The Minister for Communications, Electronics & Information Technology and Railways, Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw has inaugurated the Entrepreneurship Cell and Centre of Innovation (COI) at the Delhi campus of the Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT), the Telecom R&D Centre of the Government of India, today.

Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw inaugurating Entrepreneurship Cell and Centre of Innovation at C-DOT, Delhi Campus

COI has been established to spur indigenous innovation and entrepreneurship in various domains of Telecom like IoT/M2M, AI/ML, 5G, etc. by encouraging local startups to play a significant role in strengthening the overall technological framework fueled by synergistic collaboration amongst R&D, academia, industry and startups that would accelerate the design, development and deployment of cost-effective and globally-competitive Telecom solutions in the country.

The Minister also reviewed C-DOT’s ongoing technology programs including 5G, Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) and advanced Security projects. He interacted with young engineers and researchers involved in the design and development of Telecom technologies. C-DOT’s engineers demonstrated various cutting-edge Telecom technologies to the Minister in several technology labs.

Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw reviewing C-DOT’s ongoing Technology Programmes

Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw interacting with Researchers at C-DOT

During his address to C-DOT’s researchers, he lauded the extraordinary efforts of C-DOT’s teams in creating a wholly indigenous end-to-end 4G system powered by C-DOT’s Core and RAN from the local industry partners. He hailed this achievement as a concrete step towards achieving “Atmanir Bharta” in the field of Telecom.  

Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw addressing the Researchers at C-DOT

The Minister posed confidence in the abilities of C-DOT and local technology ecosystem in building world-class 5G networks fully driven by the home-grown technology. He underscored the Government’s vision of giving unprecedented support and stimulus to local research and innovation. He assured Government’s full support to C-DOT in making it become a global leader in the area of Telecom.

Shri Vaishnaw also mentioned about the opening of Regional Office of International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in India that would foster research and innovation in the emerging areas of Telecom and lead to the creation of greater opportunities for wider contribution by home-grown talent towards evolution of various global Telecom technology standards.

Dr. Rajkumar Upadhyay, Chief Executive Officer, C-DOT thanked the Minister for sparing his precious time to visit C-DOT and boosting the morale of researchers by showing them a direction that would shape the contours for design and development of holistic Telecom solutions in the country.

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RKJ/BK