NEW DELHI (Metro Rail News): Minister of Railways Ashwini Vaishnaw has launched “StartUps for Railways” today 14th June at the Rail Bhavan in New Delhi.
This program will provide an enabling framework for motivating & encouraging Indian innovators to come forward for the development of innovative technologies, products & technological solutions. To harness technological & operational benefits offered by next-gen innovators, the Indian Railways Innovation Policy aims at providing fund support upto Rs. 150 lakh.
Speaking at the event, Ashwini Vaishnaw said that the prolonged discussions over the integration of technology into Indian Railways have taken a firm shape in form of this initiative launched today.
The Railways Minister requested the startups to use this opportunity for which he has also assured them of support from the Indian Railways in the form of a 50 per cent capital grant, assured market, scale and ecosystem.
Salient features of the Indian Railway Innovation Policy are:-
–Grant up to Rs. 1.5 Crore to innovator on equal sharing basis with provision of milestone-wise payment;
–Complete process from floating of the problem statement to the development of the prototype is online with a defined timeline to make it transparent and objective;
–Trials of prototypes will be done on Railways. Enhanced funding will be provided to scale up deployment on the successful performance of prototypes;
–Selection of Innovator/s will be done by a transparent and fair system which will be dealt with through an online portal inaugurated today by the Minister of Railways;
–Developed Intellectual property rights (IPR) will remain with the innovator only;
–Assured developmental order to innovator; and
–Decentralisation of the complete product development process at the divisional level to avoid delays.
