Ten Finalists Announced for Intel, DST Innovate for Digital India Challenge

Intel revealed the top 10 teams in the Intel and DST Innovate for Digital India Challenge at an innovation event in New Delhi on Thursday.

The 10 finalists presented innovative devices and applications in the fields of healthcare, agri-tech, e-governance, and online education.

Notable innovations came from Bhubaneshwar-based Phoenix Robotix, which has developed a low-cost product called Aurassure, which measures the environmental pollutants and particulate matters and feeds the real time data.

Teams with digital healthcare innovations included Chennai-based Asha+, a diagnostics provider, Pune-based Embryyo, which has made a device called CerviScope that helps with early screening for Stage 0 and Stage 1 cervical cancer, and Bengaluru-based Tjay, an IoT-based wearable platform for people with epilepsy and other chronic disorders.

E-governance based innovations included Airpaper from Hassan, Karnataka, which has built a digital data distribution platform, Bengaluru-based Aapna Seva, an e-governance player, leverages the Aadhaar ID, while Chennai-based Haqdarshak is a mobile technology and service delivery platform that helps citizens discover, apply for, and benefit from government and private schemes.

Other winners included Delhi-based DEIAB, which provides a Digital-Education-in-a-Box solution that runs on solar power; Bengaluru-based Jayalakshmi Agrotech, which develops crop-specific mobile applications for farmers in regional languages, and Ahmedabad-based Indian TTS, who have developed a regional Text-to-Speech engine.

The challenge, launched in April 2015 in support of the Indian government's Digital India vision, drew more than 1,900 entries from all over India, Intel said in an emailed statement.

The winning teams were honoured by Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minister of Communications and IT, Government of India; Gregory R. Pearson, Senior Vice-President and General Manager, Sales and Marketing Group, Intel Corporation; and Debjani Ghosh, Vice-President, Sales and Marketing Group and Managing Director, Intel South Asia.

Intel also launched the 'Ek Kadam Unnati Ki Aur' program, through which it will work with national and regional governments to create a blueprint to drive technology enabled transformation at the grass-roots in ten states in India.