India's innovative smart city solution providers 2021
1. Importance of Smart Cities
Essential Infrastructure
for Businesses in Smart Cities
Tech-Topia
Why do Businesses
Need Smart Cities?
Elevating Lifestyle with Innovation
India's Innovative
Solution Providers - 2021
Mr. Manish Mehan
CEO and MD
www.insightssuccess.in
VOL-10
ISSUE-01
2021
2.
3.
4. Editor’s Note
hen the government of India launched its
Wambitious Smart City Mission in 2015, little did
anyone expect the project to be implemented so
promptly. But this was not just another government project
that would be shoved under the table for years before being
pulled out, dusted, and then implemented. In fact, this
ongoing project is already transforming cities to make them
liveable.
Smart cities will enable citizens to lead a quality life
through local area development and enhance the city's
economic growth. By 2023, around 4,000 cities of India
with a population of 5,00,000 each are expected to be smart
cities.
Making the most of available resources and making cities
liveable, sustainable with basic infrastructure, clean and
sustainable environment with smart solutions are the goals
of the mission.
Harnessing technology for smart outcomes is one of the
significant components of the mission. Needless to say, that
just like Rome was not built in a day, smart city project too
will need the time and involvement of various entities,
including people. To harness technology for smart
development, smart solution providers come to the picture
with their innovative and hi-tech solutions.
SMART
TECHNOLOGIES
TRANSFORMING
THE QUALITY
OF LIFE IN
INDIAN CITIES
5. Be it the roads, transport, government or commercial
complexes, geo-mapping, traffic control and signals, smart
parking, clean environment, and water; digitalization will
be rife in Indian cities.
Using the latest technologies like Artificial
Intelligence/Machine Learning, the Internet of Things,
sensors, blockchain/geospatial technology, and many more,
the smart city project is on a spree to transform the lives of
cities in India. So, automatic monitoring of traffic signals,
e-toilets, e-classrooms, user-friendly roads, health, public
safety, water management, smart streetlights, and much
more are being implemented in cities across the country.
The government of India’s prestigious project that was
initially targeted for 100 cities has now been extended to
more than 4,000 cities and looks promising till date with the
ongoing works. As long as the smart city mission goes on,
there will be a need for smart solutions, and the project is a
continuous process. The solution providers are already
doing their best. Taking cognizance of their contribution in
aiding the Smart City Mission to succeed, we at Insights
Success featured some of the smart city solution providers
in our latest edition, India’s Innovative Smart City Solution
Providers, 2021.
Please read about the exciting journey of these solution
providers and the smart solutions they employ for our ease
of living.
- Sumita Sarkar
Sumita Sarkar
Editor-in-Chief
sumita@insightssuccess.com
6. C O N T
E N T S
A R T I C L E S
Elevate Parking Systems
and Lifts
Enabling Innovative and
Advanced Parking Solutions
ITSPE
Providing Smart Solutions
for Traffic Mobility
Videonetics Technology
Making the World Safer
and Smarter
Importance of Smart Cities
Essential Infrastructure
for Businesses in Smart Cities
Tech-Topia
Why do Businesses
Need Smart Cities?
20 24
32
16 28
9. Management Brief
Hospital Name
Mr. Anil Agarwal
Founder
HEINRICH
Karanpal Singh
CEO
ITS Planners and
Engineers Private Limited
Elevate Parking Systems
Mr. Jitendra Singh
Managing Director
CIMCON Lighting, part of Quantela, Inc., is the industry leader
in smart streetlights and smart city platforms.
Elevate Parking Systems prides itself in terms of quality of
products offered to the clients.
HEINRICH strives to achieve an enviable position in setting
the leading standards in Life Safety and Automation through
top quality products and services
ITSPE provides state of the art solutions for managing various
ITS and smart cities infrastructure in an efficient manner.
CIMCON Lighting
Mr. Ayush Agarwal
Chief Commercial Officer
TK Elevator
Established in 2002, TK Elevator (India) installs, maintains and
modernizes elevators and escalators in India and Bangladesh.
Mr. Manish Mehan
CEO and
Managing Director
India's Innovative
Solution Providers - 2021
Videonetics Technology
Pvt. Ltd.
Videonetics has been ranked #1 Video Management Software
provider in India, and among the top 5 in Asia (IHS/Informa
Tech Research).
Dr Tinku Acharya
Founder and
Managing Director
10. Elevating Lifestyle with Innovation
levator
TK Elevator also offers
moving walks and escalators
that make journeys over long
spans faster, safer, and almost
effortless for passengers
India's Innovative
Solution Providers - 2021
12. here has been a global
Tmovement towards smarter
cities, acknowledging the
power of technology to make daily
lives easier and safer whilst providing
customized experiences. Within the
elevator industry, this movement has
been represented by the adoption of
smart, connected and remotely
monitored and managed elevators.
Whether it is a new installation,
modernization or carrying out routine
maintenance, TK Elevator is
committed to delivering professional,
dependable, and timely responses to
customer requests always.
TK Elevator’s expertise in providing
customized solutions for large
infrastructure and demanding high-rise
projects makes its products a perfect
match for the key growth sectors in the
Indian construction industry.
Having established a base of over 2100
employees across an extensive network
of four regional offices, 23 Branches
and 74 Service and Response Centres
in India, the company is determined to
serve its customers on a 24/7 basis
even at the remotest locations. With its
multi-purpose factory at Chakan, Pune
providing product and R&D support to
its customers and professional team,
TK Elevator is all set to tap the
growing elevator market of India.
In the Business of Moving People
TK Elevator (formerly known as
thyssenkrupp Elevator) specializes in
providing advanced solutions for
moving people from one place to
another: vertically and horizontally.
TK Elevator employs a highly trained
and dedicated workforce of over 900
service team members, maintaining
over 25,000 units across India. The
company’s portfolio comprises a wide
13. range of passenger and freight elevators, escalators, and moving walks that are industry-leading
in terms of engineering and technology. Its extensive range of machine room-less (MRL), as
well as machine room (MR) products, ensures that it always has the right products to cater for
the needs of low to mid-and high-rise projects.
TK Elevator also offers premium high-speed elevators that are customized for super high-rise
projects, and customized mobility solutions for commercial projects, malls and shopping
complexes, hospitals, and hotels. For situations where outright performance is not a primary
criterion, but functional excellence, reliability, and durability remain essential. The company’s
range of practical mid/low-speed elevators provide excellent value for leaner budgets.
Inspiration Behind Stepping into the Field
India is at the forefront of information technology development, world-class solutions, and
support are locally available for cloud applications, artificial intelligence (AI) and big data,
which gives the company an advantage in bringing the latest technologies to the local market.
14.
15. At present, affordable and reliable run-
of-the-mill products and solutions still
account for a majority of the demand
for elevators and escalators in India, as
the country continues to urbanize.
Although it will still take time for the
local market to shift its demand to the
higher end of the product spectrum, the
company sees smart cities as the future
direction and its advantage in
leveraging local IT support to make its
smart mobility solutions more reliable
and accessible to customers in India.
As a market leader and to stay ahead of
the competition, TK Elevator has made
the R&D and promotion of its smart
building and city solutions a high
priority in India. As more high-end
construction and infrastructure
projects, which emphasize
sustainability and speed gain
popularity in the Indian market, the
TKE brand will be one of the best-
known names in India for energy-
efficient, AI-assisted, centrally
managed and maintained elevator
solutions.
Box Full of Benefits
TK Elevator’s TEAMService brings
the industry’s most comprehensive
approach to keeping people moving
safely and reliably, by offering
systematic and stress-free maintenance
service to customers. It has the
resources and capability to service,
maintain, and source replacement parts
even for the third party manufactured
units so that its customers can rest
assured that their entire portfolio of
escalators and/or elevators regardless
of the manufacturer is in the good
hands of TK Elevator.
To ensure seamless service and utmost
safety, the company has also rolled out
a practice of ‘Preventative
Maintenance’ for some of its major
customers. Under such maintenance
arrangement, critical parts of the
elevators/escalators will be directly
replaced by new parts once they have
reached their expected component life
span, even if they are still functioning
properly.
Maintenance aside, modernization
(MOD) is another key service TK
provides to elevators and escalators
operated by its customers. Its
manufacturing facility and technical
team can renew and modernize
escalators and elevators of any make,
the modernized units will conform to
the strictest quality and safety
standards same as TKE-manufactured
units.
Among other product enhancements,
TK Elevator has developed the
following game-changing signature
solutions to cater for the needs of smart
buildings and cities:
• MULTI: MULTI is the world’s
first rope-free elevator that moves
multiple cars in a single shaft
vertically and horizontally and
reduces elevators’ footprint while
increasing passenger throughput.
• MULTI is set to revolutionize tall
building construction. With
MULTI’s rope-free system,
architects and developers are no
longer restricted in their designs by
concerns about elevator shaft
height and vertical alignment.
MULTI opens the door to design
possibilities in all directions.
• TWIN: The TWIN elevator system
consists of two cabs that operate in
the same shaft independent of each
other. Both cabs operate under the
same intelligent group control
system and are equipped with an
innovative quadruple redundancy
safety system. It uses less energy
while transporting more passengers
than conventional elevators.
• MAX: MAX is a game-changing
predictive and pre-emptive service
solution that extends remote
monitoring capabilities to increase
current availability levels of
existing and new elevators.
Utilizing the power of Microsoft
Azure Internet of Things (IoT)
technology, MAX makes it possible
for an elevator to ‘tell’ service
technicians its real needs, including
identification of repairs, component
replacements, and proactive system
maintenance.
Overcoming Challenges
TK Elevator invests significant
resources in R&D. Its products are
designed with a simple philosophy of
higher efficiency, fewer maintenance
intervals, and lower associated
emissions. Strong design and
engineering are its core strengths,
which form the basis of the business.
Meanwhile, many parts of India are
still at their early stage of urbanization,
which means TK Elevator must strike a
balance in satisfying the massive
demand for reliable and quality
mobility products. At the same time
introducing to the market state-of-the-
art advanced mobility solutions that
utilize assorted smart technologies to
make elevators and escalators more
efficient, and more user and
environment friendly.
Beating the Pandemic
The Covid-19 outbreak has had a
severe impact on society and the
economy, it also changes how people
travel, commute, and conduct business
activities. Passengers have become
more conscious about elevators
hygiene and safety protocols, while
businesses, property owners, and
managers are looking into monitoring
their mobility assets without the need
of being on-site.
16. Inevitably with lock-down
arrangements in place, the company’s
efforts to meet with and provide
service to the customers have been
affected during the most severe period.
To cope with these challenges, TK
Elevator has been working hard to
provide solutions for safer rides and
more efficient ways to remotely
monitor and manage its units amid the
pandemic, and most of the solutions
have been based on digital
enhancements and technologies.
Protecting the health and safety of the
customers, employees and
communities during the pandemic has
been the most important and
challenging task for the company, the
TK Elevator team has remained
committed to serving its customers and
continued to support businesses while
observing all recommended safety
precautions.
It has conducted a vaccination drive to
protect the health and safety of its
employees, and to give its customers
the peace of mind to work with them.
Despite all these challenges, the
service and installation teams have
gone against all odds to provide round
the clock support during these
unfavourable circumstances for its
customers.
Words from the Best
The idea of building a smart city aims
to improve the quality of urban living,
make horizontal and vertical travels
easier and reduce its impact on the
environment.
When coming up with solutions for a
smart city, the company’s advice for
the younger generation is to focus on
how their solution would improve lives
and what kind of additional value it
will bring forth to the society; this is
exactly the rationale behind the various
next-generation mobility solutions. As
cities urbanize and vertical
transportation becomes a necessity,
company’s in-car infotainment and
connectivity solutions make elevator
rides more pleasant and productive.
Mobile phone-based remote calling
solutions not only shorten the wait time
for elevator rides but also make your
daily vertical travel completely
touchless, safe from harmful germs and
bacteria.
By offering the possibility to operate
two independent elevator cars in the
same shaft, its signature TWIN
elevator system effectively reduces
energy use and as a result the carbon
footprint of vertical travels; this is just
another example among many, of how
TK Elevator invest its resources and
efforts in making urban living more
sustainable and user-friendly.
Trailblazing Towards Tomorrow
The company’s long-term business
strategy is to continue growing by
offering ingenious, customized, and
energy-efficient mobility solutions. It is
also determined to strengthen its share
in the maintenance and service
business by promoting and leveraging
its extensive experience in the industry.
With its state-of-the-art multi-purpose
facility (MPF) in Pune, configured in
line with the Indian government’s
‘Make in India’ initiative to promote
innovation and local manufacturing,
the company is determined to serve
every customer with quality local-
manufactured elevators and escalators.
It is also keen to grow with the
communities it operates in, by creating
more local employment opportunities
in its sales and service branches and
manufacturing locations.
TK Elevator spares no efforts and
resources in fostering innovation. Its
84,000 square-metre multi-purpose
facilities (MPF) was established with
an investment of about Rs.300 Cr. It
includes manufacturing and logistics
centre, customer showroom with
experience centre, training centre and
R&D centre. The facility was designed
with future expandability in mind, with
an initial capacity of manufacturing
6,000 elevator units, extendable to over
10,000 units in the foreseeable future.
Its Pune multi-purpose facility (MPF)
will enable the company to
significantly expand in the region and
support the increasing growth of the
Indian construction sector, driven by
strong urbanization.
Current Industry Insights
India is one of the fastest and largest
growing markets for smart cities due to
government initiatives and wide and
advanced adoption of technology. The
smart cities mission of the government
of India is based on a sustainable and
inclusive development approach. The
mission aims to create a model that can
be replicated, catalysing the creation of
similar smart cities in various parts of
the country.
As per Ministry of Housing & Urban
Affairs recent report, Smart Cities
Mission (SCM) is being implemented
in 100 cities. As on 30 June,2021,
2,734 projects worth ₹ 46,769 crore
have been completed. Therefore,
investing in the development of
mobility solutions to serve the needs of
smart cities is not only a forward-
looking business decision but also TK
Elevator’s commitment to upholding
corporate responsibility and growing
with India.
19. It is the time of rapid growth and change. Smart city is
the change required for better lifestyle and
sustainability. However, the evolutionary idea of smart
city can only be noticed in only a few developing cities
now. This concept is yet to set a firm footing in the rural
areas and needs time to be a fully developed concept.
Smart cities give us the sheer satisfaction of infrastructure
benefits, smart solutions, low maintenance, and safety
precautions. The concentration should be on developing a
society with all benefits possible.
Smart cities are just not maintaining societies, creating
high-tech buildings, and giving exceptional interior. But it
is a whole package that can ease your personal and
professional life.
Giving your home all benefits of smart kitchen, smart
parking, and smart locks is mainstream. However, giving
your workplace all the benefits should be the priority. With
the advanced concept of green architecture, solar services,
and recycling; smart cities are the best solutions for
business advancement.
Importance of Smart Cities
OCTOBER 2021 | 17 | www.insightssuccess.in
20. Workplaces require smart solutions for the enhancement of
industries. In the present scenario, not all workplaces have
essential infrastructural components. Giving those
components will boost the industries with sustainable and
useful changes.
Let's see what are things that will add a finer touch to your
business infrastructure.
Ÿ Green Architecture
Pollution's devasting effect on environment has been
extreme in past few years, contributing to lessening of
natural resources. Green architecture can be practised to
save the planet and use needful number of resources.
The growth of mankind has a huge impact on natural
environment. The making of buildings, house, factories can
grab the unwanted number of natural resources. Green
architecture can save the number of resources, which we
spend on creating fancy buildings. The amount of water and
electricity that is wasted can be reduced to normal if we use
green architecture.
Construction of anything is the most solid base of growth.
Using sustainable resources from the scratch will bring the
needed change and stability to the premises. Uniqueness
and sustainability would be the best combination till date.
Green buildings use less water, less energy, and create less
waste that will be healthier to live with. Green building
contractors incorporate the techniques that use recourses
carefully and more effectively during constructing,
renovation, and demolition.
Ÿ Solar Services
Cities are transforming their infrastructure to capitalize on
new technologies and integrate connected solutions into the
very foundation of how they operate and care for their
citizens.
Solar services are one of the most evolving platforms right
now. People who provide with sustainable solutions are not
only pushing the world to use solar services but also
evolving its services with every passing day.
Solar energy plays a big role in creating smart cities. Some
major benefits of using solar services are, it is eco-friendly,
reduces electricity bill, easy to maintain, and easy to install.
Including solar panels to the infrastructure of the building
will be the boom for the smart businesses.
Ÿ Recycling
More people are starting to move in city areas for better
jobs, education, and different opportunities. As much as the
population increases, so does the traffic, garbage, and
pollution.
The technology in the field of smart waste management
includes the use of sensors that measure the fill level of the
trash bin. Precise data is then sent to the cloud for further
process and analysis. By using this data, trash collection
can be planned as well as truck routes can be optimized.
Recycling is a must do for the surrounding to be cleaner
and greener. It takes care of the healthy environment
allowing optimization of the utilities and prevents
overloading of the carrier of the waste disposal.
Ÿ Seamless communication
In a smart city, communication between many systems and
sensors is critical. Without them, the smart city cannot
properly redistribute resources and improve the lives of its
inhabitants. Policymakers in a smart city have access to all
of the information they could possibly need to make
educated choices.
Smart cities utilise intelligent solutions to improve
infrastructure as well as smart and responsive government
to include residents in municipal administration. A network
of sensors, networks, and apps gathers important data such
as traffic congestion, energy use, and Co2 levels, which
makes life easy.
- Sayali Sangewar
OCTOBER 2021 | 18 | www.insightssuccess.in
21.
22. Mohammed Zakir
Operation Manager
Today's rapidly changing
modern world is fuelled by
innovative technologies that
are instrumental in transforming the
quality of human life. The Indian
economic development is steered by
convenience, comfort, and ease. As
smart cities are growing, smart parking
systems are gaining traction too.
Mechanical parking systems in smart
cities provide a better user experience
and help decongest traffic and reduce
pollution.
Parking lots and parking decks usually
have a limited amount of space
available for vehicles. It may not be
feasible to extend the boundaries of a
parking lot or construct another
parking deck in many cases, thus
limiting the number of cars parked.
This problem affects many residential,
commercial, and hospitality projects in
the metros, where plots are relatively
smaller.
Elevate Parking Systems and Lifts
provide innovative parking solutions
that can be customized according to the
requirements of site plans and
construction ideas. The company wants
to bridge the gaps that are currently
lurking in the industry.
While in an exclusive interview with
Insights Success, Karanpal Singh, the
Managing Director of the company,
sheds some light on his way of
handling the firm and the services that
the company provides. Following are
the highlights of the interview:
Please brief us about Elevate
Parking in detail.
Elevate Parking Systems was born in
2013. As the name suggests, we
wanted to elevate the car parking
system industry with our creative
ideas, unique designs, and innovative
solutions. Urbanisation has led to a
dearth of parking spaces. Research
indicates that 30% of traffic jams solely
happen because of parking issues, and
one million barrels of oil are consumed
every day in search of parking space.
The official parking space available in
cities as compared to an increasing
number of vehicles is relatively less.
This has led to frustration, stress,
chaos, and wastage of time for citizens
while searching for parking space
availability.
We engineered innovative ideas. We
busted age-old parking industry myths.
We unshackled the high operating
costs, and we partnered with clients to
give them bespoke holistic parking
system solutions that fit the project
development needs.
Within a short span of eight years, we
have come a long way. We still have a
lot to achieve. We shaped our company
to provide robust, economical, and
technologically advanced parking
system solutions. We sat behind a
driver's seat to understand what goes
through his mind while searching or
waiting for parking space availability.
We felt the frustration. We felt the
irritation and pain one went through
because of the lack of parking space.
The idea of forming Elevate Parking
was to provide intelligent parking
systems, which solved parking issues
that the end-users would cherish
regarding usage, the cost to operate,
optimum space utilisation, and
minimal downtime. Elevate Parking
has achieved various milestones in
these eight years, with most of our
projects being non-standard, specially
designed systems. We have provided
over 10,000 parking spaces so far. Our
prime objective was to save our clients'
money without compromising quality
through creative design solutions.
What inspired you to become a
smart city solution provider?
The goal of Smart City is to reduce
operational costs, improve city
management, enhance effectiveness,
Enabling Innovative and Advanced Parking Solutions
India's Innovative Smart City Solution Provider - 2021
OCTOBER 2021 | 20 | www.insightssuccess.in
23. and improve productivity. Today every
square foot of the city is already
constructed without proper planning
for parking spaces. Searching for open
parking on roads has become a painful
exercise, so much so that stepping out
of the house, be it for work, leisure, or
emergency, is now taking a mental toll
on people.
The complex, small plot sizes in cities
faced challenges to accommodate the
required amount of parking for cars on
the roads. Creating parking structures
in such cities is a major planning
challenge. This is where smart parking
solutions, which are a synchronous
integration of mechanical parking,
surface parking, technology, and
people, come to the rescue. To be
aligned with smart city goals with a
defined structured parking
management system is necessary today.
The combination of convenience and
security gives an edge over
conventional parking methods and
helps save time in a big way.
What kind of services do you
provide to your clients?
First of all, it's not clients but partners.
In our company, we refer clients as
partners. We partner with them not as
vendors but as equal partners, which is
why we provide bespoke solutions that
fit their needs. For us, the relationship
must be a relentless one, and hence
when we take a project, we not only
hear what the client requires but
always start from the basics, that is,
building a rapport.
We never run after companies. We
bond with people in companies, and
then if business comes our way, it's our
blessing and boon. Providing vertical
parking reformations is the core of our
business. We manufacture
A Mul -talented Personality
The Managing Director, Karanpal Singh of Elevate Parking Systems, believes
that me is equal to happiness. Quality me is the key to produc vity and
key to successful family life. He believes that if you iden fy challenges and
have the knack to solve problems, then no ma er what, you can deal with
the toughest of circumstances and situa ons. A complete peoples' person,
Karanpal Singh believes that no ma er how technologically and digitally
advanced the world becomes, people are driven by their heart and mind.
He iden fied these emo ons at the core of all parking problems and
issues, which reflected in the form of frustra on, anger, irrita on, wastage
of me due to traffic conges on. He resonated with these emo ons and
came up with user-friendly, efficient automated parking solu ons to
enhance the quality of life. For him, every problem was an opportunity. He
has been instrumental in the growth and func oning of his company. A
self-made man, it is his dream to lessen people's woes of parking issues.
He gave up his high-paying job as a nau cal engineer in the Navy to start
Elevate Parking Systems and has proved to be a man of ideas and solu ons
over the years. A constant learner, concept creator, solu on provider, he
wears various thinking hats to perform key roles and responsibili es within
the organisa on. But above it all, he owes the company's growth to his
employees, who are very close to his heart and takes all necessary steps to
make life easy for them.
OCTOBER 2021 | 21 | www.insightssuccess.in
24. technologically advanced car parking
systems that are user-friendly. We
design, manufacture, install and service
automated parking systems. From
Semi-Automatic, Automatic to Robotic
parking systems - we have it all.
When we take on a project, we start
with the groundwork of space
assessment, creative ideas, and
brainstorming, innovative methods,
unique designs and elevate to engineer
the system through precision and
perfection. We create an impact
through our on-the-spot solutions,
which is our biggest advantage. We
always leave behind an idea,
irrespective of whether we get the
project or not.
What challenges have you faced
while entering the field of smart city
solutions, and how did you
transform these challenges into
opportunities –
One of the biggest challenges we faced
was the preference and proliferation of
large and reputed parking companies to
build and install parking systems. They
provided solutions where the operating
and maintenance costs were exorbitant
and lacked a holistic solution, which in
the long run was ultimately not a
feasible solution. Smaller companies
were side-lined and not entertained as
the common myth is that they lack
bandwidth and domain knowledge to
execute large projects. This is not true.
We tackled these hurdles with
solutions that not only reduced
operational costs but reduced
downtime and increased efficiency. We
provided economic, technologically
advanced quality parking systems. As
manufacturers, we could cut down on
high manufacturing costs, downsize
the middleman margins, and deliver
results faster than our competitors.
How was your firm/business affected
by the COVID-19 pandemic? What
measures did you take to reduce the
damages while helping your clients
and maintaining the safety of your
employees?
COVID-19 has been a difficult time for
all businesses. It disrupted the
economy and affected day-to-day life,
with thousands losing their lives. Fear
gripped the world—fear of surviving,
fear of income loss, fear of an
unpredictable future. And the fear of
what next reigned people's minds. For
businesses the world over,
sustainability, revenue generation, and
resource availability were a priority.
The world is still struggling with the
effects of the pandemic, both
physically and mentally.
But the pandemic also paved the way
for a contactless, digitalised world and
created new opportunities. The parking
industry was not far behind in this as
well. It welcomed contactless
automated parking solutions in a
bigger way as compared to its earlier
existence. Today contactless parking is
the new norm and a necessity. It
introduced the quickest and safest way
of parking without any human contact.
Digitalisation brought in
technologically advanced parking
systems infused with artificial
intelligence. It eliminated and
minimised direct contacts at various
touchpoints, from finding vacant
parking spots, tracking, and monitoring
entry and exit points to digitalised
payments – all of which reduced time,
fuel, frustrations associated with
parking and enhanced the user
experience.
What would you like to advise the
young generation of entrepreneurs
and enthusiasts who want to become
smart city solution providers?
To be thinkers and ideators. Yes, the
younger generation has everything
available at their fingertips. But one
needs to put pen to paper and come
with customised, innovative parking
solutions that are in sync with the
client's objectives and goals.
8. Where do you see yourself in the
future? Kindly tell us about your
strategies for scaling your business.
I want to take the company's operation
across the length and breadth of India
by 2023 and globally by 2025. I am
never deterred by competition; I
believe in setting my benchmark and
breaking my record to take a higher
leap with newer targets. Small steps
have led to bigger impacts. Today we
continue using the same strategy for
our growth and way forward.
Moreover, we have earned the respect
of our clients by inculcating a
transparent and ethical work culture.
“
Networking and
collaboration have
helped us to
scale up our
business in a
big way
“
OCTOBER 2021 | 22 | www.insightssuccess.in
25.
26. We have a
responsibility
to make our
cities a better
place to live in
“
“
India's Innovative Smart City Solution Providers-2021
Providing Smart
Solutions for
Traffic Mobility
Deployment of new technology on the ground is
always a challenge. India is taking a huge leap in
terms of having advanced systems in various cities
through the smart city mission. This sudden opportunity has
brought in a lot of technological advancement; however,
there is still a lack of knowledge about ITS systems in
general.
The cities are not able to identify as well as quantify their
requirements correctly, which sometimes lead to differences
between expectations and reality. The operations of such
systems need technically skilled personnel and traffic
engineers. This critical concept is simplified by ITSPE. An
innovation-driven company specialising in intelligent
transport systems.
ITSPE being a technical company provide products,
solutions, and services related to ITS and traffic
engineering. In an exclusive interview with Insights
Success, Mr. Ayush Agrawal, Chief Commercial Officer
– ITSPE shares some insights about the dynamics of the
company. Following are the highlights of the company:
Describe about your company/firm/profession in detail.
We offer ITS products for traffic management and control
for highways, urban road networks and public transport
management. We also offer ITS design and consultancy
services, simulation modelling, custom R&D, and product
development services. We are passionate about what we do.
We will lend our expertise to understand, analyse, and offer
solutions to mobility-related problems, however big or
small, to private sector clients, and the government.
Our major offerings include Adaptive Traffic Control
System (ATCS), Transit Management, Highways Traffic
Management Systems (ATMS/HTMS), Mobility
Management, Solid Waste Management, ITS Consultancy,
and Simulation Modelling, etc. We have a strong base in
India, having in-house software development, as well as
R&D teams, which allow us to offer better solutions as per
the requirements of the clients.
What inspired you to become a smart city solution
provider?
OCTOBER 2021 | 24 | www.insightssuccess.in
27. Mr. Ayush Agrawal
Chief Commercial Officer
A Dynamic Leader
Mr Ayush Agrawal is the Chief
Commercial Officer of ITS
Planners and Engineers Private
Limited. He has experience in
marketing, adaptability, and
implementation of ITS systems in
non-homogenous traffic
conditions, operations, and
optimisation of railway networks
and promotion of technology
solutions. He has led the
marketing and implementation of
ITSPE traffic management
systems across India for the past 5
years.
He also leads the identification of
relevant and sustainable partners
for complimentary products to be
offered as a part of the company's
solutions. He brings in the
expertise of redefining ITS
systems as per market demands
and the expected technical trends.
He has a dual degree, integrated
B.Tech and M.Tech, from IIT
Bombay.
OCTOBER 2021 | 25 | www.insightssuccess.in
28. We have been interested in bringing innovative solutions
for ITS for a long time. We started with deploying our
solutions in the UK where we provided customised traffic
control systems for Southampton and East Sussex. We
strongly believe that with efficient systems we can reduce
congestion and improve the travel experience in cities. We
also want to enhance the reliability and ease of usage for
public transport.
However, the market in India was not really organised
before the start of the smart city mission. The number of
projects involving advanced ITS systems was limited. With
the rollout of the Smart Cities Programme, a lot of cities
and authorities were made aware of the various ITS systems
and their impact on the day-to-day life of road users. In
order to extend our outreach, we have aligned ourselves
with most of the major Master System Integrators (MSI)
and started offering our products for various smart cities.
Our products have been used in multiple cities by many
MSIs proving our credibility.
What kind of services do you provide to your clients?
We have worked on multiple projects such as ITS design
consultancy for Expressways in Qatar, ATCS deployments
in various cities in India, and HTMS/ATMS for highways,
etc.
We have also worked as system integrators for several
ATCS and HTMS projects where we have undertaken the
entire deployment including all of the civil and electrical
works, testing, and commissioning. ITSPE's traffic
engineering and operations teams provide customised traffic
management strategies to our clients and operate our ITS
systems on a day-to-day basis.
How was your firm/business affected by the Covid-19
pandemic and what measures did you take to shorten
the damages, while helping your clients and maintaining
the safety of your employees?
I don't think Covid has spared any government-related
sectors. Due to the sudden transfer of funds towards covid
relief and lockdowns, there was a complete halt in ongoing
projects as well as floating of new tenders. The billing
cycles were severely impacted and not many smart city
projects have been awarded in the last year. We have used
this opportunity to strengthen our portfolio and increase our
offerings to smart cities as well as highways. We enhanced
our transit management product, Neptune, to better suit the
Indian public transport needs.
We also resumed operations of our site teams adhering to
all the safety protocols by taking special approvals to
support our critical projects and established a work from
home ecosystem for our software teams to support all the
projects. We have now slowly started reopening our office
with limited strength of vaccinated employees.
What would you like to advice the young generation of
entrepreneurs and enthusiasts who want to become a
smart city solution provider?
Our recommendation to all the enthusiasts out there is to
think about the value addition of their product/service. We
all should aim to solve an existing problem with the help of
technology. The person should also think about the long-
term usage and support services to enable cities to realise
the full potential of the proposed systems and solutions.
Where do you see yourself in the future? Kindly tell us
about your strategies for scaling your business.
ITSPE is on the path of having close to 1000+ traffic
junctions in India in the next 1-2 years. We also expect to
revolutionise the transit management market by offering a
fresh approach by focusing on the overall management of
public transport instead of providing bits and pieces
solutions. We also expect to have close to 20-25 stretches of
highway managed using our traffic management platform.
ITSPE is also actively working on ITS consultancy/project
management opportunities to enable the cities to deploy
better ITS systems.
In addition to our continuous expansion in India, ITSPE is
working with various partners to extend our products and
services to European and other Asian countries. We expect
to provide technically advanced solutions and ITS
consultancy to these markets. We also plan to expand our
transport modelling services by at least 150% in the next
FY across Indian and international markets.
What is the current industrial scenario of smart city
solutions?
A lot of smart cities have deployed several IT solutions,
which have helped them greatly in enhancing their
capabilities to tackle various day to day challenges. The
integrated command control room has also helped cities to
manage the covid situation efficiently by enabling
monitoring of covid lockdowns, a helpline for covid, etc. A
lot of cities have started reaping the benefits of deploying
ICCC based solutions. In case of traffic management, there
have been drastic changes in overall traffic rule compliances
and reduction of traffic congestion at bottlenecks in many
cities. It is a long journey to reach a stage where we reap
out all the benefits possible by such ITS deployments, but
we are taking giant strides in this direction.
OCTOBER 2021 | 26 | www.insightssuccess.in
34. With an expanding urban
population and fast
urbanisation, smart city
initiatives are gaining appeal
throughout the world. Stakeholders are
seeking more efficient methods to
manage complexity, boost efficiency,
and improve quality of life. This has
generated a need for cities to monitor
and integrate infrastructure in order to
better manage resources while
providing the best services to their
residents.
Since the inception of this program,
Videonetics is playing a pivotal role
by providing its unified video
computing platform, especially
developed to address typical challenges
with regards to large-scale
surveillance, traffic management, and
video forensics, etc. It has successfully
achieved the market leadership
position in the safe and smart city
market in India by successfully
securing 140 cities in India.
The modular architecture of UVCP™
makes it efficient to integrate various
applications using pluggable modules
and customize the solution to meet the
unique needs of many industries
ranging from small shops to
universities, stadiums, and cities.
In an exclusive interview with Insights
Success, Dr Tinku Acharya, who has
worked in technology leadership
positions across industries in the US
and India. He sheds some light on the
smart city initiatives and expresses
about Videonetics and its operations.
With such an enriched experience, he
has guided and supervised numerous
graduate and doctoral students.
Let us dive into the interview given
below:
Describe Videonetics in detail.
We are the world’s first company to
develop AI and DL powered unified
video computing platform (UVCP™),
which has been magnificently
managing video data as well as other
sensor-generated multi-sensory data in
a single unified framework.
Videonetics UVCP™ has been trained
with very large and diverse datasets,
making it incredibly robust, smart, and
computationally efficient. It
encompasses Intelligent VMS, Video
Analytics, Intelligent Traffic
Management System, Facial
Recognition, Video Computing
Platform as a Service (VCPaaS™), and
Video Command Control Centre.
We have been ranked as the number
one VMS provider in India and
amongst the top five in Asia (IHS/
Informa Tech Research 2019).
Acclaimed as a market leader,
Videonetics has secured more than 140
cities, 80+ airports, 100+ large
enterprises, and monitoring 15K traffic
lanes across many geographies.
What is the USP of Videonetics, and
how is it different from others?
The key to our success has been our
uniqueness of the platform, local
solutions for local problems, ‘truly’
open platform, technology-neutral, and
willingness to undertake challenges to
resolve specific issues by providing
customized solutions combined with
world-class after-sales service to our
partners and end customers.
Our technology has achieved patents
from countries like Israel, the UK, the
USA, Singapore, Canada, India, and so
on.
How was your firm/business affected
by the COVID-19 pandemic, and
what measures did you take to
shorten the damages while helping
your clients and maintaining the
safety of your employees?
Making the World Safer and Smarter
OCTOBER 2021 | 32 | www.insightssuccess.in
35. Cities around
the world
are getting
smarter,
and so
we are!
“
“
“
“
Videonetics was founded by Dr Tinku Acharya, an IEEE fellow, internationally acclaimed scientist, inventor, and
entrepreneur, with a mission to develop an unparalleled video computing platform. He is enriched with
Intellectual Property portfolio and delivers pioneering products worldwide, to solve real-life challenges and
problems.
Dr Acharya contributed to more than 160 US and International patents in various technology domains such as
visual computing architectures, electronic imaging, data compression, multimedia computing, computer vision,
intelligent video, VLSI architectures and algorithms, and so on. He has contributed to over 200 technical papers
published in reviewed international journals, conferences, and book chapters.
He was elevated to ‘Fellow of IEEE’ in 2010 for his ‘contributions to the advancement of very-large-scale
integration algorithms and architectures for electronic image processing’. He received the ‘Outstanding
Engineer’ award from IEEE Southwest Region, USA, and the ‘Engineer of the Year’ award from IEEE Phoenix,
USA, in 2008. He was identified as the ‘Most Prolific Inventor’ in Intel (worldwide) in 1999 and 2001, and in Intel
Arizona, USA site for five consecutive years (1997-2001). He is a recipient of the ‘2009 NASI - Reliance Platinum
Jubilee Award for innovation in Physical Sciences’ from the National Academy of Science in India and the ‘first
innovator’ to receive this prestigious award.
Dr Tinku Acharya
Founder
India's Innovative Smart City Solution Providers - 2021
A Procient Leader
OCTOBER 2021 | 33 | www.insightssuccess.in
36. The COVID-19 global pandemic had a
life-changing impact on all of us in the
last two years, including a multi-
faceted jolt on the video surveillance
industry. The influence of COVID-19
on companies and economies is
changing the way businesses are run
and provided throughout the world.
Despite COVID-related restrictions
and their impact on the global
economy, Videonetics has maintained a
positive momentum and never stopped
innovation.
We became the world’s first company
to launch AI-powered video analytics-
based Pandemic Management Suite
‘SAJAG’ to empower COVID-19
warriors, crusaders, and law
enforcement by delivering actionable
intelligence with in-depth insights to
combat the spread of the COVID-19.
Business continuity and the health of
our employees, partners, and customers
are our primary concerns. During this
time, we are focused on supporting our
partners and customers as much as we
can. They are the extended arms of the
company; we ensure to sustain their
trust and confidence with us and
continuing business with them
throughout this unprecedented time
and well into the future.
What are the security trends that
Videonetics is observing in India at
present?
This unprecedented outbreak has put
every sector on the planet to the test as
governments struggle to contain the
virus. As the globe begins to vaccinate
against COVID-19, the public and
private sectors will stay alert in 2021
for protocol adherence. However,
security concerns continue to be a
significant motivator for end customers
to spend on security, independent of
vertical or even pandemic. And, in
order to overcome these difficulties, the
following major developments will
emerge in 2021:
• Artificial Intelligence Based
Solutions: Artificial intelligence-
based solutions are still popular
and will have a significant impact
on the security sector. AI is
making it conceivable for
industries to occupy with
actionable intelligence, as well as
delivering security departments
with data to spot potential issues
or threats before they arise. In
addition, they empower security
operators or law enforcement
agencies with forensics tools
during the investigation process
for making an informed decision.
• A Significant Focus on
Cybersecurity: Today’s cyber-
attacks are smarter and more
advanced than ever, so developing
cyber-resilient protection systems
is no longer an option but an
imperative. We at Videonetics are
deeply focused on ‘Highly
Secured’ offerings and have rooted
cybersecurity in our development
at the very beginning of any
product.
• Moving to Cloud: In recent times,
customers have started adopting
cloud-based video surveillance
due to its various benefits such as
major cost savings, heightened
data security, remote access, and
maintenance, flexible storage and
retention, scalability, increased
stability, and disaster recovery.
Many of the huge enterprises and,
in fact, even the government are
now embracing the ‘Cloud First’
policy, and most of their business
procedures are already using the
advantages of Cloud these days.
• User and Privacy Concerns:
With AI obtaining momentums,
how data is utilized and guarded
will remain a major concern. Now,
citizens are progressively
concerned with the confidentiality
of their data. Since most physical
security applications involve the
collection of video and data about
people and assets, privacy
regulations will continue to have a
significant impact on the industry
well into the future.
• Business Continuity: The risks to
business continuity are continuous
and severe for physical security
systems, particularly video and
access control, which are
vulnerable to environmental
disasters or terrorist attacks. The
inspection systems should come
with a built-in disaster recovery
function so that users can take
benefit of constant and
uninterrupted checking of devices
and events. This protects vital
information and ensures business
continuity, even when servers fail.
Where do you see Videonetics in the
future?
Being in the industry for more than
thirteen years, we have built its strong
heritage of innovation and leadership
in the visual computing platform. We
will continue to innovate and generate
Indian Intellectual Properties to
provide innovative products to
customers located in various parts of
the world, eventually addressing their
security and safety concerns along with
optimizing business operations.
Moreover, we have also started
expanding our footprints in Southeast
Asia, Middle East, the US, and UK
markets by delivering and deploying
solutions for various verticals.
OCTOBER 2021 | 34 | www.insightssuccess.in