EU & Pune Smart City to hold Smart Cities Developer’s Hackathon

The European Union, in partnership with Pune Smart City, is organizing a national-level smart city developer’s tutorial and hackathon on 15 and 16 April at the College of Engineering, Pune.

The initiative will be the third of its kind under the auspices of the project “India-EU Cooperation on ICT-Related Standardisation, Policy and Legislation”, the aim of which is to promote closer alignment between India and Europe in the production and use of ICT standards, and to harmonise the exchange of statistical data, thereby facilitating trade, increasing interoperability and the ease of doing business.

Project stakeholders include the European Telecommunications Standards Institute, the Telecommunications Standard Development Society of India, oneM2M, LAAS CNRS (France), and the European Commission.

“Pune Smart City is extremely pleased to be the first smart city in the country to partner India-EU ICT Standards Collaboration Project, College of Engineering, Pune and the important stakeholders for this unique and first of its kind initiative in Pune. It further builds upon our earlier efforts to foster a culture of innovation through our subsidiary, Pune Idea Factory Foundation (PIFF),” said Rajendra Jagtap, CEO, Pune Smart City.

“As Smart Cities transition from technology focused projects to data led technology programs, compliance to standards and interoperability become extremely critical for sustainability and subsequent scale up. Given the complex technology landscape in a Smart City, we are extremely pleased to be a part of this collaborative effort with some of the leading institutions within the country and globally to crowd source creative ideas and solutions from students and young adults,” said Manojit Bose, Chief Knowledge Officer of Pune Smart City.

Through the developer’s tutorial and hackathon, selected students from all over the country will learn how to develop smart city applications, which are standards-compliant and give their solutions a global reach. Pune Smart City will provide students access to current smart city challenges to see how they can be tackled. Students will be provided mentorship and technical assistance from project stakeholders. The team with the most creative solutions will win a fully-funded trip to Europe to visit a start-up. Prior to the hackathon in Pune, a developer’s tutorial will also be held at IIT Guwahati on 13 April.

Benoit Sauveroche from the EU Delegation to India reiterated the EU’s commitment to working with India on smart city solutions. “We’re excited to launch the third edition of Hackathon under the auspices of the India-EU ICT Standardisation project in Guwahati and Pune. Our first two editions, which took place in Bengaluru and Hyderabad, were hugely popular, and we believe we’ll see the same success here. All participants will get the opportunity to showcase their skills and creativity, and apply standards that will make future applications interoperable when they are deployed in smart cities. Hackathon winners will have the unique opportunity of travelling to Europe and attending a start-up event, where they will be able to develop contacts and nurture their entrepreneurial spirit.”

For more information on the event visit http://www.indiaeu-ictstandards.in/developers-tutorial-and-hackathon-april-2019/

More information on the India-EU ICT Standardisation Collaboration Project can be found here: http://www.indiaeu-ictstandards.in/