HYDERABAD: The eighth cohort of CIE’s (Centre of Innovation and Entrepreneurship) Avishkar Deeptech accelerator programme of the International Institute of Information Technology Hyderabad (IIIT-H) has finished on Monday. 13 startups from these two accelerators and other research connected programmes pitched to a set of VCs and angel networks.
Prominent angel investors, funds and VCs from across the country participated in the demo day which included investors such as Sri Capital, Venture East, Hyderabad Angels and SucSeed Ventures.
The Avishkar accelerator programme takes on two to three startups in each cohort. In the past two years, three of these startups have given exits and 10 startups have successfully gone on to raise subsequent funds. Ojas Medtech accelerator, which was launched last year has taken in six startups till date. Both the deeptech and Medtech accelerators are an intensive six-month mentor and research-led programmes.
CIE is the Center for Innovation Entrepreneurship of IIITH, focusing on all aspects relating to research-led innovation and applied research. It concentrates on deep-tech startups, seeding startups directly out of research, and actively connecting research with startups. It houses about 100 startups and is an integral part of the Hyderabad startup ecosystem.
Among the noteworthy startups who successfully completed the program in this cohort are X machines and Altor. Xmachines, which builds autonomous mobile robots has established a research partnership with ICRISAT for use of its robots in agriculture and has completed pilots at a few large manufacturing companies.
Altor, which builds smart helmets with accident sensors, alerts authorities and emergency contacts when an accident occurs. They are running pilots with 20 early adopters of their helmets.