Cisco's next big target: the networked city

Stuart Corner
Sunday, 15 February 2009 00:57

IT Industry - Market

When you're a company as big as Cisco any new market you enter has to be worth potentially, billions of dollars, and Cisco's latest target is 'intelligent urbanisation'.

With great fanfare last week the company launched, in India, 'Intelligent Urbanisation', billed as "a global initiative to help cities around the world use the network as the next utility for integrated city management, better quality of life for citizens, and economic development."

Cisco CEO, John Chambers explained it thus: "In a world where all things are becoming connected, the network has become the next utility, enabling the holistic, intelligent and environmentally sustainable creation and management of cities, industries and public services."

He added: "With the number of people living in urban areas growing from three billion today to five billion by 2030, urbanisation is a global trend impacting citizens, governments, and industries. This trend will also significantly impact the environment - the 20 most populous cities alone are responsible for 75 percent of the planet's energy consumption. "

Cisco promises that its 'Intelligent Urbanisation' initiative will "bring together a broad portfolio of Cisco's products, services, partners and solutions...with the initial focus on global sustainable solutions for public safety and security, transportation, buildings, energy, healthcare and education."

While the great unveiling might have taken place this week the concept has been alive and well within Cisco for several years. In September 2006 it created Connected Urban Development, "born from Cisco's commitment to the Clinton Global Initiative to participate in helping reduce carbon emissions."

According to its web site, CUD's founding cities were San Francisco, Amsterdam, and Seoul. In 2008 they were joined by Birmingham (UK), Hamburg, Lisbon, and Madrid. CUD aims to "demonstrates how to reduce carbon emissions by introducing fundamental improvements in the efficiency of the urban infrastructure through information and communications technology (ICT)."
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