IOTA launches Smart City Hackathon to include Blockchain technology

IOTA Foundation, a non-profit foundation focused on distributed ledger technology (DLT) and permissionless ecosystem development, announced its Smart City Hackathon. At the heart of the contest is the opportunity for developers from around the globe to solve inter-city challenges submitted by a variety of corporate entities. Hosted by Hackster.io, an Avnet community and the world’s largest hardware developer network, the virtual contest kicks off today with both corporate and supporting sponsors. Corporate sponsors who developed the Smart City challenges include Groupe Renault, ENGIE Lab CRIGEN, Birdz (a subsidiary of Nova Veolia), and Sopra Steria while supporting sponsors include Tech Mahindra, Future State CoFoundery, City of Austin (Transportation Department), and Norske Helsehus. IOTA’s unique distributed ledger Tangle technology will be used by participants to develop innovative IoT/M2M and data driven concepts for the smart city environment for an opportunity to win over $10,000 in prizes. https://www.hackster.io/contests/smart-cities-powered-by-iota

All submissions will be facilitated via Hackster.io. Using this information and the IOTA DLT Tangle, participants will be given until April 6 to develop open source solutions. Winners will be announced via a press release in April 13. Judges will include representatives from Birdz, ENGIE Lab CRIGEN, Groupe Renault and Sopra Steria. To begin the competition, participants will first be matched with a specific smart city challenge for them to solve, including initiatives based on the following themes:

1. Smart Mobility - How can vehicles engage in transactional data for things like fleet infrastructure and predictive maintenance
Sponsored by: Groupe Renault
Supporting sponsor: City of Austin (Transportation Department)

2. Smart Energy - How can we trace the green origin of electricity from source to delivery
Sponsored by: VEOLIA Birdz
Supporting sponsor: Tech Mahindra

3. Smart Buildings - Enhancing the performance of commercial buildings and attractiveness for tenants
Sponsored by: ENGIE Lab CRIGEN
Supporting sponsor: Norske Helsehus

4. Smart Districts - Developing integrated approaches for IoT and data infrastructure within cities
Sponsored by: Sopra Steria
Supporting sponsor: FutureState CoFoundery

From Ludovic MILLIER, CIO, VEOLIA Birdz:

“We gather hundreds of millions of data points every day to help cities, buildings and tertiary sector companies reduce their energy bills and improve their services. We look forward to using our expertise with other like-minded companies to empower the IOTA developer community to solve real-world energy challenges within cities we live and work.”

From Alexandre EICH-GOZZI, Global Blockchain Practice Leader, Sopra Steria:

“Sopra Steria has a strong commitment to ensure the success of the DLT projects of all of our clients. We have the conviction that IOT and DLT are two complementary technologies and that smart cities and DLT will be strongly intertwined in the future. IOTA is one of the few platforms that delivers on their vision and we are happy to be part of this hackathon and contribute to making it a successful initiative.”

From Rajesh Dhuddu, Global Practice Leader, Blockchain, Tech Mahindra:

“We are happy to partner with IOTA on this mega hackathon. It gives us an opportunity to identify smart ideas and solve some of the toughest challenges that smart cities have faced and will continue to face. As part of TechMNxt charter, we are keen to collaborate and create an ecosystem to nurture innovative ideas pivoted on emerging technologies like Internet of Things & Blockchain and transform them into compelling propositions for our customers globally.”