IIT-Hyderabad, BNVI sign MoU to extend academia, industry cooperation

IITH-BNVI collaboration is going to usher in a new wave of innovations at IIT-H by investing and mentoring entrepreneurial ideas emerging from the IIT-H start-up community to go beyond bravely from ideas to markets.

Sangareddy: Indian Institute of Technology-Hyderabad (IIT-H) and Beyond Next Ventures India Private Limited (BNVI), a Japan-based company, signed an MoU to extend academia and industry cooperation. The association with Japan and industries from the country were a distinctive strength of IIT-H since innovation and entrepreneurship are the core expertise of IIT-H, with 200-plus patents and 100-plus startups on campus.

Investment in innovations has resulted in the development of many pathbreaking technologies at the premier institute. This IITH-BNVI collaboration is going to usher in a new wave of innovations at IIT-H by investing and mentoring entrepreneurial ideas emerging from the IIT-H start-up community to go beyond bravely from ideas to markets.

---

Director, IIT-H Prof BS Murty has termed the MoU between IIT-H and BNVI as an iconic achievement which is an indication that the Indo-Japan collaboration has entered its next stage. The Director said that the collaborations between the two countries were broader and more diverse, where startups and their ecosystems were the emerging key factors.

Prof Murty said that he would strongly support BNVI’s philosophy of Open Innovation to foster social innovation from early-stage technologies in laboratories. “Such a philosophy is very important to utilise the academic research outcomes better and more for solving the real-world problems in both countries and even beyond.”, he said.

Associate Faculty of IIT-H Dr Kotaro Kataoka said IIT-Hyderabad has a strong and broad startup ecosystem, including multiple incubation centres, entrepreneurship curriculum, and student organisations. Dr Kotaro said the collaboration with BNVI will further increase the thrust of the startup ecosystem on the campus. He said that the development and networking of human resources were also important aspects of sustaining Open Innovation.

Dr Kotaro said the student of IIT-H will have more exposure to entrepreneurship experts from and through BNVI. “I hope our students will get a positive stimulation and become more proactive to find a startup utilizing the learning and R&D in the institute, he observed.

Expressing delight in this collaboration, the Chief Executive Officer of BNVI Tsuyoshi Ito said the DNA of BNV in Japan is in nurturing ideas and talent at the high-end research and lab levels and converting them into successful ventures. The CEO said that they have been investing in India for the last two years, and it gives them immense pleasure to begin this new journey with IIT-H, which has Invention and Innovation as its core ethos. Tsuyoshi said that they look forward to partnering with existing initiatives of IIT-H and supporting them from a Japanese Venture Capital Perspective. He said that they will bring some of their best learnings from Japan to contribute further as well as give the students opportunities in the Indo-Japan Open Innovation Corridor.”

Head Business Development of BNVI Shah Mayursaid and others were present.