HYDERABAD, India – A robotic leg for a 5-year-old boy whose right leg is paralyzed. A Smartphone battery that charges every time its user hits the keypad. A tablet that enables physically challenged people to control virtually everything in their home—from the room temperature to the lights to the doors.
These are just a few of the projects being worked on by two dozen or so students at a single-story veranda-style structure known as the Microsoft i-Spark Centre Innovation Academy, one of more than 100 such centers around the world and one of the first in India.
Housed in an $87,000 building that was specially constructed for innovation and inside a spacious yard with a tropical ambience, the center—where students remove their shoes and enter barefoot in order to keep it clean—is located on the outskirts of the city on an extension campus of the Padmasri Dr. B.V. Raju Institute of Technology, or BVRIT, a 14-year-old institution that is one of a growing number of private-sector colleges in India.
Though the i-Spark Centre bears the Microsoft name with the computer software giant’s blessing and employs the use of its products, the company’s contribution to the colleges isn’t financial or technical assistance. Rather, the affiliation with Microsoft provides a platform for students to present their ideas—namely, at an “ideation contest”—the prestige that comes with being linked to an industry giant and the promise, however near or remote, of one day winning a position at or the chance to collaborate with the global firm.
“It adds value,” says Dr. T.S. Surendra, principal at BVRIT, which is based in the Medak District about an hour from Hyderabad. “We have no complaints about that.”
The company, of course, gets a little extra recognition, but, more importantly, a convenient, no-cost means to scout and cultivate talent in diverse sectors of the world.
For students, the primary benefit is having a place where they can get hands-on experience and work on projects that could potentially get recognition and support from Microsoft in their bid to take the products to market.
