ISRO Immersion Challenge on AI for Space Innovation held at IIITH

25 scientists from ISRO mentored the startup & student-research teams from across India

Finalists included AI for in-space mobility, space debris solution, precision agri & rocket engines

177 teams applied, 74 shortlisted for immersion; 2 winners get a grant & POC support

HYDERABAD, India, Aug. 6, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- ISRO-NRSC and IIIT Hyderabad organized an AI for Space Immersion Program for startup and student-research teams from across the country. This day-long event brought together a dynamic community of startups, students, researchers, and industry experts, to foster innovation and explore the transformative potential of artificial intelligence in the space sector.

Ideas were reviewed by the scientists and guidance was given to refine and improve the ideas, CIE-IIIT Hyderabad and ISRO, with support from IN-SPACe, organized this innovation event to seed interesting new ideas and solutions for space. Through interactive ideation sessions, mentorship from ISRO scientists, interaction with IIITH faculty, pitch workshops, and inspiring talks, the participants had the opportunity to validate their ideas and connect with potential mentors and investors. The speakers at the inaugural and finale included Anand Rajagopalan of TM2Space, Naga Bharath of Skyroot, Vinod Bothala (Outstanding Scientist) of ISRO, Vijaya Bhanu (Director PD) of IN-SPACe, KV Ramana (Dep Director) of NRSC-ISRO, and P J Narayanan (Director) of IIITH.

The ISRO Immersion Challenge witnessed robust participation, with 177 applications received. Of these, 74 teams were invited for the immersion. The final 6 ideas included Green Propulsion for Satellites Delivery, AI-Powered Precision Rocket Control, Autonomous Swarm for Space Debris Cleanup, Precision Agriculture through crop surveys for accurate agricultural insights, and Democratizing Geospatial Data through a chat interface. The final winners were Expanse Cosmos (a startup based in Delhi) and Team Trishul (student team from Chandigarh).

Prof CV Jawahar, Dean at IIIT Hyderabad, said, "CIE at IIITH is an initiative to nurture innovations and startups based on support from research. We are very happy that ISRO and IIITH enabled this convergence of scientists, faculty, research students, startups and space enthusiasts to collectively come up with very interesting deep tech-based solutions for space."

About CIE IIIT Hyderabad

CIE at IIIT Hyderabad is a technology incubator, with 16 years of rich experience in seeding, nurturing and growing DeepTech, MedTech, Mobility and MediaTech. CIE IIITH, with research-led innovation as its primary mandate, focuses on amplifying technology and IP by creating research collaboration and co-creation models for startups to work with research groups at IIITH. CIE has been an ecosystem enabler, fostering communities that create and scale emerging technology solutions, innovations and startups.

About IIIT  Hyderabad

The International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad (IIITH) is an autonomous research university founded in 1998 that focuses on the core areas of Information Technology, such as Computer Science, Electronics and Communications, and their applications in other domains through inter-disciplinary research that has a greater social impact. Some of its research domains include Visual Information Technologies, Human Language Technologies, Data Engineering, VLSI and Embedded Systems, Computer Architecture, Wireless Communications, Algorithms and Information Security, Robotics, Building Science, Earthquake Engineering, Computational Natural Sciences and Bioinformatics, Education Technologies, Power Systems, IT in Agriculture and e-Governance.

Website: www.iiit.ac.in

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