When city leaders get clear about vision, people get to work. That was the case in New York when Mayor DeBlasio issued the challenge to redesign the thousands of abandoned phone booths that dotted the five boroughs. What began as a design challenge resulted in a team that ultimately created CIVIQ Smartscapes, a company builds “hyper-connected Smartscapes”.
There are approximately 500 connected wireless kiosks located in high-density areas that display city information along with advertisements. Starting in New York City with the support of the elected leadership is quite a feat. But what’s next?
CIVIQ Smartscapes has been on a roadshow talking with cities across the U.S. and focused on the seven finalists of the Smart City Challenge. As I’ve learned from other companies who hope to expand their single-city product or service to other municipalities across the US, this is where it gets interesting.
Each city has their own regulatory road map that is implemented by a maze of how city departments implement and execute new projects. For CIVIQ Smartscapes, there are two main integration points that need to be worked out before they can “go live” in a new city: (1) location on city sidewalks (2) integration to broadband infrastructure.
The need to navigate these two areas is becoming more common for companies large and small. Cities are working furiously to identify every piece of “street furniture,” such as light poles, that can accommodate technology such as small cells to boost network capacity as citizens demand greater mobile broadband connectivity.
This emphasizes the need for cities to prioritize the creation of a road map of their broadband and wireless broadband infrastructure, providing much-needed clarity for private sector companies, like CIVIQ Smartscapes. This kind of clarity means greater and more seamless integration of innovations that create real and needed solutions for citizens and visitors.
About CIVIQ Smartscapes
CIVIQ Smartscapes designs, manufactures and integrates turnkey interactive smart city communications solutions that provide access to and enhance public information, commerce, safety and efficiency to create “Smartscapes” – the future of intelligent urban infrastructure. CIVIQ is a portfolio company of JMC Capital Partners. For more information about CIVIQ Smartscapes, please visit www.CIVIQSmartscapes.com.
