Budget 2021: When Robot has a request for the Finance minister

Kolkata: Inker Robotics, a technology-based start-up and an industry expert in the field of Automation are developers of ALTON, an indigenously developed Humanoid Robot.

Alton has put forward a request for Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman ahead of the Union Budget 2021.

ALTON, developed at INKER’s R&D center, is a modular training Robot of its kind, designed to enable an experiential learning experience in Robotics.

In an interaction with his CEO, Mr Rahul P Balachandran, ALTON shared his view and expectations from the upcoming Union Budget, he said, “Globally Automation is currently a $168 Billion industry with an immense growth opportunity. As we move along this path, the nature of jobs and the skills required will be different from what we have currently. With progress also comes the need to innovate, reskill and upskill. Now is the time to drive adequate skilling initiatives and designing the strategic education roadmap by academia and industry leaders in the field.

To meet India’s vision of a $5 Trillion economy, incentivization of educational road map development with industry participation is required. Additionally, incentivization of relevant sectors to adopt the Industry 4.0 technologies should be provided to accelerate the demand for robotics and automation.

The expectation from the Finance Ministry during the Union Budget Announcement on February 1 is to support automation players in diving deeper into this mission, empower the student community to drive India’s Automation future, and help stakeholders across industries to drive this vision.”

Rahul Balachandran, Founder, and CEO, Inker Robotics as an industry specialist in the world of machines and robots, Rahul foresees to open a whole new dimension of practical knowledge to the industry stakeholders about the opportunities that lie with Automation basis hands-on experience with their hi-end robotics equipment.

Sharing his views on the Budget and expectations, he said “India has been projected as the only economy that will grow in double-digit i.e. 11.5 per cent in 2021. As we have seen, the challenging 2020-21 has made us realize the importance of adapting and adopting the latest technologies to drive the economy forward. To enable us to be future-ready it is important to expand on policies and programs like the National Program on Artificial Intelligence.

There should be more focus in the budget on various constituents of Industry 4.0 like Robotics and automation, Digital manufacturing, AI among others where India is lagging behind many of its global peers when it comes to both innovations in the areas as well as their adoption across sectors.

The need of the hour is well-thought-out Policy formulation to support and nurture Unified support systems and comprehensive eco-systems that will bring together stakeholders across academia, research and development and industries. This will accelerate the translation of investment and innovation to value generation and impact creation. The expectation from the Finance Ministry during the Union Budget Announcement on February 1 is to support various stakeholders who are driving the mission - “Futuristic technologies to enable the Atmanirbhar Bharat vision by framing favourable policies, providing grants and strategic investments.”

ALTON is one of its kind educational companion for students. Every single aspect of this robot is designed and developed in a way that it makes learning robotics fun. With the countless number of hours researching, Alton is made as an educational robot that is engaging and interesting for students having great features unmatched by any other similar product.

He helps in familiarizing and training the kids on how robots are developed and can help in various activities. He is a trainer to school students via the “Hello Robots” free online workshop session which now marks 5000 hours conducted by Inker every week. He interacts, self-explanatory, and demonstrates for better familiarization of students about Robotics and machine learning.

ALTON also has a great image tracking feature helping it to respond to users in proximity to it taking humans to a new level. ALTON is developed as 100% modular and can be dismantled easily making it easy for students to learn the motors and joints and other mechanical elements.

It’s the visual age and with its intuitive GUI interface, it is very easy for users to control and work with the robot. Interacting with the robot is a walk in the park. Alton is stable and safe to use and can avoid obstacles during motion and has precise and controlled movements that make it safe to use in any given environment, all put together makes him the humanoid robot. Powered by Raspberry Pi and components are controlled by Arduino mega boards, the combination packs enough power to meet the needs of robotics students. (UNI)