IIT Madras to coordinate international project on Smart
Cities
Chennai: Indian Institute of
Technology Madras is coordinating an international project on ‘Smart Cities’
with leading Indian and European Technical Higher Education Institutions.
The Institute has taken up this initiative as part of the
Heritage Network, an Indo-European network of twenty leading Technical Higher
Education Institutions. They collaborate on research and academic activities
that address common priorities of national interest and wellbeing of society.
The network aims to achieve these goals by identifying partner institution/s in
the network and undertaken joint research projects, academic and research
exchanges, industry partnerships
A ‘Smartcity working group’ was constituted during the 2nd
General Assembly Meeting of Heritage Network hosted by IIT Madras on 6th and
7th February 2018. Representatives of European and Indian partner institutes
participated in the meeting to formulate a workable action plan for the Heritage
Network consortium.
During this meeting, IIT Madras and IIT Kanpur were chosen as
Indian Coordinators to coordinate the activities and action plans on Smart
Cities with Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM) and KTH Royal Institute of
Technology, Stockholm being selected as the European coordinators.
Speaking about the project, Prof R. Nagarajan, Dean
(International and Alumni Relations), IIT Madras, said, “IIT Madras greatly
values partnerships with leading academic institutions and industry around the
world. Networks such as this provide us with an opportunity to collaborate
simultaneously with several global institutions on topics of current relevance
to society.”
Prof Fouad Bennis, President of Heritage Network and Director
for International Relations, Ecole Centrale de Nantes, France, Mr. Raj
Cherubal, CEO of the Chennai Smart City Mission, and Dr. Ashwin Mahalingam,
Associate Professor, Building Technology and Construction Management Division,
Department of Civil Engineering, IIT Madras, delivered addresses on Day One of
the 2nd General Assembly meeting.
A brainstorming session was held with subject matter experts
from the Heritage Network member institutions who are working on
Smartcity-related subfields during the 2nd General Assembly meeting.
The Smartcity working group has decided to have a few
intermediate follow-up meetings before the next annual GA meeting in 2019 and a
dedicated workshop on Smartcity to evaluate the progress of the working group
during the next annual GA meeting in 2019.
The meeting also kickstarted the Heritage Network Workshop
Series. The idea is to conduct a thematic workshop along with the annual GA
meetings each year, on topics/areas of mutual interest/importance to both
Europe and India. Various aspects such as exchange programs, research
cooperation, industry participation, funding channels, policy engagement and
outreach activities were discussed to draft a roadmap for the Heritage Network.
Potential short-term, mid-term and long-term action plans were
identified in terms of educational programs/ exchange possibilities, research
collaboration, industrial involvement and joint-funding opportunities between
Indian and European partner institutions.
In addition to the existing partners, four more institutes, two
each from India (IIT Dhanbad and IIT Roorkee) and Europe (UPM, Madrid and KTH,
Sweden), became members of the Heritage Network through a formal voting
procedure.
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