Three Big Bs: Big Data, Bold Transparency, Better Insights

Data has always played a critical role in our lives right from the times unknown, from cave paintings in Bhimbetka to the new Surface Pro 3 in the markets. Data is in many ways entwined with knowledge, and that is with progress. But the transition from information to intelligence is deliberate one. Huge amounts of data are of no use, if it cannot be effectively used. Take the instance of the Apollo Mission, the Apollo guidance system that successfully landed Neil Armstrong on the Moon had just 64 kilobytes of memory and operated at 0.043 megahertz. Whereas modern-day smartphones, average one to two gigahertz, meaning that they are around 40,000 times faster. That is the way we are progressing in our power processing. But are we doing sufficient enough justice to all the data that we are generating, especially when it is generated in huge amounts by various systems of a city, from its municipality to its administrative services. The flow of data can be overwhelming. Can a smart city cope with this flow? Definitely not a cake-walk, is it?

But it’s a road that every city is either embarking upon or has already started confronting. Smart cities are endowed with an added layer of brilliance – that of rigorous transparency for citizens. This decade, specially has seen staggering examples of how citizens have demanded transparency as a staple and without any compromise whatsoever.

How can any government deliver that no matter how high its level of intent, when it is mired in data deluge that is striking every edifice with unrelenting force and unwarned disasters? Big Data crunched in a way that it is mashed into digestible insights and that too in real-time and without any adulteration – that’s quite a challenge.

Auckland, which inhabits some 1.4 million citizens and is New Zealand’s largest city, is already contemplating the scenario when it doubles its population by 2040. It has invested in advanced data center, desktop, and cloud-based software, and Auckland Transport, one of its sub-sets is empowering citizens with a wealth of new transportation services—such as filling bus cards online and reporting potholes from a Smartphone—and empowering employees to work more productively.  The website (https://at.govt.nz/) also offers a whole host of services like helping citizens plan their trips through online booking of bus and ferries, and provide realtime update on traffic and road blockages. Services like these make the life of citizens much easier and create a lot of positivity in general. Today, there are solutions out there which civic leaders can leverage to have access to data from any source, including sensors, building automation systems, and traffic cameras. Through analytics, that data can be advantageously turned into meaningful, actionable information that is accessible on devices of choice, empowering cities to reach citizens anywhere and provide the services they need.Data, anywhere today, whether a business enterprise or a government one is a huge question and it is not be fought against but fought with.

Look at how Spain has started planning its largest annual festival, La Mercé, where to test the feasibility of using Big Data, Barcelona went on to create the La Mercé service which gives government staff insight into structured and unstructured data related to the festival so that the city can improve the services that it provides and facilitate greater attendance. Collected data relates to the festival’s entertainment and food venues, citizen interest and satisfaction, people mobility, and incident detection.

Today’s cities need to empower their people, be it real-time insight for government workers or for citizens anytime, anywhere, and on their favorite devices without compromising security, privacy, or compliance.

When NASSCOM applauded the concept of a ‘Digital India’ that honourable PM Narendra Modi had chaperoned this year, its President, R. Chandrashekhar, President, had said, “The emphasis on e-governance, e-healthcare, e-education covering both urban and rural areas, manufacturing in India and public private partnerships is praiseworthy. NASSCOM will continue with its efforts to create the best global talent pool in India and make India digitally literate.”

Thanks to the right technology, digital literacy can assume new depths and impacts and through data and analytics, city leaders can gain vital real-time insights from multiple data sources—such as traffic cameras, social media, and other public channels—to make more accurate decisions, achieve greater efficiencies, and respond faster in emergency situations.

There have been some interesting case studies in this regard in India as well. The Bangalore Traffic Police use the FaceBook page to enable citizens to reach them in realtime and interact with the authorities. There have been numerous stories of how many issues were resolved because of postings on the page.

There are also a host of other services that are being provided by the government in form of property registrations, disaster management, traffic alerts, etc. All these are centric on the data that is generated and analysed dynamically with very little human interference or interface. The availability of data must be in a coherent form and could be readily used by the citizens.

Government IT spending in India is expected to touch $7.2 billion in 2015 according to Gartner and this would entail spending by the government sector (state and regional government and central government agencies) on internal IT (including personnel), hardware, software, external IT services and telecommunications. IT services could easily grow to reach $1.8 billion in 2015 and internal services will achieve a growth rate of 9.9 percent in 2014. Also, government spending on software will hit $910 million in 2015 and all this would be fuelled by the theme of ‘Less Government & More Governance’ with the idea of delivery of a citizen-centric and transparent government at the core. Something, that is only possible through the extensive use of technology and by leveraging digital government, as a Gartner analyst had reminded.

Government is expected to accentuate its focus on expanding broadband penetration, accelerating digitization of core government processes, leveraging mobility to engage the citizens, cloud initiatives and public private partnership and with ambitious plans to build several smart cities.

That’s just one way to illustrate how we can embrace this tough goal ahead. Smart processes are not dependent on the amount of data generated. Don’t forget that the three astronauts that flew out in an Apollo spacecraft, flying 8 days (four each side) and a total of 953,054 miles did so on computing power that is less than our smart phone. The same is true for man, and so it is for a city.