KOCHI: Three startups from Kerala -- Thiruvananthapuram-based Genrobotics, Aluva-based Jackfruit365, and Kochi-based Nava Design & Innovation -- are among the winners of the National Startup Awards 2020 announced on Tuesday.
The winners were selected across 12 sectors including agriculture, food processing, education, energy and finance.
Genrobotics Innovations Pvt Ltd., whose manhole-cleaning robot Bandicoot, is now widely used in six states, won the award in the 'campus-initiated startups' segment. "This is a prestigious award and one of the highest honour for us," said Rashid K, one of the co-founders of Genrobotics. "Genrobotics offers human-controlled robots as an alternative to manual scavenging," the award citation said.
Jackfruit365 received the award in 'food processing' category. The startup invented a flour from green jackfruit to control blood sugar and the product received a patent this year. "We sincerely hope this award will take us one step closer to our mission of turning every jackfruit in India to control India's diabetes epidemic by working with the central government to fortify wheat flour with green jackfruit flour like we fortified salt with iodine," said James Joseph, founder of Jackfruit365.
The third startup award from Kerala went to Nava Design & Innovation, which bagged the prize in the 'agriculture - productivity' segment. Nava Design's robotic coconut sap tapping device - Saper -- is powered by solar energy. It reduces the number of human tree climbs from 270 to just two times in a period of three months. The device and process have been patented in 28 countries, covering more than 90 per cent of coconut growing area in the world.