IIT Madras: Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar inaugurates new facility of Centre for Innovation

NEW DELHI: Vice President of India Jagdeep Dhankhar today inaugurated the new facility of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras Centre for Innovation (CFI) in the presence of Thiru K Ponmudy, Tamil Nadu minister for higher education and IIT-M director V Kamakoti.

The new facility, which is located in the recently-constructed Sudha and Shankar Innovation Hub, is dedicated to student-led activities and encouraging Innovation and Entrepreneurship (I&E) activities of the students and researchers. It is funded by both alumni as well as government contributions besides the institute.

The Sudha and Shankar Innovation Hub was constructed with the support of V Shankar founder of CAMS Pvt Ltd and alumnus awardee of IIT Madras. Shankar was also present during the event.

V Kamakoti, IIT Madras director said: “During the last 14 years, the CFI has had a tremendous impact on both innovation and start-up culture at IIT Madras. Nearly 6,000 students have benefited from learning various skills at this centre and approximately 1,000 student projects have been completed. In addition, about 50 start-ups can trace their roots back to the CFI.

“With the growing appetite in student community for innovation and entrepreneurial activities, this centre needed major expansion to cater to current and future needs,” he added.

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IIT-M Centre for Innovation

The Sudha and Shankar Innovation Hub (SSIH) Teams, which have more than 2,000 students, faculty and members, have established 12 world records and over 200 start-ups have originated from the hub, IIT-M informed.

Speaking at the inauguration, Jagdeep Dhankhar said: “V Kamakoti is the Director of IIT Madras during ‘Amrit Kaal,’ the 75th year of Independence. He along with the faculty will be creating those warriors who will shape the destiny of India in 2047 - they are before me.”

The Vice President further said: “Alumni are the spinal strength of an Institution. Institutions grow on the shoulders of the alumni, their laurels and their contributions. Let us in this country have a mechanism for a structured evolution of alumni in all institutions. Those alumni and institutions will certainly take care of our economic nationalism and our growth trajectory… I would want this great institution (IIT Madras) to take the lead in having a model platform for all alumni. This model can change the world.”

He also interacted with the various teams of Centre for Innovation. IIT Madras students asked questions on the future of the nation and the importance of start-ups for the nation’s economy.

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IITM Centre for Innovation hosts 15 hobby clubs and 6 competition teams with additional teams providing support on branding and engagement, finance, and web-ops, coding.

The competition teams work on themes such as hyperloop, electric vehicles for racing, solar-powered cars, autonomous ground vehicles, sounding rockets, and space rovers.

While the Hobby clubs are dedicated to themes including astronomy, mathematics, analytics, bioinformatics, 3D printing, techno-art and Blockchain. CFI teams have won national and international accolades, including representing India at global fora, the institute said.