A talk about the smart city with Ericsson’s Beverly Rider
AUSTIN, Texas–In a big-picture talk about the smart city on Monday, Beverly Rider, vice president of enterprise IoT and smart cities for Ericsson, spoke to RCR Wireless News at Galvanize in Austin, Texas.
Rider began the discussion by making it clear that every city requires a different approach based on their unique challenges and resources.
“I don’t think there is a true definition for ‘smart city,’” Rider said. “Every city has its own character and mission what it’s going to accomplish based on what citizens want. I think there are some European cities that have really leapfrogged, but sometimes to their own detriment. And sometimes where they are doing so many things so quickly, and stepping five steps ahead, where the citizens aren’t catching up to them. In the U.S. I think Austin is doing a very good job, Portland is doing a very good job. On the East Coast I see some cities have made a marked improvement year-after-year.”
But one location that nearly all cities seem to be focusing on are airports. Airports are the doors to every city, and are becoming an important piece for IoT implementation.
“Airport is the handshake to the city for most people. I see a lot of concentration on airports in particular. Almost every city in the world is looking at their airport as their entry point, as their handshake, and from there how do we make that visitor experience a good one. I have probably 25 cities talking about airports all at the same time.”
When asked what the future of the smart city is, Rider said she wants to bring the fun back into cities by getting people to work together to find a solution.
“I think that there has to be a diametric shift. So there has to be a shift to wanting to share information, not hold on to information – to work together and not stay in your silo, and there needs to be a shift to adopt change not for change’s sake. If I could have the best of the best I would take components of every single city and make a showcase of that.”
The floor opened up for questions where Rider was asked which network she believes would win out the battle to become the go-to IoT low-powered network.
“I do think 5G will permeate, and I think that is a result of the larger operators going that direction. I think it will be a combination of all [networks]. I think the speed and efficiency of rollout is surprising to me.”
Rider then gave her 11 year-old son’s definition of 5G.
“Better, faster, quicker, less bandwidth and then tons of bandwidth.”
With the rapidly approaching 5G network and the growing demand from cities to implement IoT solutions, the possibilities of the effect on our infrastructure is nearly limitless.
“There are no rules, all bets are off,” Rider said. “There are things that have developed that every city needs. Transportation, parking, bike lanes, access to multi-mode - those come up in every single city. I don’t know where the end is, right when I think we’ve reached the end something else comes out.”
