The objective of the India Innovation Initiative project is to create an innovation eco-system in the country by sensitizing, encouraging and promoting innovators and facilitating commercialization of the innovations. DST and CII jointly launched the Young Inventors initiative "Steer the Big Idea" in the year 2004. It was aimed at capturing the innovative ideas from young innovators for the benefit of Industry & society. In 2005, CII & DST joined hands with Industry to form IRIS - Initiative for Research and Innovation in Science. IRIS has been focused so far on school students i.e. innovators below the age group of 18 years. Agilent has been organizing the Agilent Engineering and Technology Awards through which it has been encouraging engineering students towards hands-on engineering in India and recognizing innovation. CII & DST have now joined hands with Agilent in a combined effort to launch a nation-wide innovation competition for all innovators above the age group of 18+: "India Innovation Initiative - i3". i3 aims to capture the innovative ideas from the Indian innovators in the age group of 18 years and above, including students, innovators from R&D Institutes & Labs, Industry professionals and individual innovators / Entrepreneurs, grassroots innovators etc. The topic for the 2009 event is "Technology Innovation for Masses and Global Impacts". Description of the topic: The project entry should be technology based and should have the potential to address some of the pertinent problems in the society related to Industry, community, global climate changes, water scarcity or any other such concerns/issues. The innovation should also have a potential for commercialization. More information on topic selection parameters here: India Innovation Initiative i3 - Topics 2009 Competition Details: The competition will be challenge based. The innovative projects will go through two levels of screening. A panel of judges comprising of eminent scientists, industrialists and experts will do the first screening. There will be a second screening process at the National Fair for selecting the top 5 innovations. These selected innovations /innovators will be awarded cash prizes and offered IP protection and licensing/ commercialization support. The ESP of this initiative will be identification of projects that would be directly related to industry, matured enough to be used by the industry, with a substantial potential to be commercialized. Participation is open to all innovators in the age group of 18 years and above. This includes : * All colleges, universities and Institutes. * Innovators from R&D Institutions and Labs. * Entrepreneurs, Industry professionals and Freelance Innovators. * Grassroot Innovators through NGOs and Rural development organizations. For more details, access here: India Innovation Initiative i3 - Participation Participants can register online or offline by submitting a hard copy of their application, more details here: India Innovation Initiative i3 - Registration Timeline of the competition: 1. Start Date for Registration February 10,'2009 2 . Last date for receiving entries for i3 May 30, '2009 3 . Evaluation for top 50 Innovations (Online Screening) May 4 - 18,'2009 4 . Announcement of shortlisted names for the National Fair July 2009 5 . i3 National Fair August 2009 To Know more: India Innovation Initiative - i3 For contact information, access here: India Innovation Initiative i3 - Contact Form