IITM Pravartak Technologies Foundation

Check you are in scope before anything else

Every IITM Pravartak scheme page repeats the same line: it will only accept proposals in sensors, networking, actuators and control systems. That is not a soft preference on the funding side — it is the filter. IIT Madras hosts several other startup bodies, and if your work sits outside cyber-physical systems you should be applying to one of those instead, not to Pravartak.

Pick the scheme that matches your stage

• No company yet, just an idea and a plan to build a prototype: Entrepreneur In Residence. Winning a hackathon or a Grand Challenge is one of the stated routes in.
• Finished EIR, or you have patents and papers, and you want to take a product from early proof of concept to a working prototype over two years: PRAYAS. You will need an established professor as a mentor, from a UGC or central institute or from a company with an R&D function — line that up before you write the proposal.
• You have a product with market fit and you need to get it commercialised: Seed Support System. A private limited company has to be incorporated before any funds are released, so start that if you have not.
• You already have a company, licensable technology and at least one paying customer: DIAL.

Applying to the wrong one is the most common way to waste a call.

How the application actually works

There is no rolling form. Each scheme runs as a call for proposals, and you submit a proposal in Pravartak's specified format with three things in it: your objective, your milestones and your expenditure details. Write the milestones as though someone will hold you to them quarterly, because they will — continued funding on the approved projects depends on progress against them.

Selection has two stages. A Technical Review Committee reads and shortlists. Shortlisted applicants then present in person to a Technical Evaluation Committee, which decides whether the idea is genuinely innovative and whether it has marketing potential. Prepare for a technical audience that will ask what is novel and who will buy it.

What reviewers are weighing

The deliverables Pravartak lists for its schemes tell you what it is counting: filed patents and licensable technology, a working proof of concept, publications, jobs created, the number of UG, PG and PhD candidates you deploy, industry collaborations, and for the later schemes a marketable product with an actual customer base. A proposal that spells out what it will produce on those lines is speaking the committee's language.

Know the IP position before you sign

It differs by scheme and it matters. Under EIR and PRAYAS, patents and technology ideas are jointly owned by Pravartak and the inventors; Pravartak bears the filing cost and later licenses the technology back to the startup with a royalty clause, with an exclusive licence option available on terms set at filing. Under the Seed Support System, all patents and technology ideas are owned by the startup. Under DIAL, the licence fee can be substituted through equity at a mutually agreed valuation, and where an external funder is in the picture the IP can be jointly owned by Pravartak and that funder. Read the scheme page for the one you are applying to and raise anything you are unsure about with the coordinator before you commit.

Practical notes

Check the scheme page for its registration status before you start writing — when we last looked, only Entrepreneur In Residence was accepting applications and the other three showed as closed. Each scheme page lists a coordinator inbox for clarifications, and that is the right place to ask when the next call opens. The office is in the IIT Madras Research Park at Taramani, Chennai, and Seed Support System startups get desk space there for two years, so plan on being reachable in Chennai.

IITM Pravartak Technologies Foundation is a Section 8 not-for-profit company that runs the Technology Innovation Hub on Sensors, Networking, Actuators and Control Systems — SNACS — at IIT Madras. It is hosted by IIT Madras and funded by the Department of Science and Technology under the National Mission on Interdisciplinary Cyber-Physical Systems. It works out of the IIT Madras Research Park at Taramani in Chennai, and was incorporated in June 2020.

Pravartak is one of several startup-facing bodies at IIT Madras, and its remit is narrow: cyber-physical systems — hardware and software that sense the physical world, move things, connect them and control them. Every one of its startup schemes repeats the same line, that it will only consider proposals in sensors, networking, actuators and control systems. If you are building outside that, this is the wrong door, whatever else IIT Madras runs.

What they support

The research areas Pravartak funds are communication, sensors and networking; data science and machine learning for IoT; embedded control systems and software; security and cryptography for control systems; control algorithms and automated systems; industrial IoT; and AI for IoT. Its portfolio runs from semiconductors and RF photonics to medical devices, satellite communications, industrial automation, electric mobility and air-quality sensing.

It supports founders across the whole arc, with a different scheme at each point: before you incorporate, while you turn an idea into a prototype, once you have a company and need to reach the market, and after that when you are scaling. There is no general incubation programme to join — you apply to the scheme that matches where you are.

Programmes

There are four startup schemes, all run as calls for proposals.

Entrepreneur In Residence is for the stage before a company exists. Pravartak backs an individual with an idea in cyber-physical systems for up to one year while they build a prototype, with a monthly grant, technical mentorship if needed and lab access. When the prototype works, the EIR can apply to PRAYAS or the Seed Support System next. Patents from EIR work are jointly owned by Pravartak and the inventors, Pravartak pays the filing costs, and it later licenses the technology to the startup with a royalty clause. Twenty-two people are named as Entrepreneurs in Residence on the programme page.

PRAYAS — PRomotion and Acceleration of Young and Aspiring technology entrepreneurS — is a two-year programme that takes a product from roughly TRL 1-3 to TRL 4-6, with protecting the intellectual property as the main focus of the phase. It expects you to have finished EIR or to have a body of patents and papers behind you, and it requires an established professor as a mentor, from a UGC or central institute or from a company with an R&D arm.

The Seed Support System is for a startup with a product or service that has market fit, room to scale and technology at its core. It covers proof of concept, prototype development, product trials, market entry and commercialisation, aiming to get the company to a point where angels, venture funds or banks will back it. A private limited company has to be incorporated before funds are released. Selected startups get a four-seater desk space for two years at the IIT Madras Research Park, introductions to investors and customers, and access to the Gopalakrishnan Deshpande Centre. Under this scheme all patents and technology ideas are owned by the startup.

The Dedicated Innovation AcceLerator, DIAL, is post-incubation support for a company that already exists, has licensable technology and has at least one revenue-generating customer. It provides customer connections, investor connections and internationalisation support to push an existing product further into the commercial domain. DIAL is the one scheme where ownership can change hands: the licence fee can be substituted through equity at a mutually agreed valuation, and where an external funder is involved the IP can end up jointly owned by Pravartak and that funder.

Pravartak also awards fellowships — undergraduate, postgraduate, doctoral, post-doctoral and faculty — for skills and research rather than company building, and has run Grand Challenge competitions, including the Yuru Musical Instrument Hackathon with Sony Music Entertainment (Japan) and Sony India Software Centre, and SAMVEDAN. Winning a hackathon or Grand Challenge is a stated route into EIR. Separately it runs the Centre for Human-Centric AI, a research centre working on AI for education, healthcare, financial services, legal systems, agriculture and security; it invites partnerships rather than applications, so it is not a route into funding.

Facilities and support

On offer are lab access at Pravartak, desk space at the IIT Madras Research Park for Seed Support System startups, technical mentorship on all four schemes and business mentorship on three. Pravartak files and pays for patents on the EIR and PRAYAS routes. Investor and customer introductions come with the later-stage schemes, as does access to the Gopalakrishnan Deshpande Centre. The site does not describe what equipment the labs hold, so ask before you assume a particular bench or instrument is there.

Track record

Pravartak publishes a Hub Performance Index setting out its mission targets year by year alongside what it achieved. Against those it reports 46 startups and spin-off companies, 31 Entrepreneurs in Residence, 9,643 jobs created, 76 technologies and 107 technology products across the first five years. Its Seed Funded Startups page names 56 companies, so the two counts do not agree. Named portfolio companies include Mindgrove Technologies, Vyoma Systems, TuTr Hyperloop, SecurWeave, Vaan Megam Networks, Drutam Technologies, Taara Labs, Abyom SpaceTech & Defence and Morpho Innovations. Its publication count is also given two ways — 137 on the homepage and 280 publications, IPR and intellectual activities in the Hub Performance Index.

Beyond India, it runs joint research projects with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the University of Texas at Austin, Rice University and Carnegie Mellon University under a National Science Foundation collaboration, and has innovation-hub tie-ups with two Nepalese universities.

Who runs it

The Project Director is Prof. David Koilpillai of the Department of Electrical Engineering at IIT Madras, and the Chief Executive Officer is Dr. M. J. Shankar Raman. The governing body mixes industry figures — Shri Bhaskar Bhat, Dr. Kumar Sivarajan of Tejas Networks and Dr. G. Venkatesh of Sasken — with IIT Madras academics, and Dr. Ekta Kapoor as Mission Director from DST.

How to apply

Every scheme works the same way. You write a proposal in Pravartak's format covering your objective, your milestones and your expenditure, and submit it during an open call. A Technical Review Committee shortlists, then you present to a Technical Evaluation Committee, which decides whether the idea is innovative and has market potential. Funded projects are reviewed on a quarterly basis and continued funding depends on hitting milestones.

When we last checked, the Entrepreneur In Residence page carried a live apply link and PRAYAS, the Seed Support System and DIAL each showed registration as closed. Questions about any of the schemes go to the startup schemes coordinator inbox listed on each scheme page, and general enquiries to the address on the contact page. Pravartak's office is at B5-01, B Block, 5th Floor, IIT Madras Research Park, Kanagam Road, Taramani, Chennai 600113.