Technology giant Google won a Rs.150 crore contract from Pune smart City to set up free Wi-Fi spot at 200 places.

Under this programme, Google will be collaborating with companies including IBM, Larsen & Toubro (L&T) and RailTel to work on Google Station platform.

“With the goal of creating a great Internet for the next billion users, we have found that making high-quality public Wi-Fi more easily accessible can play a critical role in bringing the benefits of Internet to millions of Indians. We believe that Google Station, can help ISPs, venue operators, and city governments quickly and reliably deploy high speed internet,” a news report quoting Google spokesperson said.

Google Station is essentially a platform that gives organizations/partners an easy set of tools to roll out Wi-Fi hotspots in public places. Google Station provides software and guidance on hardware to turn fiber connections into fast, reliable and safe Wi-Fi zones. At users’ end, the login process is simple and unified, which makes it easier for venues to manage their networks. Pune will be the first city to have Google station.

Whiile RailTel will provide last-mile fiber connectivity to enable Wi-Fi hotspots at around 200 strategic locations across the city of Pune, L&T will work as the master system integrator for the Pune Smart City project and IBM will providing smart city solutions to set up a Smart City Operation Centre (SCOC) to integrate all the services and applications on a single platform.

Google and RailTel are already working on install free Wi-Fi hotspots across railway stations on 100 stations.