Microsoft launches 14 innovation centres in India

Signing agreements with leading academic institutions across four states, Microsoft has launched 14 Microsoft Innovation Centres (MICs) in India. The centres are designed to offer a unique environment conducive for student entrepreneurship. The MICs are expected to play a crucial role in:

• Deepening the relationship between academia and industry
• Enhancing at a very basic level, employability and education
• Reducing the digital divide
• Supporting innovation and driving sustainable socio-economic impact

Microsoft has 75 MICs around the world. It aims to launch 100 such centres in India over the next two years. These centres will impact over 5, 00,000 students, certifying 1,00,000 students on Microsoft technologies. The programme will also drive innovation and help build a product-based software economy by supporting product development, and over 500 start-ups, said the company release.

Acting as innovation hubs at select colleges and technology institutes, the centres will provide incubation and expert hands-on support on Microsoft technology innovation, research, and software solutions to create a pool of student technology experts across India.

Each MIC will function as a hub for five other neighbouring colleges and will operate in a hub-spoke model driving employability, innovation, and entrepreneurship in the academic ecosystem around it.

The first MICs will be hosted by 14 cities namely:

Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Rajahmundry, Khammam, Bapatla, Guntur and Tirupati in Andhra Pradesh; Raipur in Chhattisgarh; Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh; Trichy, Vellore, Coimbatore, Madurai and Salem in Tamil Nadu.

Innovation across key priority technology focus areas:

Under the initiative, upcoming developers will be encouraged to innovate across key priority technology focus areas that are driving growth and change for the economy. These include Mobility (Windows Phone), Cloud (Windows Azure), Kinect, Accessibility, Healthcare and a wider field for solving problems with focus on India.

The MIC program will play a key role in driving Microsoft’s vision for developing new talent in India at the student level.