The Gopalakrishnan-Deshpande Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (GDC) at Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT-M) has launched its flagship offering, I-NCUBATE, which enables faculty, researchers and entrepreneurs to validate if their technological ideas can be converted into a sustainable business.

Under 'I-NCUBATE,' GDC is working to bring deep-tech ideas from the laboratories of academic institutions to the marketplace. The first cohort of seven teams that have gone through I-NCUBATE program with instructors from George Washington University completed their session on Monday, 30th April 2018.

I-NCUBATE is a 7-week engagement programme where teams, each comprising a Faculty Lead, an Entrepreneur Lead, and a Mentor, come together as a cohort under the GDC umbrella and go through a customer-discovery exercise with their respective business ideas.

The key goals of I-NCUBATE are -- to help the faculty and the entrepreneur obtain an evidence-based validation of their idea by interacting with a sufficiently large number of potential customers; to enable the faculty and entrepreneur to formulate a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) that can be subsequently tested in the marketplace, and to assist the entrepreneur in formulating a business model for tapping the market opportunity.

GDC believes that these steps at a pre-incubation stage are essential pit-stops in the journey of transforming an idea into a scalable and sustainable business venture.

All teams that successfully complete the I-NCUBATE programme will be eligible for reimbursement of expenses incurred for participating in the programme up to a limit of INR 1,75,000.

Though the deadline for application for first cohort of I-NCUBATE has ended, GDC invites applications to participate in the I-NCUBATE programme by filling up the application form and sending the same to GDC at cinogdc@iitm.ac.in.

GDC has just completed the first cohort of the I-NCUBATE program with seven start-up teams from diverse areas in deep tech - MedTech, industrial safety, environment, and agri supply chain.

In year 2018, GDC plans to work with over 50 start-up ideas in from different scientific and engineering institutions from all over India.

GDC has been established at IIT Madras in August 2017 to provide the necessary thought leadership and networking impetus to help in building the systems and processes that enable innovative and entrepreneurial thinking across the Institute at all levels.

To recall, last month it was announced that IITs across the country are planning to help doctoral/Phd students convert their thesis in to a full-fledged 'Start-ups'. The move planned will be first executed by the IIT-Delhi to allow research scholars to become entrepreneurs.

Speaking about IIT-Madras, in 2016, India's largest private sector steel company, Tata Steel, has sponsored a research being done by some meticulous IIT Madras scientists into graphene, a new-generation carbon material.

In the same year, IIT-Madras joined hands with Nokia to work together for creating technological solutions that will increase the current broadband connectivity situation in the rural India. Nokia provided funds and technological expertise for research at the prestigious IIT-M’s Center of Excellence for Wireless Technology (CEWiT).

Via - Hans India | References - GDC@IIT-M

[Top Image - EduBirdie.com]
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