In a major move to advance urban innovation, the Smart City Research Centre at IIIT Hyderabad and the Kakinada Institute of Engineering and Technology (KIET) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on June 17, 2025, to support the Kakinada Smart City Mission. The collaboration will focus on establishing a Smart City Living Lab at the KIET campus, integrating cutting-edge technologies and real-time urban solutions to drive smart city development in Kakinada.
The MoU was signed in the presence of Sagili Shan Mohan, District Collector of Kakinada, along with other dignitaries. The initiative marks a significant step toward bridging academia, government, and technology to build smarter and more sustainable cities.
The Smart City Living Lab at KIET will serve as a dynamic ecosystem, enabling students, researchers, and local stakeholders to engage with real-world urban challenges and develop innovative solutions. The lab will also focus on deploying and validating smart city technologies in practical settings, with the KIET campus acting as a testbed for new solutions.
The planned activities for the Smart City Living Lab at the KIET campus will involve the deployment of cutting-edge smart city technologies for real-world testing and validation. This initiative will focus on collaborating with local stakeholders to execute urban projects that yield measurable outcomes in line with the lab’s objectives. In addition, the lab will facilitate workshops, expert-led sessions, and training programs to promote knowledge exchange and skill development in urban innovation.
Moreover, the lab will offer students valuable internships and research opportunities, fostering the next generation of urban development experts. These initiatives will directly contribute to Kakinada’s long-term vision of integrating smart technologies into the city’s infrastructure, enhancing its sustainability and livability. Through these collaborative efforts, the lab will support the development of impactful, scalable solutions that address the city’s growing urban challenges.
Anuradha Vattem, Chief Technology Architect at IIIT Hyderabad, expressed her excitement about the partnership, saying, “We are thrilled to extend our Smart City Living Lab model to KIET. This collaboration allows academic institutions to play a vital role in creating impactful, real-world solutions to address urban challenges.”
During the meeting, the IIIT-H team presented their ongoing research in key areas such as crowd monitoring, water supply distribution and quality monitoring, digital twin technology for water networks, and a scalable City IoT Platform (ctOP). The District Collector showed particular interest in these innovations, especially crowd monitoring, and suggested exploring a Proof of Concept (PoC) in the district soon.
“The positive response from the District Collector is incredibly motivating,” said Ms Vattem. “The support of the District Administration is crucial in taking research out of the lab and into communities where it can bring about meaningful change.” This partnership between IIIT Hyderabad, KIET, and the local government marks the beginning of a new phase in implementing scalable smart city solutions in Kakinada.
The International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad (IIIT-H) is an autonomous research university founded in 1998. It focuses on Information Technology, including Computer Science, Electronics, and interdisciplinary research with social impact. Its research areas include Visual Information Technologies, Human Language Technologies, Data Engineering, Robotics, Earthquake Engineering, Bioinformatics, and IT in Agriculture. The institute is de
