Tata Trusts, Lockheed Martin seek Indian innovators

The 2018 edition of the India Innovation Growth Programme 2.0 (IIGP) was launched last week with an aim to develop entrepreneurship, accelerate indigenous innovations and incubate affordable, accessible and acceptable solutions to improve the country’s agriculture, healthcare, water and other such sectors. The IIGP was established by the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India, Lockheed Martin Coporation and Tata Trusts, in 2017

“The India Innovation Growth Programme 2.0 has been revolutionary in its discovery of young and highly motivated innovators who want to create large scale social impact with their high quality solutions that are also affordable and accessible. We are always looking for innovators and entrepreneurs who are on a mission to improve quality of life, especially for the underprivileged and deprived,"says Manoj Kumar, head, Entrepreneurship and Innovations, Tata Trusts.

Participants can apply in two ways: university challenge and open innovation challenge. University challenge applications are sought from individual students or teams across educational institutions in India. Top 30 university teams will receive mentoring by IIT-Bombay and the teams will go through a competitive screening process. Top 10 selected teams will receive research grants of Rs 10 lakh for developing a concept/prototype. After further screening, the top 4 teams will be awarded research grants of Rs 25 lakh each enabling them to advance to the next stage of application. In the open innovation challenge, top 50 participants go through a rigorous boot camp conducted by IIM Ahmedabad and face similar stages of screening until top four innovators are in a position to receive funding.

IIGP 2.0 has already met with some early success.  Five winners from the last year’s edition have begun to market their products in India and overseas. Two others have conducted field trials, while three have successfully created a proof of concept and product validation.

"We are targeting very high quality innovation and we would like to have as many of them come forward for the program," said Harkesh Mittal, ‎Programme head of Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Tech Commercialization, Department of Science & Technology, Government of India.