Tallinn University of Technology Opens New Professoriate, Starts Smart City Development
Next year, Tallinn University of Technology (TUT) will open a communication technology professoriate where scientists and students will develop IoT and Smart City solutions of the future.
Jaak Aaviksoo, Rector of TUT, and Dan Strömberg, CEO at Telia Estonia, signed an agreement, which states that Telia will help with the creation of the communication technology professoriate, which will work on various IoT and Smart City solutions with the purpose of making people’s lives even more convenient and efficient. The communication technology professoriate is first of its kind in Estonia.
“The partnership between Telia Estonia and TUT is versatile and strategic. Creating a joint professoriate is the highest cooperation level between a university and a private company. In addition, we will be able to take scientific research and development of IoT and 5G to a new level and test new technological solutions in the TUT campus. TalTechDigital, the digital initiative of the TUT, being an ambition of intelligent and digital campus, fully supports cooperation with Telia,“ said Jaak Aaviksoo, Rector of TUT.
Dan Strömberg, CEO at Telia Estonia, said that the existing cooperation between TUT and Telia will increase even more. “We believe that digitalization of the society is one of the most important keywords today. Our goal is to make Estonia a better place for living and working, and our cooperation with TUT will help to achieve this goal.“
Gert Jervan, Head of the Department of Computer Systems at TUT, said that the idea of the professoriate first came up during discussions that were held during cooperation between Telia and TUT, and Telia’s key persons quickly agreed that this an excellent idea which benefits everyone.
“In addition to opening the professoriate, Telia’s support will help to create a communication technologies research group, which will include PhD students and postdoctoral fellows. In addition to financial help, Telia will open its IoT infrastructure for TUT. I hope that the benefit it mutual, and Telia will get a scientific boost for its daily business activities. For example, opening the IoT platform for our scientists and students will make it possible for them to use real data from real environments and create new services based on that information,“ Gert Jervan said.
Telia will provide TUT with the Internet of Things (IoT) platform with all necessary connections and data, which will make it possible to develop various Smart City solutions for Estonian cities.
“This platform supports different technologies like 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G, fiber optics, and SigFox, and enables to create new solutions much faster and more conveniently than before,“ said Toomas Kärner, Head of IoT at Telia.
For example, it is possible to analyze how people move between different districts of Tallinn during different times of day based on an interactive map (the downloadable map can be viewed at https://we.tl/1tRO7FcerI).
“It is possible to create new and exciting solutions based on this map, and this will help people to plan their daily tasks even more conveniently,“ Toomas Kärner said.
According to him, similar solutions will become very important in the near future, as they can help with emergency planning, for example. Additionally, data related to real-time information about parking, pollution, noise, and energy consumption can be utilized in a number of ways.
View image gallery of the event at https://www.dropbox.com/sh/4cgzkj62vktyxps/AACL4SqsDqfIaQIHH3CzOXNla?dl=0