The 20th century was the era of the large corporations.

• Conglomerates such as GE, P&G, Schneider Electric, IBM, Nestlé, GM, Toyota, Mitsubishi, Siemens, Volkswagen, Fiat, Nissan, Nokia, Microsoft, Samsung, Apple, Google, and many more were the flag-bearers of globalization, instrumental in deploying a variety of technologies and products worldwide, improving the quality of lives of hundreds of millions.
• They created jobs, and led the creation of wealth in their societies through shareholder value creation, or by paying taxes.
• India missed out on getting the benefits of a national manufacturing champion, due to the failed experiment with state-driven socialism, but we have an opportunity to gain leadership in the future of innovation-driven enterprises.
• The Indian government has learnt the lesson, is ready, keen, and working to support the various pieces and elements of the “Enterprise of the Future”.

The Atal Innovation Mission, based at the NITI Aayog, is helping create the infrastructure and institutions to support the business world of the 21st century.

ATAL INNOVATION MISSION

Objective

Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) is Government of India’s endeavour to promote a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship. Its objective is to serve as a platform for promotion of world-class Innovation Hubs, Grand Challenges, Start-up businesses and other self-employment activities, particularly in technology driven areas.

The Atal Innovation Mission has two core functions:

• Entrepreneurship promotion through Self-Employment and Talent Utilization (SETU), wherein innovators would be supported and mentored to become successful entrepreneurs.
• Innovation promotion: to provide a platform where innovative ideas are generated

Atal Tinkering Laboratories

 Background

• With a vision to ‘Cultivate one Million children in India as Neoteric Innovators’, Atal Innovation Mission is establishing Atal Tinkering Laboratories (ATLs) in schools across India.
• The objective of this scheme is to foster curiosity, creativity and imagination in young minds; and inculcate skills such as design mindset, computational thinking, adaptive learning, physical computing etc.

Key Features of ATL

•  ATL is a work space where young minds can give shape to their ideas through hands on do-it-yourself mode; and learn innovation skills. Young children will get a chance to work with tools and equipment to understand the concepts of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math).
• ATL would contain educational and learning ‘do it yourself’ kits and equipment on – science, electronics, robotics, open source microcontroller boards, sensors and 3D printers and computers. Other desirable facilities include meeting rooms and video conferencing facility.
• In order to foster inventiveness among students, ATL can conduct different activities ranging from regional and national level competitions, exhibitions, workshops on problem solving, designing and fabrication of products, lecture series etc. at periodic intervals.

Financial Support

• AIM will provide grant-in-aid that includes a one-time establishment cost of Rs. 10 lakh and operational expenses of Rs. 10 lakh for a maximum period of 5 years to each ATL.

Eligibility

• Schools (Grade VI – XII) managed by Government, local body or private trusts/society to set up ATL.

Atal Incubation Centres

Background

• AIM intends to establish ‘new’ incubation centres (Atal Incubation Centres / AICs) across India by providing them with financial support.
• AICs would further support and encourage start-ups to become successful enterprises. They would provide necessary and adequate infrastructure along with high quality assistance or services to start-ups in their early stages of growth.
• AICs would be established in subject specific areas such as manufacturing, transport, energy, health, education, agriculture, water and sanitation etc. Each AIC would be required to choose at least one area for specialisation.

Eligibility

• AICs can be established either in public/private/public-private partnership mode. These can be established in:
• Academia – This includes higher educational institutes and R&D Institutions.
• Non-academic – This includes Companies/ Corporates/ Technology parks / Industrial Parks/ any individual/ group of individuals.

Financial Support

• AIM will provide a grant-in-aid of Rs. 10 Crore to each AIC for a maximum of 5 years to cover the capital and operational expenditure cost in running the centre. The applicant would have to provide a built up space of at least 10,000 sq. ft to qualify for the financial support.

Conclusion

•  The flagship programme to support Atal Incubation Centres (AICs) around the country will help create the sandboxes where start-ups figure out their business models and take their first few tentative steps in the business world, hopefully giving India its business giants of the future.
• The nascent VC/PE industry in India will be given an impetus by the Fund-of-Funds, managed by the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP).
• This overarching plan, implemented with a business-like approach, will hopefully help India create the economic giants of the future that can drive our growth, create jobs, generate wealth, and provide resources for the underprivileged in our society.