KOCHI: Chitty, the robot with artificial intelligence, took viewers by storm in Shankar’s movie ‘Enthiran’. It was a rage not only with children but also with adults and had a large fan following. It looks like robots are becoming the centre of interest among students across the city, going by the response at the ongoing Raspberry Pi workshop at Startup Village, Kalamassery. Over 30 students, including 10 girls, are undergoing training. The Village received over 200 applications for the programme. At present, there are two big companies at the Village working on Robotics and many smaller ones too.
“The future of technology is robotics and artificial intelligence. The children in the city are very keen on exploring the opportunities in this sphere. Even students with minimum knowledge in electronics can easily experiment with robotics. But if they intend to make a product, intense research is required. Children usually need some tangible products to experiment further and robotics provide exactly the same opportunity. We hope that soon more companies will start operations in robotics at the Village,” said Zacharias Manuel, technical head, Startup Village.
He added that funding to encourage research is needed to promote companies in the space.
ASIMOV Robotics and Sastra Robotics are the major companies in robotics at the Village. Sastra offered training to over 150 students over a period of six months.
“Since robotics has become a part of the curriculum, the interest of students to become a part of this sector has indeed increased. This apart, the domestic market for the sector is also expanding fast,” said Jayakrishnan, chief executive officer, ASIMOV Robotics Private Ltd.
Akhil A, chief operations officer, Sastra Robotics, said robotics is the future as big companies like Google have started investing hugely in the sector.
“We conducted training programmes for B-tech students in robotics in the past and the response was overwhelming. If this is any indication, the robotics and artificial intelligence technology is here to stay,” he said.