#6 – Abhijeet Jhala – Making a parking system “smart” using Azure

Welcome to the “Cloud Solution Architect” podcast where we talk to Azure architects from across the globe and discuss interesting and creative Azure solutions. For more podcast episodes, animated azure video lessons and simplified how-to Azure articles please visit www.cloud-monk.com

In this episode we talk with Abhijeet Jhala (AJ) who works as a Cloud Solution Architect with ISVs.

He talks about how he has the “coolest job” since he has to solve a business problem only once but can be reused many number of times. We talk about how he was instrumental in solving a business problem which was – making a parking gate “smart” using Azure and its IOT capabilities. He also talks about how having a breadth of technical experience and a hip pocket skill helps him be a “problem solver”

Enjoy listening !

AJ’s journey on how he got to where he is today

• AJ talks about how he started off with Oracle and how he started off with a blank state in Azure when he joined Microsoft but quickly mapped & translated the syntax from Oracle and AWS to Azure
• AJ talks about how he has the coolest job by working with industry solutions in the ISV space. AJ solves a business problem once but the solution he develops can scale – thanks to partners who help amplify his solution to 100-1000s of customers

Interesting projects that AJ has worked on –

• A leader in parking management wanted their Kiosks, gate to be intelligent and dynamic fare based system. The challenges were the parking were 5 levels underground and had no internet connectivity. Azure IoT was used to solve this business problem – including OCR, Azure edge camera for License plate reading. This also gave them additional value added services like – differential pricing based on demands, monitoring the parking spots, categorize the car by frequent customers and more.

AJ defined what a “good day” and a “bad day” is for him –

• Good day:
  • True business impact which tangible results than just a technical solution
  • Seeing his impact in real world

• Bad day:

• • Unhappy Customers

AJ’s advice to anyone who is starting off in the Cloud Solution space –

• Categorizing oneself as a pillared solution category expert – may not be a good idea. The real world doesn’t work that way – they do not hear solutions or products, what they want is industry problems. In order to solve this he had to stop wearing the hat of a “pillared solution expert” model. He now prefers calling himself a “problem solver” rather than a Data & AI Architect or Apps & Infra architect with a “hip” pocket skill.

AJ’s advice to keep himself abreast of all the changes happening in the cloud world –

• He is more of an audio/visual learner
• Azure Mechanics, Azure Academy, and Channel 9 video contents are something that he goes back to for an update on the features.
• For day-to-day updates he prefers following updates blog

How to get in touch with AJ

• LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhijeetjhala/
• His future blog link will be posted here 🙂