Top executives of Cisco Systems have informed Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu that Visakhapatnam would be first taken up for development as Smart City among other cities chosen from Gujarat, Rajasthan and Maharashtra.
Mr. Naidu interacted through a video call with Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Cisco Padmasree Warrior and president (Globalization and Smart+Connected Communities) for Cisco Systems, Anil Menon.
Sharing his experience of working on smart cities, Mr Menon informed the Chief Minister that the development model adopted by Cisco for Visakhapatnam would be replicated in other cities too.
He said Cisco would focus on setting up a skill development centre and provide training through Global Talent Tracker (GTT). The company was also keen on working with Andhra Pradesh in digitising education and healthcare.
For this, the Chief Minister said a task force would be constituted to follow up on the implementation. Cisco has also evinced interest in working on disaster management technologies.
Stating that Vizag has great potential to transform into a financial, IT powerhouse and a logistics hub, he said the Centre recently sanctioned the Sagarmala project.
Stating that Reliance has come forward to provide 4G services in 524 towns, the Chief Minister asked Ms. Padmasree to adopt a village under the “Smart Village – Smart Ward” initiative. IT secretary B. Sreedhar and Joint Secretary Pradyumna were present.
