessed, analysed and acted upon—securely in near real-time—it opens up a world of opportunities,” said Mike Zeto, general manager, AT&T Smart Cities. “With our strategic alliance members, we’re delivering solutions that will give city leaders meaningful insights into the communities they serve. This can mean improved quality of life for citizens.”
AT&T’s Smart Cities Operations Centre (SCOC) provides a near real-time view of ongoing activity in a city. SCOC securely collects and analyses the enormous amount of data generated from multiple civic departments and points around the city into a centralised, customisable dashboard. This kind of visibility can lead city leaders to make faster, more informed decisions, strategically deploy resources, cut down crisis response times and save costs.
AT&T (MWC2018 booth 4D30) and Cisco are exploring opportunities to integrate the Cisco Kinetic for Cities platform into select AT&T Smart Cities solutions, including AT&T SCOC. Cisco Kinetic for Cities is a cloud-based platform that helps cities extract, compute, and move data from connected things to secure IoT applications to deliver better outcomes and services.
“Cities today are looking to unlock the value of the data being generated by connected machines, things and spaces,” said Anil Menon, global president, Smart+Connected Communities, Cisco. “Cisco Kinetic for Cities is purpose-built to harness the power of all that data to drive smart city initiatives forward. Together with AT&T we want to help bridge the disparities between connected devices, people, and processes to simplify operations, enable new revenue sources, and allow leaders to be more responsive to citizen needs.”
The open architecture of the Cisco Kinetic for Cities platform makes it easy to add solutions to address a wide range of city needs. The platform unlocks citywide data, enabling it to be used by previously siloed devices, applications, and services. Data that was once used by a single party to power a single application can now be utilised by many parties across many applications, multiplying the value of that data and enabling a seemingly endless amount of new services that help increase the quality of life in today’s cities.
For example, the data provided by connected parking metres can be used to help drivers find an open parking space, third-party parking app providers can monetise that data, and city planners can utilise the data to better understand traffic patterns and peak usage times. One data point – parking metre availability – can be utilised by multiple parties to deliver many different services. The same possibilities apply to smart lighting, urban mobility, water metering, safety & security, and many other city services.
Smart cities pilot in Portland, Oregon
As part of our smart cities spotlight cities initiative, the city of Portland will soon be piloting 2 of our solutions: AT&T Smart Cities Digital Infrastructure and AT&T Smart Cities Structure Monitoring.
We’ll use AT&T Digital Infrastructure with Current, powered by GE‘s CityIQTM, to transform some existing lighting infrastructure into a sensor-enabled data network. The sensors will help Portland address issues like traffic flow and parking. Intel IoT technologies power each sensors’ computer vison analytics. Portland will deploy about 200 Digital Infrastructure sensors throughout its Central Eastside area.
The city will also deploy AT&T Structure Monitoring. Working with the IBM IoT Cloud, IBM Services and Moniteye, the city will deploy devices on various infrastructure in Portland with LTE-enabled sensors to remotely monitor structural behavior. The sensors, which measure things like temperature, tilt and cracks, also feature alert triggers to capture significant events.
“As we work to make Portland an even smarter and more connected city we’re excited to launch this new collaboration with AT&T,” said Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler. “This is significant in helping us build our city’s infrastructure and create new opportunities for local residents. With the integration of AT&T’s Smart City solutions, we will be better positioned to improve traffic and increase public safety.
New Strategic Alliance members
To transform our cities, we need the help of the entire smart cities ecosystem. This includes the public and private sector, and the developer community. To do this, we formed the AT&T Smart Cities Strategic Alliance. It’s made up of leading industry organisations and tech companies, including Cisco, IBM and Intel. We welcome Synchronoss and Ubicquia as the newest members to the alliance.
Synchronoss offers cloud, messaging and digital products to Technology Media Telecommunications companies. Synchronoss uses its technologies and platforms to enhance the operations of managing devices, digital nodes and data in complex IoT environments, like smart cities. Through the orchestration of digital touch points, to cloud storage and smart messaging, Synchronoss helps smart cities save money, reduce consumption, earn new revenue and stimulate new jobs.
Ubicquia offers municipalities, utilities, broadband service providers and lighting manufacturers a cost-effective and expandable platform for deploying simply connected, simply smart broadband, small cell and smart city services. Their plug and play network has the ability to turn any street light into a multi-function router that supports a growing list of services that include advanced lighting controls, public Wi-Fi, and the connection to third party sensors including air quality monitors and surveillance cameras.
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