Living in an urban setup like New Delhi, New York has its own advantages and disadvantages. While the growth, the speed is what attracts the most, the cost of living, pollution and population are some of the factors that drive many away from their urban dream.
In order to address these urban issues, technology giant Google has launched a new venture called Sidewalk Labs. This New York based venture is being regarded as an urban innovation firm that aims to develop new technologies that will make both living in big cities and as well as running these big cities considerably an easier task.
Sidewalk will be run by Dan Doctoroff, ex-deputy mayor of economic development of New York city under Michael Bloomberg.
Sidewalk Labs is an urban innovation company devoted to improving city life for residents, businesses and city governments, in particular by developing and incubating civic technologies.
According to Google's CEO, Larry Page, "Sidewalk will focus on improving city life for everyone by developing and incubating urban technologies to address issues like cost of living, efficient transportation and energy usage."
With the urban population growing at an exponential rate every year, it has slowly become a popular field of study. What will Google be able to bring to this area of research with Sidewalk will be an interesting thing to see.
“Making long-term, 10X bets like this is hard for most companies to do, but Sergey and I have always believed that it’s important,” said Page at the launch.
"And as more and more people around the world live, work and settle in cities, the opportunities for improving urban environments are endless," he added.
Google hasn't yet disclosed the amount of money it has invested in Sidewalk. What it has revealed is that the investment amount is relatively modest when compared to its other projects.
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