This week’s Smart City roundup features a list of smart city big players and a partnership between countries to countries further smart city efforts. .

Top smart city suppliers

Navigant Research predicts that global smart city technology market is expected to be worth more than $27.5 billion annually by 2023. Question now is, which of these vendors will be able to help cities transform into smart metropolises?

Examining 16 leading smart city suppliers, Navigant has ranked according to the following criteria: vision, go-to-market strategy, partners, product strategy, geographic reach, market share, sales & marketing, product performance & features, product integration, and staying power. The result is a list of top vendors for the Smart City market, topped by none other than IBM, a company that has invested $1 billion in cloud computing and analytics services to enable cities to improve information infrastructure and connectivity.

IBM is followed by a string of familiar technology companies, including Cisco Systems Inc., Schneider Electric, Siemens AG, Microsoft, Hitachi Ltd., Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., Ericsson, Toshiba Corp. and Oracle Corp.

Using Navigant Research’s proprietary Leaderboard methodology, vendors are profiled, rated, and ranked with the goal of providing industry participants with an objective assessment of these companies’ relative strengths and weaknesses in the growing global smart city market.

U.S. teams with India for smart city projects

President Barack Obama will soon be visiting India with the main agenda of strengthening the relationship between U.S. and India. According to reports, the two countries will be signing a landmark agreement to build smart cities in Allahabad, Ajmer and Vishakhapatnam as part of the U.S.-India Infrastructure Collaboration Platform. The initiative was first put into motion when India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the U.S. back in September, 2014. Sources stated that over the past three months, the teaming countries have been fine-tuning elements of the deal to be finalized during President Obama’s upcoming visit.

“The consortium has been set up to collectively look at business opportunities in various sectors including smart cities and aims at identifying and bidding for projects across the country. Large projects require strong Indian partners along with financing solutions to realistically move forward,” said American Chamber of Commerce in India (Amcham) executive director Ajay Singha. “The consortium will jointly interface with governments at the state and central levels and operate as a cohesive group offering multiple solutions to suit a diverse bunch of re requirements.”

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