Promising Tech Startups Get Grants Worth Rupees 6 Crore

Sixteen promising startups and 20 teams of university students have been given grants totaling Rupees six crore by the India Innovation Growth Programme (IIGP) – a joint initiative of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Lockheed Martin and Tata Trusts.

The winners were chosen from over 2400 applicants who presented innovations that aim to bring large scale social impact and industrial transformation in the country. Each startup awardee gets a grant of Rs 25 lakh, while university teams get Rs 10 lakh each to further develop and mature technology solutions proposed by them.

“We have thoroughly planned how to go ahead from start-up to scale up. If a company partner with a startup, then DST will also partner with it and extend a matching grant to help it scale up,” announced DST secretary Prof. Ashutosh Sharma while speaking at India Innovation Growth Program 2.0 award function.

Prof Sharma urged that the number of participants participating this year should be doubled next year. The government is coming up with startup centers worth Rs 150 crore each to help startups access resources, especially hardware. Three centers will be launched this year and the number of such centers will be scaled up gradually to 20.

The innovation award scheme is being implemented by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), Indo-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF), Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE) at IIM Ahmedabad and the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay.

Smart stethoscope for early diagnosis of lung and heart diseases is of the innovations awarded under the Open Innovation Challenge category. “We have attached a smart device to a normal stethoscope. This will help diagnose heart and lung diseases in early stages. The device is attached with an app to record the heart and lung sounds and it can pick up abnormalities that can help in early diagnosis. It is so simple that health workers can use it,” explained Adarasha K of IIT Bombay co-founder of Ayu Devices while speaking with India Science Wire. It is being used by health workers in Gujarat and Maharashtra.

Siddhant Dangi and Ujjawal Kumar Jha from BITS Pilani have used Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) to develop prosthetic arms that can operate with ‘mind signals’.

Other winning teams come from Siddaganga Institute of Technology, IIT-Madras, IIT-Bhilai, IIT-Kharagpur, IIT-Kanpur, Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (ACSIR), Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology, Shoolini University of Biotechnology and Management Science, SRS, ICAR-National Dairy Research Institute, Chitkara University, BITS Pilani, SKUAST Kashmir and Veer Surendra Sai University of Technology.

The winners in the ‘Open Innovation Challenge’ category are Astrogate Labs, Ayu Devices, BeAble Health, BioMed Innovations, BNG Spray Solutions, C Electric Automotive Drives, CogniABle, CyCa Oncosolutions, Kanpur Flowercycling, Nubewell Networks, Ossus Biorenewables, Tan90 Thermal Solution, Terero Mobility, Unbox Robotics, Varta Labs and Vidcare Innovations. NoPo Nano Technologies, Sastra Technologies, and Terero Mobility have signed MoUs with Lockheed Martin for helping them scale-up.

Jyoti Singh

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