Government of Western Australia’s Agent General to Europe John Atkins at Smart to Future Cities Forum
Speaking at Ovum’s Smart to Future Cities 2016 event, Government of Western Australia’s Agent General to Europe John Atkins put forward a convincing case for Western Australia as one of the world’s most innovative regions.
Bringing together cloud technologies, smart cities concepts, data analytics, robotics, autonomous vehicles and artificial intelligence, the region is aiming to transform its economy, which has traditional relied on natural resources. The region aims to create a new ecosystem, with the hub based in Perth, built on the back of future technologies and a redefinition of the basis of Western Australia.
“Perhaps the most exciting project is the Square Kilometre Array,” said Atkins. “It’s combining scientists and engineers from more than 20 countries and now we can explore the universe 20 times faster than any telescope around the world today. More than 4 petabytes of data has been produced by the project since 2013.
“We’re redefining our role in the community by embracing technology”
The project itself aims to utilize largest radio telescope ever seen on Earth, and will be world’s largest public science data project upon completion. The overall aim of the project is to answer fundamental questions of science and about the laws of nature, such as: how did the Universe, and the stars and galaxies contained in it, form and evolve?
Aside from answering questions which have puzzled scientists for generations, the project is also drawing attention simple because of the scale at which it operates. Once completed it will generate data at a rate more than 10 times today’s global Internet traffic, presenting a unique data collection, analysis and action challenge.
From a transport perspective, the company have taken lessons learned from Transport for London, and built an enhanced passenger experience through citizen engagement on its app, building network intelligence through data analysis and managing the day to day challenges of congestion through IoT deployments throughout the city. Investing in advanced data analytics tools and processes, the team are setting themselves the challenge of taking the region beyond the 21st century.
Western Australia has chosen to diversify its economy, reducing the reliance on natural resources, by embracing the collaborative, and encouraging the adoption of disruptive technologies. Contrary to the traditional policy of government undertaking time-consuming reviews, the Government of Western Australia has put its ambitious foot forward, driving innovation in its agricultural, scientific, transportation and natural resources industries through cloud and data analytics technologies.