Axis Bank uses student ideation to support smart cities

Private sector Axis Bank is using an online gamification competition to generate ideas for the smart cities for the government and also will implement the winning idea via the Axis Bank Foundation.

Based on the implementation of the ideas, the Bank will take a call on whether to continue with this theme or look at other emerging areas as well.

Rajesh Dahiya, Group Executive, Axis Bank said that they will use this platform to generate new solutions for emerging problems in the country that could be implemented via their Foundation as well the non-government organisations that partner with it.

The winning team was awarded Rs 1 lakh as cash prize and Rs 10 lakh will be used as a seed fund for the project's implementation.

The initiative, called Axis Moves!'' is in the format of an online gamification competition for b-school students to present innovative ideas that could bring the desired change in the society.

In the first year of Axis Moves!, the bank has witnessed 1170 registrations across 16 campuses competing through a series of simulations in a gamified, virtual environment to find a place in the Grand Finale, which was held last week.

Dahiya said that the idea was to connect with young students beyond jobs and sensitise them to social sector and issues that are relevant to the country.

"We got more than 500 ideas. The challenge given to them was to identify what are the problems which smart cities would face and how it could be addressed by modern technology and industry players like banks and corporates," he said.

Students were divided into teams which competed against each other in tackling these challenges. Of these, six teams were gotten into Mumbai from all over India and they played the game in front of the jury by refininf ideas, facing special recommendations, jury questions were answered.

According to Dahiya, what made this initiative different than other case study and ideation competitions was that they would not just stop at the ideation stage, but will take it forward to implement it.

The Bank has roped in its Foundation and their NGO partner. Dahiya said that if interested, the student will join in and they will put seed money to work with the idea.

"We wanted NGOs to also get sensitised and wanted then to participate in areas of national interest. First offer will remain to them to associate with the idea. They need not join us but can refine and implement the idea over the next 12-18 months," he added.

The lender is looking to various methods to contribute to society by getting in ideas and also involving their Foundation in this endeavour. He said that while a lot of work has been happening on 'smart cities', they wished to look at practical challenges and what can be done within vision document given by the government.

Going forward, he said that this initiative will give an opportunity to banks and other companies to participate in implementation process as well.

"The focus is now on making sure that early work starts happening there. If it needs more depth, we may look at working on it for couple of years. If new themes come up in the future, we may consider those too," he said.

However, he also explained that the they do not want to generate too many ideas, that cannot to implemented. The aim here is to bring out specific problems to solve and engage other business schools as well in the coming years.

The purpose of the smart cities Mission of the government is to drive economic growth and improve the quality of life of people by enabling local area development and harnessing technology, especially technology that leads to smart outcomes. The vision is that area-based development will transform existing areas (retrofit and redevelop), including slums, into better planned ones, thereby improving liveability of the whole City.

New areas (greenfield) will be developed around cities in order to accommodate the expanding population in urban areas. Application of Smart Solutions will enable cities to use technology, information and data to improve infrastructure and services.

Cities including Bhopal, Ludhiana, Surat, Kochi, Pune, Guwahati, Jaipur, Solapur and Chennai have been identified by the government for this purpose which will be developed into smart cities.