Zoho's Sridhar Vembu To Co-Chair Oversee Committee for 3 AI CoEs

Dharmendra Pradhan to Announce 3 AI-CoE on Healthcare, Agriculture and Sustainable Cities on 15 Oct.'24

Union Minister for Education, Shri Dharmendra Pradhan, will be announcing three AI Centres of Excellence (CoE) focused on Healthcare, Agriculture, and Sustainable Cities on 15th October 2024 in New Delhi.

To realize the vision of "Viksit Bharat," these three CoEs for Artificial Intelligence (AI) will be led by top educational institutions, in consortium with industry partners and startups. They will conduct interdisciplinary research, develop cutting-edge applications, and create scalable solutions in these three areas. This initiative aims to galvanize an effective AI ecosystem and nurture quality human resources in these critical fields.

To oversee the implementation of this initiative, an industry heavy Apex Committee has been constituted, co-chaired by Dr. Sridhar Vembu, Founder and CEO of Zoho Corporation.

As part of the vision to "Make AI in India and Make AI work for India," the establishment of these centres was announced under Para 60 of the Budget Announcement for 2023-24. In alignment with this, the Government has approved the creation of the three AI Centres of Excellence, with a total financial outlay of Rs. 990.00 Cr over the period of FY 2023-24 to FY 2027-28.

Shri K.Sanjay Murthy, Secretary/HE will grace the occasion, along with Directors of IITs, Heads of higher educational institutions (HEIs), industry leaders, start-up founders and senior officials from various ministries of the Government of India.

Education Has Become Increasingly Unaffordable Due to Urban Real Estate, Says Zoho CEO Vembu

SaaS major Zoho's CEO & Founder Sridhar Vembu believes that "Education has become increasingly unaffordable. A good part of it due to urban real estate (and even real estate around small towns) becoming extremely expensive; that affects education, health care and of course, housing and retail as well."

Sridhar Vembu further said that – "A lot of corruption money from politics is 'parked' in real estate and that has inflated prices beyond normal market forces. In a sense, all of us pay for political corruption in the form of expensive housing, schools and health care."

In a post over social media platform X, the Zoho CEO referred to a post on X, which showed the term-wise split of the amount to be paid to a school, in addition to a registration fee and an annual fee.

According to the X user's post, which Sridhar Vembu referred as an example for his point, he had to pay Rs 10,000 as a non-refundable registration fee, an annual fee of Rs 25,000 that was recurring and Rs 98,750 each for four three-month terms, between April 2024 and March 2025.

"We are investing in school education to make it affordable (our schools are free) but we can only do it in deep rural areas where land is affordable," added Vembu in the X post.

Notably, the cost of education in India has increased substantially. Between 2012 and 2020, education costs rose by about 10-12% annually. This includes tuition fees, transportation, and examination fees.

The rising cost of real estate in urban areas drives up the expenses for educational institutions. Schools and colleges often pass these costs onto students through higher tuition fees.

Corruption and speculative investments in real estate can inflate property prices, indirectly affecting the cost of education. This creates a cycle where high real estate prices lead to higher educational costs, making quality education less accessible.

Public expenditure on education has remained relatively stable, around 3.9% of GDP in 2018-19. However, private expenditure has grown faster, reflecting the increasing privatization of education. Together, public and private spending on education accounted for 6.6% of GDP in 2018-19.

Although, the education budget has seen periodic increases. For instance, the 2024 budget allocated ₹1.48 lakh crore to education, with significant increases for school education and literacy. Despite these efforts, affordability remains a challenge for many families, especially with the rising costs. And, Zoho founder, Sridhar Vembu, despite being a billionaire raise this issue to bring it in open.

While there are several government schemes aimed at making education more affordable, the implementation and reach of these programs can be inconsistent, limiting their effectiveness.

Addressing these barriers requires a multifaceted approach, including increased public investment, better implementation of government schemes, and efforts to reduce the cost of private education.

Zoho Founder Invests In Chennai-based Medical Device Startup vTitan

Sridhar Vembu, founder of one of India's most successful startup Zoho, has announced that he has invested about $10 million in vTitan, a medical device startup based out of Chennai, reported Times of India.

Besides being the main investor Zoho has also developed the user interface and software component for the medical devices of vTitan. Additionally, Zoho is also working with vTitan to develop IoT, AI and machine learning enabled prototypes in the coming months.

Founded in 2010 by Periyakulam Kasthuri, vTitan was working along with Zoho in stealth mode for last eight years. The startup offers medical devices, the first being their patented Accuflow SP-550 and Accuflow IBP-550 syringe infusion pumps for critical care medication administration. The pumps are powered by indigenously developed and patented closed-loop motion control technology.

The Accuflow SP-550 which works on electricity is priced at Rs 35,000 while the Accuflow IBP-550 includes an integrated battery pack for portability and is priced at Rs 45,000. "This is a dream that I saw over 10 years back. It is a blessing for us to fund a startup and entrepreneur who is working towards making this dream come true," said Sridhar Vembu to TOI.

The startup has employed a closed-loop motion control technology in these pumps for which it owns the technology patent in seven countries including North America, China, UK and India. The Company also expects to receive a CE certification for the devices by March. A CE mark on a product indicates that it complies health, safety and environmental protection standards necessary for sale within the European Economic Area.

The start-up has completed trials at Apollo Hospitals, Fortis Malar, Sri Ramachandra and Cancer Institute.

India's Current Medical Device Industry Scenario

Indian medical device industry is dominated by global giants and despite unfavourable domestic regulations, local Indian startups promise to make lifesaving medical technology more accessible in a country where quality and affordable healthcare is scarce, especially in any place that's not a major city.

India's medical devices industry is growing at about 15 per cent annually and is expected to reach at least $25-30 billion (Rs 1.65-1.98 lakh crore) by 2025, according to a report in March by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India.

Last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi invited startups to focus on research for innovative medical devices and use technology to make healthcare more affordable.

“India should manufacture its own medical devices to bring down the cost. Recently, the government reduced cost of stents by 85 per cent," said Modi while addressing oncologists at Tata Memorial Hospital.

To recall, in March 2017, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has moved a cabinet note and suggestion that the maximum age for classifying a biotechnology or a medical devices firm as a startup be raised to 8-10 years from the current 5 years [Read Here].

In an address to mark 75 years of cancer treatment by Tata Memorial Hospital, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said plenty of things pointing to startups working in medical devices, healthcare and health-tech but he seems to be either unaware of the fact that there exists many such medical device startups and health-tech startups in India that are innovative and working towards bringing down the cost of healthcare, or may be PM Modi wants to start everything afresh for startups working in health technology segment.

In medical device startups segment, Bangalore-based PathShodh has made a device that can perform 8 health tests on single platform and for this the startup has been shortlisted by National Health Systems Resources Centre (NHSRC) as a very important and useful device.

An another Bangalore based medical device startup called Museinc has built a ‘Smart Stethoscope’ to make Stethoscopes a common household device. Ten3T is also one such medical wearable device startup trying to help patients with real-time cardiac monitoring.

Zoho Founder Invests In Chennai-based Medical Device Startup vTitan

Sridhar Vembu, founder of one of India's most successful startup Zoho, has announced that he has invested about $10 million in vTitan, a medical device startup based out of Chennai, reported Times of India.

Besides being the main investor Zoho has also developed the user interface and software component for the medical devices of vTitan. Additionally, Zoho is also working with vTitan to develop IoT, AI and machine learning enabled prototypes in the coming months.

Founded in 2010 by Periyakulam Kasthuri, vTitan was working along with Zoho in stealth mode for last eight years. The startup offers medical devices, the first being their patented Accuflow SP-550 and Accuflow IBP-550 syringe infusion pumps for critical care medication administration. The pumps are powered by indigenously developed and patented closed-loop motion control technology.

The Accuflow SP-550 which works on electricity is priced at Rs 35,000 while the Accuflow IBP-550 includes an integrated battery pack for portability and is priced at Rs 45,000. "This is a dream that I saw over 10 years back. It is a blessing for us to fund a startup and entrepreneur who is working towards making this dream come true," said Sridhar Vembu to TOI.

The startup has employed a closed-loop motion control technology in these pumps for which it owns the technology patent in seven countries including North America, China, UK and India. The Company also expects to receive a CE certification for the devices by March. A CE mark on a product indicates that it complies health, safety and environmental protection standards necessary for sale within the European Economic Area.

The start-up has completed trials at Apollo Hospitals, Fortis Malar, Sri Ramachandra and Cancer Institute.

India's Current Medical Device Industry Scenario

Indian medical device industry is dominated by global giants and despite unfavourable domestic regulations, local Indian startups promise to make lifesaving medical technology more accessible in a country where quality and affordable healthcare is scarce, especially in any place that's not a major city.

India's medical devices industry is growing at about 15 per cent annually and is expected to reach at least $25-30 billion (Rs 1.65-1.98 lakh crore) by 2025, according to a report in March by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu India.

Last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi invited startups to focus on research for innovative medical devices and use technology to make healthcare more affordable.

“India should manufacture its own medical devices to bring down the cost. Recently, the government reduced cost of stents by 85 per cent," said Modi while addressing oncologists at Tata Memorial Hospital.

To recall, in March 2017, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has moved a cabinet note and suggestion that the maximum age for classifying a biotechnology or a medical devices firm as a startup be raised to 8-10 years from the current 5 years [Read Here].

In an address to mark 75 years of cancer treatment by Tata Memorial Hospital, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said plenty of things pointing to startups working in medical devices, healthcare and health-tech but he seems to be either unaware of the fact that there exists many such medical device startups and health-tech startups in India that are innovative and working towards bringing down the cost of healthcare, or may be PM Modi wants to start everything afresh for startups working in health technology segment.

In medical device startups segment, Bangalore-based PathShodh has made a device that can perform 8 health tests on single platform and for this the startup has been shortlisted by National Health Systems Resources Centre (NHSRC) as a very important and useful device.

An another Bangalore based medical device startup called Museinc has built a ‘Smart Stethoscope’ to make Stethoscopes a common household device. Ten3T is also one such medical wearable device startup trying to help patients with real-time cardiac monitoring.