IWCE 2023: Telecommunications technology expo highlights city solutions like smart pavement
Time is marching on and so is telecommunications technology — these days, at a breakneck pace. The IWCE 2023 exposition in Las Vegas, Nev. this week highlighted tech-forward city solutions like smart streetlights, city-wide networks, 5G, satellites, and roadways that can wirelessly charge electric vehicles speeding along at 65 miles per hour.
“Modular, prefab infrastructure as a Lego kit with tech inside,” explained Tim Sylvester about the smart pavement solution his company, Integrated Roadways, was showcasing at the expo. “They act as hosting locations for civic tech of all sorts.”
That tech includes wireless vehicle charging technology, fiber optic cables, smart city edge servers, and various types of sensors including those to detect weather and direct autonomously driving cars, among other devices.
Beyond the next-generation tech embedded in the smart pavement, Sylvester’s company advocates for public-private partnerships that would turn public roadways into utilities. Traditionally, their maintenance costs are covered by the taxpayers who use them. But if they became networks for profitable technologies like fiber optic cables and sensors, their upkeep could be assured via pavement lease agreements managed by public-private partnerships.
“Roadways are civic real estate, but they’re completely undeveloped. We’re turning the road into digital real estate, and we’re hosting digital tenants,” Sylvester said. “The commercial revenue subsidizes the roadway. This becomes a no-cost solution for the drivers.”
The Missouri-based Integrated Roadways’ booth was one of more than 300 venders at the event, which was held at the Las Vegas Convention Center and drew about 5,000 registrants hailing mostly from public safety-related organizations and telecommunications technology businesses.
“We have a real niche market,” said Kevin Garmong, vice president of Pepro, which manufactures hardened enclosures designed to protect delicate telecommunications infrastructure. He was standing alongside the company’s Faraday Cage, a mobile box that can withstand lightning strikes, electromagnetic pulses and various types of interference.
“They can be towed up into the mountains or wherever they’re needed, or flown in,” Garmong said. Given the prevalence of wildfire and other incidents that require deployed telecommunications solutions into remote locations, the bulk of their clients are based in the West, Garmong said. Pepro, which was founded 28 years ago, is based in Oil City, Pa.
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