Alibaba Cloud, the cloud computing arm of Alibaba Group, has announced the launch of its ‘City Brain’ city management initiative in Malaysia. This is a significant milestone for Alibaba Cloud as it’s the first time for the City Brain solution to be adopted overseas.
The Malaysia City Brain initiative is developed on Alibaba Cloud’s cloud computing infrastructure and will support Malaysia’s digital transformation with cloud technology and artificial intelligence (AI).
Powered by Alibaba Cloud’s large-scale computing engine Apsara, Malaysia City Brain would offer a comprehensive suite of acquisition, integration, and analysis of big and heterogeneous data generated by a diversity of sources in urban spaces through video and image recognition, data mining and machine learning technology. The power and functionality of the City Brain would enable Malaysian urban planners and city officials to upgrade their city governance and decision-making to turn the city into an intelligent one.
Traffic Management Kuala Lumpur
In the first phase of the program, the capital Kuala Lumpur will roll out the Malaysia City Brain for use in traffic management to improve mobility in the city. With its massive cloud computing and data processing capabilities, the City Brain can optimize the flow of vehicles and traffic signals by calculating the time to reach intersections. It will also be able to generate structured summaries of data, such as traffic volume and speed in particular lanes, which can be used to facilitate other tasks including incident detection.
In addition, the ‘City Brain’ solution can connect with various urban management systems including emergency dispatch, ambulance call, traffic command, and traffic light control. By integrating and analyzing real-time data generated from these systems, City Brain can optimize urban traffic flow such as by identifying the quickest route for emergency vehicles to arrive at the scene within the shortest time frame.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) Tools
As the City Brain’s functionality expands, enterprises, start-ups, entrepreneurs, universities, and research institutions would in the future also have the opportunity to access and leverage its artificial intelligence (AI) tools to drive a wide range of innovation.
“Cloud computing, data technology, and AI has become fundamental tools for all companies and organizations to operate effectively,” said Simon Hu, Senior Vice President of Alibaba Group and President of Alibaba Cloud. “Building on this partnership, we are happy to see Malaysia become the first country outside of China to adopt the City Brain. Through the program, we aim to empower all Malaysian stakeholders in both the public and private sectors with the tools to enhance efficiency, advance innovation and succeed in the digital age. For Alibaba Cloud, this is the true meaning of inclusive technology.”
Alibaba Cloud has launched its Malaysia City Brain initiative in collaboration with the Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC), the country’s digital economy development agency, and Dewan Bandaraya Kuala Lumpur (DBKL), the city council in the capital, at a ceremony in Kuala Lumpur.
