VISAKHAPATNAM: Andhra Pradesh will be transformed into an innovation hub, and a Centre of Excellence by Amazon will be set up here soon, announced Minister for Information Technology and Industries Mekapati Gowtham Reddy.
Speaking after the hybrid inaugural of the ‘Centre of Excellence of IoT and AI’ set up by National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM), in a joint partnership with the Union Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) and the Government of Andhra Pradesh, at Andhra University campus here on Tuesday, he said one Centre of Excellence will be set up in every constituency for which the YSRC government will be making rapid strides.
The CoE at Andhra University, the first in the State, is aimed at promoting innovation in emerging technologies such as IoT, AI, robotics, etc. It also promotes entrepreneurship by providing an incubation facility for peer-to-peer learning and the benefit of an industrial environment. Start-ups in the State are also expected to benefit from the launch of the new centre with newer opportunities in areas of their development, mentorship, funding, and adoption of their solutions in the industry.
The CoE of IoT and AI is a step towards solving real-world challenges and creating an impact. It is designed to be a catalyst that will help the industry embrace technology and become globally competitive. The centre will focus on harnessing the power of artificial intelligence and internet of things to bring unprecedented opportunities for industry, start-ups, and academia.
Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Union Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship & Electronics and Information Technology, who addressed the ceremony virtually, said, “Technologies like IoT and AI are going to deeply shape the future of the technology landscape and the economy in general. It is absolutely essential that the centres of excellence become not just academic extensions of universities, but also living, breathing, growing centres of energy, dynamism, entrepreneurship, and technology in the coming years.”
The Minister appreciated the collaborative approach that has been followed in setting up this CoE. “The world is now looking towards India as a reliable and trusted supply chain partner,” he said, adding the target of a $1 trillion digital economy is real and achievable.
Gowtham Reddy observed: “We have nine technologies, which are going to be the sunrise technologies for world events. They are artificial intelligence & machine learning, robotic process automation, edge computing (an extension to cloud computing), quantum computing, virtual reality and augmented reality, blockchain, IoT, 5G and, finally, cyber security. If we can be a world-class leader in any of these nine technologies, then we are talking about a trillion-dollar economy coming to the shores of Andhra Pradesh.”
Debjani Ghosh, president of NASSCOM, said, “The Centres of Excellence have become almost a melting point that beautifully connect the different ecosystems to understand the big problems that technology can solve...”
The CoE at AU is the fourth in the country and first in the State, and supports CoE IoT incubation infrastructure to support start-ups, SMEs, students, and other innovators based on membership and support from design to prototype in productising their ideas.It also houses a well-equipped lab with hardware design tools, wireless development kits, application sensors, etc that otherwise would have been difficult for the start-ups to afford.