IIT Madras launches innovation contest for sustainable startups
The Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT-M) has recently launched the third edition of the Carbon Zero Challenge (CZC), an all-India eco-innovation and entrepreneurship competition. The CZC 2022 is focusing on "Resource Depletion and Pollution" accelerated by climate change and biodiversity losses. The event was launched on August 24 and the CZC 2022 winners will receive a start-up seed grant of Rs. 10 lakh.
Shortlisted teams will get funding support to establish startups
The competition aims to accelerate the lab-to-market transition of eco-innovations in India by funding their innovations and development from proof-of-concept and lab-scale solutions to working prototypes or pilots. The shortlisted teams will get funding and mentorship support to build startups and carry on their idea to the market through commercialization. Winners will also get access to IIT-M incubation resources with angel and VC funding.
IIT-M will introduce its patenting mechanism to contest participants: Director
During the event launch, Professor V Kamakoti, Director of IIT-M, said that the Institute has plans to establish a "School of Sustainability" to work toward UN SDGs. He also announced that IIT-M will introduce its patenting mechanism to the contest participants. "The Institute has a robust incubation ecosystem that can help start-ups mature and convert their ideas into a viable business," Kamakoti added.
Seed funding essential to convert ideas into working prototypes: Kamakoti
"Seed funding is important to convert an idea into a working prototype and support teams through pre-incubation and incubation," Kamakoti said. "HomoSEP, which was supported during the earlier editions of CZC, has converted into a product and the third device has been given recently to a family member of a person who was engaged in manual scavenging," the professor added.
Know about this year's theme
The theme for this year's CZC is circularity in resource conservation (CRC). The theme focuses on the idea based on the need to balance demand and the earth's supply. This is done through resource conservation, rethinking design, and materials to enable resource reduction, recycling, recovery, and reuse. The public service systems require non-polluting technology to achieve this with low carbon and land footprint.
Some more details about the competition
According to the IIT-M press release, around 100 teams are expected to get shortlisted and of them, 25 will receive prototype funding up to Rs. 5 lakh per team. The teams will be trained to "sharpen their market orientation and entrepreneurial quotient, and develop the sustainability report for their product to market it as a clean-tech company." They will also interact with industry experts.
How to apply?
If you wish to apply to the contest, then let us inform you that the last date to apply is September 24, 2022. You can get the details regarding the competition and the application procedure from the CZC2022 web portal.
