India’s dependence on imports needs to be reduced, says Mah Gov

Pune: Emphasing that India needs to reduce its dependence on importing technologies, Maharashtra governor Jishnu Dev Varma on Wednesday said bridging the gap between academia, industry, startups and govt agencies is essential to translate research into commercially deployable solutions, which in turn will strengthen the country’s innovation ecosystem.

Varma was speaking at the inauguration of the three-day workshop on Mid-TRL technology transition and innovation acceleration jointly organised by COEP Technological University and CANEUS International, in partnership with the govt of Maharashtra in Pune.

“This initiative directly responds to our goal of make in India in critical sectors such as aerospace, defence, semiconductors and advanced materials. India still depends heavily on imports. Every technology that successfully transitions from TRL 4 to TRF9 is a step forward reducing the dependence. It strengthens our innovation pipeline and enhances national competitiveness,” said Dev Varma.

The governor said while universities across the country were producing quality research, a significant gap remained between innovation and implementation and that is where CANEUS International comes in. “Stronger collaboration between universities industry, startups, investors and govt institutions is essential. India has over 1.3 lakh registered startups and thousands of active research programmes in our universities and national laboratories. Yet only a fraction of these innovation successfully reach the market. By bringing together academia, industry, startups, investors and govt agencies on a single platform, this workshop will help convert ideas into deployable, and scalable solutions,” said Dev Varma.

Highlighting the state’s economic strengths, the governor said the state contributes nearly 15% of India’s GDP and is home to more than 40,000 MSMEs. However, he said the state’s real competitive advantage lies in its human capital. “Events like this convert human capital into economic value. They will attract investments, foster startups and create high quality employment thereby reinforcing Maharashtra’s position as India’s leading industrial and innovation states,” said Dev Varma.

Renowned scientist Raghunath Mashelkar, chairman of CANEUS International Milind Pimprikar and Sunil Bhirud, COEP Tech University, were also present at the inauguration.

Calling it a first of its kind structured Mid-TRL technology-transition effort in India, Pimprikar said that Maharashtra is now positioning itself to lead it. The Maharashtra govt has partnered with CANEUS International to create a Mid-TRL innovation acceleration and skilling institute in the Mumbai region focusing on aerospace, defence, energy and deep technologies.

“This is not an expo, not a conventional conference, and not a routine startup mentoring event. During the three days, the focus will not be on speeches alone, but on a working process: identifying industry and mission needs, mapping technology bottlenecks, forming project concepts, and building pathways for funding, validation, certification, scale-up, and deployment,” said Pimprikar.