India’s population is exploding, and its urban infrastructure is struggling to keep pace. While startups are solving problems ranging from food delivery to laundry, there’s not enough interest among the startup community towards building smarter cities. That’s where Microsoft, in collaboration with the Indian government, comes in.
Microsoft has launched an initiative to help startups working on smart cities by lending them funds up to $1, 20,000 credit on Azure, Microsoft’s public cloud platform. The startups should be working for solutions to help smart cities. This was announced by the Company’s CEO, Satya Nadella at ‘Future Unleashed’ event in Mumbai.
The company has also created a scheme to help groups of startups market their integrated solutions as in smart cities as conceived by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the Smart Cities project. So far the government plans to have 100 such smart cities.
Some of the requirements of a smart cit are: basic infrastructure to provide a decent quality of life, a clean and sustainable environment, guaranteed electricity and water supply, good waste management systems, safety of citizens, egovernance, and other such prerequisites.
According to Ravi Narayan, Director at Microsoft, this initiative by the Company will help bridge the gap between governments and startups. “If you look at it, they are two ends of the spectrum. But working together there is scope to provide solutions, especially in new government initiatives like Smart Cities and Digital India,” he said.