Which UK city is set to become one of the smartest in the world?
Hull city council partners with IoT specialist to connect services and systems
Hull is piloting a scheme which will see it become the first "programmable" city in the UK using an Internet of Things (IoT) foundation.
The city council is partnering with IoT specialist Connexin to create a purpose-built Smart City Operating System (OS) which will connect essential council services and centralise information to develop a better quality of life for the city's inhabitants.
The council will use Connexin's CityOS platform to analyse. manage and respond to data from an array of council services and systems using a single intelligent dashboard.
The platform will integrate current and future data from IoT devices, such as smart lighting, parking and waste management.
Councillor Daren Hale, deputy leader of Hull city council said that the project will improve the council's decision-making which will positively impact services from traffic management to health and social care.
"Developing Hull as a smart city will give us the opportunity to work with public and private sector partners to deliver real benefits to communities, businesses and visitors to Hull," he said.
"Residents will receive better information to make choices about transport, traffic and parking.
"As the project develops, it will create a demand for new digitally skilled workforce in the city, so we will need to invest in skills and training for younger generations so they are prepared for the new types of jobs that will be created in the digital sector."
Connexin's CityOS is built on the Cisco Kinetic for Cities platform, which transforms data from a range of IoT sensors into a set of urban service domains, including waste, light and parking.
It has over 70 Cisco certified integrations which the vendor actively maintains and updates.
Furqan Alamgir, founder and CEO of Connexin, stated: "We're thrilled to be partnering up with our home city and are committed to making Hull a world-leading smart city to foster economic development and enhance many aspects of liveability, workability and sustainability.
"Our platform will enable Hull to become a "programmable city" and move from outdated siloed service driven technologies to a central platform to improve service delivery, reduce costs and to make the most of new technologies such as IoT, AI and machine learning algorithms.
"The Connexin and Cisco partnership gives Hull the ability to manage sensors from multiple vendors in one place removing the reliance on legacy systems and their associated costs."
Scot Gardner, chief exec of Cisco UK & Ireland, added: "When you start to think of a city as programmable, there are opportunities to not only improve individual services with technology but use combined data insight from those services to create a holistic, actionable view for local authorities."