THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The state government has signed an MoU with Airbus BizLab, a global aerospace accelerator, which is part of the Airbus group. The MoU was exchanged between Siddharth Balachandran, Leader, Airbus Bizlab, India, and Saji Gopinath, CEO, Kerala Startup Mission (KSUM), in the presence of Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan at his chamber on Saturday.
Under the MoU, an Innovation Centre will be set up in Thiruvananthapuram, which will be the nodal body for planning and executing all the activities to help startups. “We are confident that this partnership with Airbus Bizlab will help embed innovation in the industrial ecosystem of Kerala. It will upskill the local youth and will enhance employability,” said Chief Minister.
Airbus BizLab will also provide support and mentoring for startups in Kerala and conduct regular workshops and discussions with experts from aerospace and defence sectors.
Further, the France-headquartered company, which has set up facilities in Bengaluru, Toulouse (France), Hamburg (Germany) and Madrid (Spain) to create a global network of business accelerators, is to run training programmes to train participants in aerospace technologies.
Also, the company will identify opportunities for Kerala to adapt aerospace technologies across sectors and bring all the relevant Airbus teams and startups to demonstrate technologies. After successful demonstration, it will help the innovation centre to sign partnerships and deploy the technologies.
“The initiative aims to foster local talent in the aerospace domain and help promising startups to contribute towards shaping the future of flying not only in India but also the world,” said Anand E Stanley, president and managing director, Airbus India and South Asia.
“Airbus BizLab is a global leader in providing innovative, new-age solutions for the aviation sector. The early-stage entrepreneurs in Kerala will enormously benefit by working in close tandem with such a prestigious company,” said M Sivasankar, Secretary, Kerala IT.
Airbus BizLab, which has pioneered the corporate approach to accelerate an idea into scalable business, provides wide-ranging support for early-stage projects in the form of a six-month acceleration programme, through which entrepreneurs and startup businesses are given access to a large number of coaches, experts and mentors across various domains, such as technology, legal, finance, marketing and communications, easing prototyping and market access.
The ceremony was attended by Tom Jose, Chief Secretary, Margit Hellwig-Boette, German Consul General; M C Dathan, scientific advisor to the CM; Santhosh Kurup, CEO, ICT Academy; Hrishikesh Nair, CEO, Technopark; and others.