About the event

Ural Welcomes “Smart City”

On October 31, ComNews Information Group held in Ekaterinburg the next forum from the series of events entitled “Smart City & Region: Digital Technologies Paving Way to a Smart Country”, which are being held by ComNews in seven regions of Russia throughout the year 2019.

The forum in Ekaterinburg gathered over 100 high-profile members of legislative and executive regional and municipal governments of the Ural Federal District, government institutions, federal telecommunication service providers, ICT companies, power distribution and other utilities, suppliers of ICT solutions, system integrators, and developers of digital services.

PJSC MegaFon was Strategic Partner of the Smart City & Region in Ekaterinburg, while Supertel and IskraUralTEL were Bronze Sponsors, and Arrow Electronics and Schneider Electric were Session Sponsors. The forum was also supported by Huawei, Intersvyaz Company and ICBCom.

The forum was endorsed by the Ekaterinburg City Administration, along with the Special Economic Zone “Innopolis”, the SPb CIO Club, the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), Non-profit Partnership RUSSOFT, International portal “HELPINVER – Discover the New Russia!”, the IT-Directors’ Club in the Central Federal District and International Academy of Communications.

The plenary session of the business forum was dedicated to conceptual development and scaling of well-proven models of Smart City. The plenary session was kicked off by Evgeniy Gurariy, Aide to the Presidential Plenipotentiary Envoy to the Ural Federal District, who spoke about implementation of the national project “Digital Economy” in the Urals. He was followed by Yury Guschin, Director of ICT Department of Sverdlovsk Region, who gave an overview of the regional digital development projects. Elena Klybova, regional Deputy Minister of Investment and Development, shared her opinion about a very important issue – investment promotion of Smart City and Smart Region projects. Evgeniy Ivanov, Digital Projects Director of PJSC MegaFon in the Urals and Siberia, entitled his report: “MegaFon’s solutions for Smart City and leasing as a tool to finance them. Alexey Sabitov, regional Deputy Minister of Social Policy, spoke about a unified social card – an IT platform for social support. Yury Torgashin, First Deputy Director of IT Department of Khanty-Mansy autonomous district – Yugra, offered his outlook on telecom infrastructure as the foundation of digital economy. Oleg Izvekov, Director of Rostelecom’s “Smart City” project shared his experience of implementing Smart City projects in the Urals, and Head of Innovations and IT of Solikamsk Administration Boris Vasilenko spoke about turning Solikamsk into a Smart City. The conversation around the concept of Smart City continued at the plenary discussion.

The next session was dedicated to solutions, serving the needs of Smart Cities. Natalia Poddubnaya from Supertel’s Modernization department spoke about the specifics of building telecommunication networks for the needs of Smart City projects. Natalia Deyanova, Schneider Electric’s Vice-President for Marketing and Digital Experience, told the audience about “Energy for Smart Cities”. Dmitriy Vasilenko, Arrow Electronics’ Senior Field Applications Engineer and Head of Analog Devices in Russia and CIS, entitled his report “Reliability of data collection wireless networks for critical infrastructure sensors”. Alexey Alexeev, IskraUralTEL’s Deputy CEO – Head of Corporate Department, offered an overview of industry digitalization practices. Vladimir Mikshevich, Senior Key Account Manager, Huawei EBG Russia, told the audience about integration of Smart City systems into public spaces based on smart poles. Tatiana Trofimova, Director of Medical Information and Analysis Center, spoke about a digital development program implemented in the Sverdolvsk region’s healthcare system. Vasily Fadeev, Director of the Institute of Energy Saving named after N.I.Danilova, entitled his report: “A city as a service – Smart comfort”. Oleg Plotnikov, Director of Intersvyaz’s Center for Industrial Internet, also shared his thoughts on how to make a city Smart.

The session continued after lunch, to introduce the audience to several other solutions for a Smart City. Oleg Lisyutenko, CEO of ICBCom, spoke about IoT solutions for digital municipal infrastructure. Konstantin Shur, Director of Linergo, shared on the practical experience in automation of utilities and their integration into the city infrastructure. Andrey Smolnikov, MOTIV Group’s Head of Wireless department, dedicated his report to Telecommunication infrastructure for Smart Cities. Vyacheslav Sazonov, Head of Sales at Altarix, shared with the audience the tools for efficient roll-out of a digital Smart City platform in the region. Vladimir Domanskiy from the Tyumen Industrial University shed light on the innovations in professional training. The case study part of the forum was concluded by Kirill Oparin, Head of the regional office for CIS of the International Telecommunications Union, who spoke about the ITU’s international practices for sustainable Smart cities.

The event wrapped up with an express-discussion, where speakers and the audience were free to discuss any questions they had left. Panelists discussed, which Smart City areas are potentially the most efficient, what are the barriers faced by municipalities and businesses when building Smart City, and what are the specifics and challenges of Smart City/Smart Region projects.

Smart City & Region forum in Saint Petersburg demonstrated the critical need for exchanging opinions, approaches and best practices of Smart City between different regions and cities.

The next Smart City & Region event organized by ComNews Group will take place in Novosibirsk (Nov. 28), and the series will conclude with the final event in Moscow on Dec.6.