Intel and Karnataka government to build systems and open data for automotive safety

The Karnataka government also signed an MoU with the French government to promote startups and help French firms understand the Indian market.

The Karnataka government and Intel, India have decided to work together to collect data from automobile drivers over the next nine months in Bengaluru. Priyank Kharge, IT-BT and Tourism Minister of Karnataka, and Nivruti Rai, Country Head of Intel India, signed an MoU in an effort to understand road safety and grey areas in infrastructure.

The technology will be provided by Intel, while the government will ask the traffic police to provide access to information about commuters. The data will be gathered from a box that will hold a SIM card provided by a telco and will be integrated onto the car as an anti-collision device based on radar, lidar technology, a remote sensing method that uses light to measure distance. These technologies are available in only high-end cars today.

This will be part of Intel’s IoT strategy and will build an open platform that can be used by all Indian states. The pilot will happen in Bengaluru.

“We can involve the big cab operators like Uber and Ola too to be part of this programme, because the city of Bengaluru will get all the details of the grey areas from these operators,” said Kharge.

Roy has been championing these technologies for a while now and believes that this platform can help several startups and companies build services on top of the data being collected on the platform. May be a Bosch and Continental could be part of this platform to help Intel and the Govt promote automotive safety through IOT. The challenge, however, will be to get a good data set and sample. “This is just the beginning and we are going to use the data to make sure citizens have services, and the government becomes accountable to provide great infrastructure,” Roy said.

The partnership comes at a time when road accidents are at an all-time high. According to data provided by the government, there were 4,80,000 road accidents in the country in 2016, and more than 1,37,000 people died last year due to road accidents.

Tie-up with the French

Additionally, renewing three centuries of partnership with the French, the Karnataka IT department and government agency Business France India signed an MoU to promote an exchange programme for startups and industry.

The programme will help French startups understand business in Karnataka and the same exchange programme will continue for startups from Bengaluru. There are over 250 French companies in Bengaluru and most of them are working to foster innovation in Karnataka.

France has more than 10,000 startups and is one of the top 10 innovative countries in the world. There are more than 1,000 French companies in India. French companies like Airbus and Dassault Systems are in Bengaluru and have already forged partnerships with the Karnataka government to promote startups.

“This MoU will enhance Karnataka’s role in developing emerging technologies. We will try to set up a centre of excellence for animation with the French in Bengaluru. They will also set up a startup hub in Bengaluru,” said Kharge.