TURNPLUS WINNER AT BIRAC-SOCIALALPHA QUEST FOR ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGIES CHALLENGE-SUPPORTED BY MPHASIS
Bangalore: TURNPLUS was among the Top 10 winners at the recently concluded BIRAC-SocialAlpha Quest for Assistive Technologies, supported by Mphasis. The quest was aimed at identifying start-ups, social enterprises or non-profits that have created innovative products, equipment or systems that enhance the learning, working and daily living for person-with-disabilities. The award ceremony was held in Bangalore at Taj Gateway and was presented to the Founder Mr Anand Kutre by Manoj Kumar, CEO Social Alpha and Head of Innovation, Tata Trust.
TURNPLUS is a patent pending and well-engineered solution for bucket seats in vehicles which swivels and extends to provide easy entry and exit. “The growing mandate within our country, like the “Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan” or “Accessible India Campaign” by our Prime Minister to be inclusive, makes it imperative that we include such innovations into our daily lives to provide non-discrimination in transport to persons with disabilities” says Anand. The winners of this challenge were awarded grant prices up to INR 50 Lakhs each for completion of clinical trial, improvements in design for manufacturability and fulfilment of work orders. They were also enrolled in the social alpha accelerator for inclusive solutions, a comprehensive and rigorous 3 month accelerator program where they will be given a chance to work with selected implementation agencies within the Social Alpha, BIRAC and Tata Trust network.
TURNPLUS is a plug-and-play product wherein the installation is undertaken in under 4 hours at the client location in the passenger seat of the car with no modifications or visible change to the aesthetics of the vehicle. The mechanism does not require any power, running completely on manual operation. The safety of the product is successfully tested for front crash, rear crash and seat belt anchorage. The mechanism does not require any maintenance and comes with a 3 year warranty. The product is registered under MSME and can be easily fitted into most Indian cars.
TURNPLUS is the first mechanical variant produced under True Consultancy, a company which is dedicated to providing accessibility solutions from home desk to office desk. The company is in talks with several corporates and cab aggregators who are keen to use these solutions. “The push from top management and D&I teams within corporates to enable such solution deployment, ensures the mobility aspect for a diverse employee base is at the top of their agenda” says Anand, who is in talks with several teams.
On the future plans of the company, Anand says, “Our goal is to address assisted mobility holistically by creating a range of well-engineered products that enables easy access from home desk to office desk”. TurnPlus will also have upgraded products which will have a wheelchair attached to it, wherein the entire seat will come out of the car and help the person sit on the wheelchair. The company is also planning customised products like Ramps which can be easily installed and dismantled.
True Consultancy is registered under MSME on March 4, 2011. The company is headquartered in Bengaluru, Karnataka and provides products and services across India. True Consultancy products like TurnPlus was a Finalist at Elevate 2016 and the Tea harvester won Elevate 2018.