ideas
ideas
impact
challenge
*conditions apply
to
i2I
i2I 2.0
2024-25
Build on your sustainability ideas
Apply and win a chance to see your ideas transform into a workable prototype
supported by
Grand Prize
INR 100,000
for each of the
5 winning teams.
Start your entrepreneurial journey as a sustainability innovator.
Join a team that develops sustainable solutions, receive expert training, and stand a chance to receive a seed grant of up to 10 lakhs.
About i2I
“Ideas to Impact (i2I)” is a nation-wide competition in India, spearheaded by IIT Madras and supported by Wipro Foundation. The contest is designed to transform innovative ecological concepts into viable prototypes that actively contribute to a carbon-neutral future. Its mission is to equip students, who have a keen interest in resource circularity, with the necessary resources, mentorship and guidance. This support will empower them in their journey, from the initial ideation phase to the proof-of-concept stage. Upon successful completion of this program, students will be well-prepared to participate in initiatives like the Carbon Zero Challenge (CZC) and kickstart their entrepreneurial journey.
The Vision
The vision of the contest is to provide a platform for students with a strong leaning toward a career in sustainability. It aims to revolutionize the approach to resource management and consumption. This idea-pitching competition rallies behind the power of circularity to transform industries, redefine sustainability, and safeguard the planet.
Circularity isn’t just a concept. It’s a transformative framework to confront global crises head-on. Bold steps are being taken toward tackling climate change, resource depletion, biodiversity loss, waste and pollution by embracing circular economy principles. It’s time to turn challenges into opportunities, and through collaborative innovation, bring about a world where humanity thrives within its ecological boundaries. This marks the inaugural edition of the “Ideas to Impact (i2I)” contest. Supported by Wipro Foundation, this is the latest offering of the Wipro earthian College Program for students across India.
The collaborators
IIT Madras stands as a distinguished institution, widely recognized for its significant contributions to higher technological education and applied research. The institute holds the prestigious distinction of being India's leading educational institution, as recognized by Ministry of Education's NIRF, and Atal Ranking of Institutions on Innovation Achievement (ARIIA). IIT Madras demonstrates an unwavering dedication to instilling a robust environmental consciousness, with the overarching goal of shaping future leaders deeply committed to sustainability principles. The institute spearheads transformative changes through initiatives such as the Carbon Zero Challenge, which has supported 75 eco-innovators over three (3) cohorts and propelled the teams towards commercial success. Building on this success, IIT Madras is launching “Ideas to Impact (i2I),” a precursor to Carbon Zero Challenge.
Launched in 2011, the Wipro earthian sustainability education program works at the intersection of Wipro’s commitment to the key domains of education and ecology.
For Wipro, more than a decade-long investment of resources and time in education indicates that we see this as a key driver of long-term and systemic change. Over the years, our work with higher education institutes has helped us push our common agenda of strengthening and enabling education for sustainability. Our intentions are to facilitate and co-create platforms to help infuse sustainability ideas, concepts and practices within the higher education ecosystem.
Issues of sustainability are complex and need multidisciplinary thinking and constant re-evaluating and refining. Some of the solutions we are looking for are along the lines of optimizing resource use to reduce waste, sustainable alternatives to increase agricultural output, and others. This competition provides a platform to students, to serve as a launching pad for such concepts, and to facilitate their transformation into tangible realities. Through this collaboration with IIT Madras, Wipro earthian aims to support initiatives that promise to deliver innovative solutions focused on circularity and sustainability.
Ready to take on the challenge?
A total of 25 ideas with great potential will be selected. Each of the 25 teams behind these ideas will be offered intensive training on entrepreneurship to help create practical and effective sustainability solutions.
Why participate?
Ideas to Impact (i2I) provides an amazing opportunity to showcase your validated idea at IIT Madras and offers incredible rewards for the top 5 teams.
Selected 25 teams will receive upto 50K support for developing their protoytpes.
Grand prize of up to INR 1 lakh for each of the 5 winning teams. The amount will be shared among the Team Lead and Team Associates.
Direct entry into the interview round of Carbon Zero Challenge (CZC), with a chance to secure prototype funding of up to INR 5 Lakhs and win a seed grant of up to INR 10 Lakhs.
Opportunity to showcase the idea to a larger audience at the Demo Day hosted at IIT Madras at the end of the contest.
What do we offer?
Training on prototype development
Access to mentorship
Visibility and networking opportunity
Tentative Timeline
Aug 9 2024
Sept 30 2024
Oct 2024
Dec 2024
Jan - Jun 2025
Jun 2025
Launch of 2nd Edition of Ideas to Impact (i2I)
Last date for application
Selection of Top 25 teams
Announcement of Top 25
Lab-scale prototype development
Announcement of Top 5 teams
The Challenge
In the Ideas to Impact challenge, participants will be provided with an opportunity to ideate solutions for issues concerning the circularity of resources.
Students will look at sustainable alternatives to resource management, including air, water, energy, soil and material/ waste. A few problem statements are available for reference. Students may use these statements as guides and build ideas around them. They are also free to look at other topics and ideas.
Material waste
Water
Air
Soil
Energy
Themes
Problem
statements
The following problem statements would be useful in understanding the type of solutions that we are looking for. Please note that the detailed problem statements shared here are indicative only. Additionally, some timely eco-innovations with a meaningful impact on addressing current environmental challenges include carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS), green hydrogen, lithium-ion battery recycling, waste-to-wealth technologies, Artificial Intelligence/ Machine learning, Data Analytics based solutions for environmental problems, etc. The topics, areas of work, and issues need not be limited to these. Students are welcome to choose a topic or an area of interest of their choice within the five thematic areas.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Creating Healthier Zones in Cities
Disaster resilience in the Built Environment in the Hills
Disaster resilience in the Built Environment in the Coastal Cities
Sustainable Management of Construction and Demolition Waste
Nature Based Solutions for Waste Water Treatment
Automated Waste Water Treatment
Heat Islands and their impacts
Urban Flooding
Eligibility
How to apply
Guidelines
Teams led by a Team Lead and mentored by a Lead Faculty will work on innovative ideas to establish technical viability for potential commercialization partners or customers. The Student Lead Associate, and Associates, should be in their 2nd year or above of an undergraduate program, 1st year or above of a postgraduate program, or doctoral research students, and take responsibility for leading the technical, business and sustainability modules of the project.
Team Lead
The Team Lead is the person primarily responsible for working on the project and fund management of the team.
Team Associates
The team typically comprises undergraduate (2nd year or above) or postgraduate students (1st year or above) or research scholars who are involved with the project submitted. A Student Lead Associate should be identified. There can be more than one, up to four, associates - ideally, one focusing on technical aspects, one on implementation/business aspects, and one on sustainability aspects.
Lead Faculty
The Lead Faculty will be responsible for guiding the team's progress and monitoring the utilization of the proof-of-concept fund.
i2I 2023-24 in numbers
2000
701
20
5
Registrations
Winners
Innovative Ideas
Shortlisted Ideas
27
States
700
Colleges
20 Teams
Enrolled in the Pratham Program by Nirmaan, IIT Madras Pre-Incubator, and trained in entrepreneurship mindset, customer discovery, and environmental impacts by experts.
10 Teams
Sought and received access to lab facilities, and mentorship with
subject matter experts and access to campus incubators across India.
10 Teams
Offered additional funding support of INR 2-3 lakh through Nirmaan, the pre-incubator of IIT Madras, and support from other incubators.
Shortlisted teams FY 23-24
The Ideas to Impact Challenge (i2I) has successfully concluded its first edition. From the initial pool of 60 shortlisted submissions, 20 teams were chosen to advance to the next stage. The selected 20 teams were onboarded to the Pratham Program of Nirmaan-Pre-incubator of Ideas to Impact Challenge. They also participated in a three-months long mentorship program on sustainability and entrepreneurship. As a part of this process, they received financial support to develop their ideas into working prototypes.
College Name | Theme | Idea |
NIT Trichy | Soil | Automated air injection delivery system for mitigation of liquefaction hazards.
|
Kumaraguru College of Technology | Material | Packaging material from crop residues |
NIT Surathkal | Water | Microbial Carbon Capture Cell, that simultaneously treats wastewater, and captures the carbon dioxide that is being generated. It is a modification to the conventional microbial fuel cell (MFC) that treats wastewater in two chambers separated by a proton exchange membrane. The first chamber performs the anaerobic digestion of wastewater with the help of bacteria. In the second chamber, microalgae are being cultivated, which improves the quality of treated water further and takes up the carbon dioxide generated in the anodic chamber. |
LBS college of engineering | Water | A system that utilizes satellite images and IoT systems to predict flood-prone areas and enhance early warning systems. |
College of Veterinary and animal sciences | Material | Biodegradable water cans using pineapple peel waste. |
Shiv Nadar University | Material | Fully automated mini-cleaner bot, specially built to maneuvre sandy surfaces, which enables it to clean beaches. |
NIT Pondicherry | Water | To create a bubble barrier to act as a microplastic collector as a potential alternative in the riverine ecosystem. |
COEP Technological University, Pune | Air | Sustainable wind turbine and airpurifier for urban environments.
|
LBS college of engineering | Energy | Design and development of electric cutter for laterite stone quarries and laterite stone based industries. |
NIT Arunachal Pradesh | Energy | Mobile production unit for customizable semi-torrefied mixed agro-waste biomass pellet. |
Vidya Academy of Science & Technology | Air | Power generation using kite. |
KG Reddy College of Engineering & Technology | Material | Low-cost, fibrous, recycled, aggregate blocks for rural housing. |
Indian Institute of Management Sirmaur | Material | Plastic recyclable bricks, to help manage plastic waste and conserve soil. |
NIT Trichy | Material | Producing paver blocks from Soil-Like Material (SLM) obtained from landfill mining for use in eco-friendly infrastructure. |
Sri Krishna College of Technology | Soil | IOT based landslide detection system integrated with software application. |
IIT Madras | Water | FARMWISE - A platform to build a sustainable & scalable agri-business using tech-assisted aquaponics. |
AC Tech, Anna University | Water | Sea water desalination is a one of the promising methods employed to address the water crisis on the global scale. However, reject brine solution from seawater desalination plants often raises serious concerns, since it cannot be discharged without treatment due to environmental concerns. Zero Liquid Discharge (ZLD) technology aims to treat seawater RO reject brine solution and recover economically valuable salts as well. The integration of membrane and thermal-based separation techniques to achieve ZLD is a promising technology. |
Sri Sairam Engineering College | Material | Revolutionizing waste management through EcoAR. |
College of Engineering Guindy | Energy | Customised eco-friendly solar cell. |
IIT Kharagpur | Energy | Eco-friendly and Energy-efficient storage of Bio-Hydrogen |
Top 18 teams of the 1st edition of i2I at IIT Madras during Demo Day.
The winners of the 2023-24 edition
After rigorous evaluation, the top 5 teams of the 1st edition of i2I were chosen on the Demo Day. It was held on August 9, 2024, at the IIT Madras campus. These teams won a cash prize of INR 1 lakh. They also secured direct entry into the top 100 teams of the 5th cohort of the Carbon Zero Challenge.
Team Name: Plasricks
College: Indian Institute of Management, Sirmaur
Problem Addressed: Plastic waste management
Innovation: Interlocking bricks from plastic waste, which needs no cement for building
Team Name: Bubbar Systems
College: National Institute of Technology, Puducherry
Problem Addressed: Microplastic removal from water bodies
Innovation: Air bubble barrier designed to remove microplastics, while ensuring safe passage for the fish
Team Name: KCT
College: Kumaraguru College of Technology, Coimbatore
Problem Addressed: Sustainable cutlery material
Innovation: Eco-friendly cutlery made from crop residue, rice bran, lemongrass and paddy straw
Team Name: Brilletmaker
College: National Institutes of Technology, Arunachal Pradesh and Surathkal
Problem Addressed: Crop residue management and stubble burning
Innovation: Mobile production unit for customizable, semi-torrefied, mixed agro-waste biomass pellets
Team Name: Forge
College: Lal Bahadur Shastri College of Engineering, Kasargod
Problem Addressed: Energy efficient machinery
Innovation: Design and development of electric cutter for laterite stone quarries and laterite stone based industries
Teams of
2 to 5 members are welcome to apply.
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Contact us on info@ideastoimpact.co.in / 04422575328