Watson's at work in Vizag

BANGALORE, INDIA: An expert team from IBM will review Vishakhapatnam’s (Vizag) emergency management system to provide strategic recommendations for disaster management, helping the city become more resilient.

Vishakhapatnam is one of the 16 cities awarded an IBM Smarter Cities Challenge grant for 2015 and 2016.

The IBM team will use Watson Analytics Professional Edition to uncover trends in city data. This might include studying travel patterns, public health, or the effects of man-made and weather events. The tool can understand questions posed in natural, non-technical language, and help its users collaborate, predict and plan.

"The project will identify and recommend best practices that would help the District Collectorate to come up with a robust emergency response system,” said Mamtha Sharma, Head Corporate Citizenship & Corporate Affairs, IBM India.

By the end of 2016, IBM aims to make Smarter Cities Challenge grants to more than 130 cities worldwide.