PU signs pact to set up centre for robotics, AI

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, July 18

Panjab University (PU) and the Vitti Research Foundation, a non-profit company for promoting artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Wednesday for setting up a Centre for Advancement of Artificial Intelligence and Robotics (CAAIR).

The term of the MoU will be for five years.

As per the MoU, the CAAIR will create an innovative application platform and domain capabilities across verticals for Digital India needs — smart city, health, manufacturing and agriculture.

It will build a startup community and entrepreneurial ecosystem for AI and robotics and set up a collaboration of academia with the industry and the government to rework on technology backend.

It will also provide support to all aspects of data analytics, including analysis of large data sets and applications of AI to all areas of research.

The AI has applications on speech recognition, natural language processing, expert systems, computer vision, robotics and gaming.

“The AI has already become a part of our everyday lives with virtual personal assistant to help us organise our day and perform tasks on our behalf. Recognising the growing need of the AI in every aspect of life, the MoU will bridge a gap between the industry and academia,” said Kundana Kumar Lal, president of the Vitti Research Foundation.

There is a clause of joint patents and publications by both PU and the Vitti Foundation.

Prof Rajat Sandhir, associate director, Research Promotion Cell (RPC), said: “The MoUs will benefit students in internship, post-doctoral fellowship, research scholars and faculty. There are clauses on taking joint research projects and joint supervision of research scholars. PU will provide human resources and physical resources on sharing basis to support the activities of the centre of excellence for the project development, delivery, content design, writing and retooling.”

A similar agreement was also signed with the Sabudh Foundation for setting up a sabudh data science for social good centre in Mohali that will train students in advanced technologies and create a momentum in research, both applied and fundamental, that has the potential of addressing social problems in the region.

The term of the MoU with the Sabudh Foundation is also for 5 years.