Bhubaneswar: The Indian Space Research Organization has signed a Memorandum Of Understanding with the Veer Surendra Sai University of Technology for setting up an advanced Innovation and Incubation Center in the Campus.
The Center will be one of its kind in the country set up by the premiere Space Agency. The MOU was signed in the presence of ISRO Chairman K Shivan and Sanjay Kumar Singh, Principal Secretary, Skill Development and Technical Education Department, Odisha, between the Vice Chancellor of VSSUT Prof Atal Choudhury and ISRO representative.
While ISRO will provide Rs 50 lakh grant for this purpose in the first phase, the University will facilitate all infrastructures. This is one of the six Space Technology Incubation Centers that the ISRO is planning to set up cross the country. According to ISRO website, “To attract and nurture the young academia with innovative ideas / research aptitude for carrying out research and developing the Academia–Industry ecosystem for Space Technology, ISRO is in the process of setting-up of one Space Technology Incubation Centre in 6 regions of our Country viz. Central, East, North, North-East, South and West”.
This will enable the young academia to realize their innovative ideas/research aptitude into space grade components/elements which can be utilized for space applications and guide them towards setting-up the future start-ups.
The center was envisaged during the visit of an ISRO team which appreciated the efforts of VSSUT students who had developed and successfully launched a sounding rocket on September 10, 2018. The 1.8-metre long sounding rocket weighed about 6.5 kg and reached to height of 13000 feet (3.96 km).