The prospect of genuinely ‘smart’ UK cities has just moved one step closer with the launch of an initiative aimed at forging a common approach to the ‘internet of things’.The HyperCatCity initiative, which is backed by the Government’s Innovate UK Programme, brings together public bodies and some of the biggest names in private industry to discuss best practice for integrating smart technologies across the country’s infrastructure.
Research firm Gartner has projected that 4.9 billion ‘things’ – from tablets and toasters to clothes and medical devices –will be in use in 2015 – a 30% increase on the year before. That number is expected to soar to 25 billion by 2020.
At the the project’s core is the open and interoperable HyperCat IoT standard. Developed by IBM, BT and ARM in 2014 it gives developers a common platform and enables various smart devices and IP-enabled ‘things’ to communicate with one another.
Among the businesses signed up to participate are KPMG, Accenture, Symantec, Huawei, QinetiQ, Arquiva, Open Energi and Fujitsu.
Supporting the London infrastructure Plan HyperCatCity will first be piloted in the capital with the goal of assessing infrastructural needs for a city with a booming, eight-million-plus population.
Some £1.3tn will be invested in London’s infrastructure between 2016-2050, according to the Greater London Authority.
The London Datastore, which collates data from the Greater London Authority on a number of important quality-of-life parameters such as population, recorded crime and hours spent on the tube, has already ‘HyperCat-enabled’ its data.
HyperCatCity will subsequently roll out in Bristol and Milton Keynes.
The Bristol Is Open project has already resulted in the installation of smart energy metering and consequent 20% cuts in energy usage; solar panels that store energy in reused car batteries; and an air-quality monitoring application.
In Milton Keynes, meanwhile, BT has helped the local council introduce smart waste disposal and real-time monitoring of parking-space availability and streetlight maintenance needs (sensors notify the council when bulbs need replacing).
Speaking in the House of Lords this week Justin Anderson, who is running the HyperCatCity programme, said: “HyperCatCity is a powerful example of where the rubber hits the road when an entirely open, interoperable IoT specification is applied to real life smart city challenges, building better services for citizens and, ultimately, taking some of the friction out of people’s daily lives.
“It is also HyperCatCity’s collaborative approach that will see Britain take the unlikely lead in the global smart cities race.”
