New Delhi: The Central government’s Department of Science of Technology (DST) has sanctioned Rs 170 crore to IIT, Delhi to set up a Technology Innovation Hub on Collaborative Robotics, namely, ‘Cobotics’, under the National Mission on Interdisciplinary Cyber-Physical Systems (NM-ICPS).
The Hub on ‘Cobotics’ at IIT Delhi, which is known as ‘I-Hub Foundation for Cobotics (IHFC)’, was incorporated as a Section-8 company by the institute in June 2020 with the initial seed funding from the DST.
According to an NDTV report, the four verticals that will be covered under the IHFC are medical robotics, agriculture and disaster management, defence, and smart manufacturing (Industry 4.0).
IIT Delhi Director, Prof V Ramgopal Rao, who chairs the board of the company under the NM-ICPS programme of DST, said, “IHFC will not only perform research in the area of Collaborative Robotics i.e. Cobotics, but also proactively translate the outcomes into products for the benefit of humanity.”
The focus will be on technologies where robots should be able to work together with humans for maximising the benefit of human intelligence with robots’ precision and ability to work tirelessly in an environment where humans cannot work.
More than 50 faculty at IIT Delhi and similar numbers from other universities in India and abroad including Japan, Korea, USA, UK and others, along with several companies, have already committed to the “I-Hub Foundation for Cobotics” at IIT Delhi.
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