Hyderabad, The International Institute of Information Technology Hyderabad (IIITH) on Tuesday announced that Silicon Labs – a leading provider of silicon, software and solutions for a smarter, more connected world – is the corporate founding partner for its new Smart City Living Lab.

Silicon Labs is the first private company to join as a founding partner. Hyderabad is the home of Silicon Labs' newest and fastest-growing wireless development center, the Institute said in a release here.

The mission of the Smart City Living Lab is to provide a research and development ecosystem for next-generation technologies designed to improve safety, sustainability, energy efficiency, sanitation, and overall quality of life in densifying cities.

The Smart City Living Labs, part of IIITH’s Smart City Research Center, is supported by the Government of India’s Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Smart Cities Mission, the Government of Telangana, European Business and Technology Centre (EBTC), and Amsterdam Innovation Arena.

“This unique private, public and academia will catalyse the nation's goal in enabling 100 smart cities in the next 5 years. The complementary skills and knowledge that Silicon Labs and Living Lab have will help future -proof our cities of tomorrow,” said Dr Ajai Garg Senior Director, MeitY.

“Silicon Labs is honored to be the first corporate founding partner for IIITH’s Smart City Living Lab,” said Dr. Manish Kothari, Vice President, Silicon Labs India.

While private companies like Silicon Labs focus on solutions that address market needs, academia will focus on building new knowledge through research and imparting education. The combination is expected to yield accelerated development of new breakthroughs.

“Collaboration between industry and academia is key to fuel innovation and growth in technology,” opined Ramesh Loganathan, Professor- Co-Innovation and Head Research/Innovation Outreach, IIITH.

“Silicon Labs’ expertise in designing compelling wireless devices will enhance our efforts of building an innovation ecosystem for smart cities.”

Commenting on the collaboration, Vincent van Noord, Director Europe at European Business and Technology Centre said, “We are very happy to have Silicon Labs as one of the Corporate Founding Partners in the Lab. The focus for Silicon Labs is to work/develop/test solutions and products together with like minded counterparts which can then be demonstrated and showcased in the Lab.

The Smart City Living Lab plays a part in the Government of India’s Smart Cities Mission, a new initiative to drive economic growth and improve the quality of life of people by enabling local development and harnessing technology to create smart outcomes for citizens.

In this ambitious project, 100 cities are being covered for the duration of five years with a budget of Rs.100 crore per city per year.
(Agencies)