Texas Instruments Collaborates with IIM Bangalore and Department of Science & Technology to support the winning teams with funding close to Rs 3.5 crores
Bangalore: The DST & Texas Instruments India Inc. Innovation Challenge Design Contest 2016 enters its semi-final phase with the start of the first of the two semi-final rounds today at IIM Bangalore. The contest saw the participation of ~11000 students from 624 engineering colleges from across India. The semi-final event was inaugurated by Mr. Sanjay Srivastava, Director – University Program, Texas Instruments India & Mr. Nagaraja Prakasam, Mentor, NSRCEL IIM Bangalore.
30 student teams from 30 engineering colleges presented their innovative products to a panel of evaluators who are thought leaders and accomplished achievers from various walks of life. The panel consisted of entrepreneurs, professors, bureaucrats and entries were judged based on customer validation, strategic innovation, marketing innovation, business interdependence, etc. The second semi-final is scheduled to be on April 22, 2017 at BML University, Gurugram.
IICDC over the years has become a platform that nurtures innovation. Engineering students have displayed path breaking innovation that has the potential to bring about socio economic change for India. It aspires to foster innovation at the formative years of a student. Most of 2016 entries have corroborated closely with the Government’s vision of Swaach Bharat, Digital India, Smart Cities projects, etc. Most solutions that have been shortlisted to the semi-finals have the potential to solve pressing problems across various sectors and to help bring positive change to the lives of millions of people. This contest aims to propel the government’s ‘Make in India’ initiative through student start-ups and contribute to the country’s manufacturing ecosystem.
Texas Instruments has taken this contest to greater heights by collaborating with IIM Bangalore and DST. IIM Bangalore through its efforts at NSRCEL will mentor the top 10 teams and help them to incubate their innovative product into start-up ventures. DST will fund INR 3.5 crore to the student start-ups, which will go towards the product development fund of INR 1.5 crore and seed fund of INR 2 crore for the top teams to incubate their start-ups.
“Texas Instruments India, through India Innovation Challenge has been the pioneer in creating a platform for young engineering students across the country to showcase innovation. It is heartening to see around 11,000 students across 624 top engineering colleges participating in this contest. The scale of this year contest would not have been possible without the unrelenting support from partners IIM B, DST and MyGov. Some path breaking innovations are being witnessed this year and we are confident that with the support of our partners the students are well poised to bring a change in the eco-system making it safer, cleaner, smarter, productive and more efficient” said Sanjay Srivastava, Director – University Program, Texas Instruments India.
Professor Suresh Bhagavatula, Chairperson, Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Development, at IIM Bangalore, said, “IICDC is an excellent platform for the students who are having a dream to convert their ideas to successful enterprises. The last few months, we have encouraged and mentored some of the talented engineers and with semi-finals they are very close to build their own start-ups to get incubated at the Nadathur S. Raghavan Centre for Entrepreneurial Learning (NSRCEL) from IIM Bangalore”.
“DST plays a pivotal role in promoting science and technology in the country. Collaborating with India Innovation Challenge we were able to witness innovations that had the right amalgamation of ideas and technology to help build and transform this nation into an economic power house”, said Mr. H.K. Mittal, Advisor and Head, NSTEDB, DST, GOI.