Technoglitch
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The industrial city of Jamshedpur in Jharkhand, while not on the official list of cities under the central government’s Smart Cities Mission, is gearing up to be one in all earnest. The city, also known as Tata Nagar, or Steel City, because of its industrial affiliation, is witnessing several internet of things (IoT) applications designed to make the lives of its 1-million-plus residents better.
“IoT is probably the biggest game-changer we are experiencing,” says Ashish Mathur, managing director of Jamshedpur Utilities and Services Co. Ltd (JUSCO), which provides utility services such as water, power and waste management in the city. JUSCO is a one-of-its-kind utility company in the country—carved out of Tata Steel from its Town Services Division in 2004—that provides the services as an integrated entity; elsewhere, different companies provide different utility services.
Such an integrated structure is an advantage in terms of better work coordination for multiple services, but Mathur insists that it should not detract from the “pioneering initiatives” JUSCO has undertaken in using technology to improve the people’s quality of life. “Our journey started almost 10 years back when JUSCO set up the first call centre, called JUSCO Sahyog Kendra, in the city to reach out to customers and address their issues with any of our services,” he says. The company kept using different technologies as they came along the way. “For instance, we were the first to start combined billing for all kinds of utility services and among the first to introduce e-billing, e-payments, etc,” he adds.
The company is now working on multiple IoT projects with Tata Communications Ltd, which has been rolling out specialized communication networks called LoRaWANs (Low Power Wide Area Networks or LPWANs; the specifications for these networks are standardized by a non-profit association of telecom firms from around the world called the LoRa Alliance. The idea behind a LoRa network is to provide a broad mechanism for devices (such as battery-powered sensors) to send relatively smaller amounts of data over larger distances while maintaining battery life for many years.
How Jamshedpur is becoming a smart city - Livemint
“IoT is probably the biggest game-changer we are experiencing,” says Ashish Mathur, managing director of Jamshedpur Utilities and Services Co. Ltd (JUSCO), which provides utility services such as water, power and waste management in the city. JUSCO is a one-of-its-kind utility company in the country—carved out of Tata Steel from its Town Services Division in 2004—that provides the services as an integrated entity; elsewhere, different companies provide different utility services.
Such an integrated structure is an advantage in terms of better work coordination for multiple services, but Mathur insists that it should not detract from the “pioneering initiatives” JUSCO has undertaken in using technology to improve the people’s quality of life. “Our journey started almost 10 years back when JUSCO set up the first call centre, called JUSCO Sahyog Kendra, in the city to reach out to customers and address their issues with any of our services,” he says. The company kept using different technologies as they came along the way. “For instance, we were the first to start combined billing for all kinds of utility services and among the first to introduce e-billing, e-payments, etc,” he adds.
The company is now working on multiple IoT projects with Tata Communications Ltd, which has been rolling out specialized communication networks called LoRaWANs (Low Power Wide Area Networks or LPWANs; the specifications for these networks are standardized by a non-profit association of telecom firms from around the world called the LoRa Alliance. The idea behind a LoRa network is to provide a broad mechanism for devices (such as battery-powered sensors) to send relatively smaller amounts of data over larger distances while maintaining battery life for many years.
How Jamshedpur is becoming a smart city - Livemint