With a view to giving further push to its ‘Mission Innovate Punjab’, the State Government has decided to organise an ‘Innovation and Technology Summit-2019’ on November 5 with an objective to promote Punjab as the Global destination for Innovations & Research.Disclosing this here today, Principal Secretary Science Technology and Environment Rakesh Verma said that the Department would hold this summit in collaboration with Punjab Chambers of Commerce and Industries. He said that under ‘Mission Innovate Punjab’ the State was drawing up an ambitious roadmap for developing a robust ecosystem for research & innovation to enhance competitiveness, boost economic growth and create employment.While holding a pre-summit meeting here at Punjab State Council for Science and Technology with the heads of academic and research institutions to work out the modalities, Rakesh Verma said that steps had already been initiated to consolidate the facilitating environment through active involvement and networking of institutions having state-of-the-art research & innovation infrastructure. A Council for Punjab Research & Innovation under the aegis of Department of Science Technology and Environment has already been established in this regard, he added.Various key issues included partnering organizations, dignitaries to be invited for inaugural programme, details of technical sessions, funding possibilities, felicitation of institutions/start-ups were discussed in the meeting to make this summit a grand success.The Principal Secretary further pointed out that the inaugural session on ‘Leveraging Punjab as Land of Opportunities for Innovations’ would include launch of ‘Mission Innovate Punjab’ by the Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh, where the National & International elite speakers from Government, Academia, Industry, Innovation and Research Organizations would highlight the available opportunities and strengths for positioning Punjab as an emerging destination for research & innovation. He said that the Chief Minister would also release Roadmap for Mission Innovate Punjab to promote Research & Innovation in the State, Draft State Action Plan on Climate Change (SAPCC) for consultation in Summit and Partnership of DSTE, GoP with R&I Institutions (signing of MoUs).It was also decided in the meeting to hold a session on Innovation and Academia: Boosting Research & its commercialization to throw a light on the significance of the innovation driven research undertaken by key institutions and its profound possibilities for applications in various Industrial sectors including commercialization. The session will also explore work on creating Local to Global, Global to Local network of researchers and Innovators.
With a view to encouraging international collaborations in the critical fields like aerospace, robotics, critical infrastructure and disruptive technologies and utilization of Punjab research capabilities for fulfilling its innovative needs, a session in the theme of Cross-Cultural Innovations: Exploring Global opportunities for collaboration and Convergence would also be held.Bringing thinkers and leaders from industry and MSMEs together, a session on Disruptive Technologies: New Paradigm of Development would also be held, which would portray the success stories on transformative technologies viz industry 4.0, machine to machine learning, artificial intelligence, internet of things which has helped them in transformation. The Chief Innovation Officers, Technology Heads/Leaders from industry will share how to leverage technology to transform, MSME and AGRI sector of the state as well as advocating technologies in league with ‘Make in Punjab’ concept, innovative products and promotion of knowledge-based technology driven entrepreneurs.In order to provide platform for young innovators and technocrats to interact with budding start-ups and young researchers, the ‘Young Innovators & Start-ups’ session would ignite their interest for shaping ideas into innovations for future careers.To build a robust delivery mechanism for governments in the field of Social Health, Education, Water Management, Clean technologies, Skill, Digital Payments, Securities etc, the ‘Social Innovations and Enterprises-Transforming Public Delivery System’ would further focus on emerging technologies.Funding Opportunities session would bring in the experts from funding organization (public & private), venture capitalists to highlight the funding schemes/programmes available for promoting technology development and commercialisation. The summit would conclude with Innovation Awards to felicitate Research Institutions/Industry/Start-ups for their outstanding contributions towards innovation and growth of State.Prominent amongst other present in the meeting included: Vice Chancellor Maharaja Ranjit Singh Punjab Technical University, Bathinda Prof. Mohan Paul Singh Ishar, Vice Chancellor, DAV University, Jalandhar Dr. Desh Bandhu, Director, NIT, Jalandhar Prof. Lalit Kumar Awasthi,; Dean R&D from PTU, Kapurthala, Professors and Senior Faculties from various other Institutions including IIT Ropar; PGIMER, Chandigarh; Central University, Bathinda; Public Health Foundation of India, New Delhi and Punjabi University, Patiala.Caption: Principal Secretary Science Technology and Environment Rakesh Verma holding discussions regarding ‘Innovation and Technology Summit’ at Punjab State Council for Science and Technology at Chandigarh.