The inception of Atal Tinkering Labs was a watershed moment for the Indian Education system. Owing to such labs, myriad of students are now coming forward to innovate something revolutionary with the help of scientific equipment available to them.

There is still some opacity among various educational institutions regarding the setting up and functioning of these labs. We have attempted to resolve these confusions by discussing all major aspects of Atal Tinkering Labs in India.

Background

To promote a culture of entrepreneurship and innovation across India, Indian Government’s Think Tank Niti Aayog launched its flagship program Atal Innovation Mission (AIM). This initiative is instrumental in streamlining the policies by the government that revolve around innovation. The concept of Atal Tinkering Labs in Indian schools is one of the primary offerings by AIM.

What are Atal Tinkering Labs?
Atal Tinkering Labs are workspaces in the schools where the students of Class Sixth-Twelfth can acquire innovative skills through hands-on learning. The Niti Aayog envisions nourishing one million students as innovators in the future.

The tools and equipment in the laboratories enable the students to learn multiple STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) concepts. As a result, they are able to transform their ideas into reality. The equipment and DIY (do-it-yourself) kits are mainly related to the latest technologies, such as robotics, microcontroller boards, 3D printing, and sensors.

Additional activities

This initiative isn’t just limited to promoting the innovation culture by working in the labs. Numerous additional activities can also be conducted, including exhibitions and competitions at the national and regional level. To promote problem-solving among the students, workshops and lecture series can be conducted regularly. Screening of STEM-related films is often included by the educational institution. Niti Aayog also encourages the ATL schools to invite reputed speakers for talks on STEM education and entrepreneurship.

Financial support to the schools

Each school selected for setting up Atal Tinkering Laboratory in India receives a grant of Rs. 10 lakh from the Indian government for the establishment of the lab.

The school also receives a sum of Rs. 10 lakh separately for operating the lab over a period of five years. This amount is also used for the:

• Maintenance of the lab
• Competitions
• Lecture series
• Payments to the mentors and other professionals involved

The involvement from other institutions for financial support is also encouraged to further upgrade the ATLs. The Niti Aayog encourages local institutions and industries to be a part of this initiative by creating facilities and exhibits that are domain/subject specific. Recently, SAP Global had a tie-up with Atal Innovation Mission to adopt 100 ATLs across India.

Equipment in the labs

The Niti Aayog provides a comprehensive list of the equipment and tools to be purchased by the schools through the funds granted to them. These tools and equipment are segmented into four different packages:

Package 1: The kits and equipment related to robotics, electronics development, Internet of Things (IoT) and sensors are part of this package.

Package 2: This package constitutes rapid prototyping tools, including the 3D printer kit and tools, along with filament for the 3D printers. A set of arts & crafts accessories is also found in this package.

Package 3: All the electrical, mechanical and measurement tools come under this package. Some of these tools include pliers, screwdriver set, soldering iron kit and workstation for drilling.

Package 4: It comprises safety equipment, accessories, consumables, power supply, and a construction kit.

Innovations by the students

What differentiates an ATL from a science or technology lab is the fact that the focus is on interdisciplinary learning so that students can create something revolutionary.

To further accelerate the creation of groundbreaking ideas, the Niti Aayog had organized a six-month-long nationwide challenge called Atal Tinkering Marathon. The themes included clean energy, water resources, waste management, smart mobility, agri-tech, and waste management. Top 30 innovations from this challenge received various prizes, which also involved the three-month-long ATL Student Innovator Program (ATL SIP). These innovations include:

• A smart tap to monitor and purify water flowing through it
• Use of sewage water to produce electricity
• A smart lock system to avoid accidents, theft and illegal use of two-wheelers
• Air purification and monitoring system
• Waste cleaning robot based on ‘C’ Programming language

These and numerous other ideas highlight how the student working in these Atal Tinkering Laboratories can drastically improve the society we live in.

Eligibility Criteria for the Schools

Infrastructure: The school applying for the ATL must have 1,500 square feet of area. For the schools in hilly/Himalayan and island states, UTs, the minimum eligible area is 1,000 square feet. There should be facilities like a science lab, a steady electricity connection, a computer lab with internet, a library and a playground in the school campus.

Faculty: The school must have employed dedicated and qualified staff for Sciences and Mathematics.

Enrollments: A minimum of 400 students must have enrolled in Grades VI-X. For the schools in hilly states, this number is 250 students.

Attendance: The attendance of the students and faculty must be 75 percent or above in the last three years.

The selection process, which involves two rounds, takes around 10 weeks. The application form and deadline can be checked from here: http://aimapp2.aim.gov.in/.

Advisory Body

Each school with Atal Tinkering Lab is supposed to constitute an advisory body to monitor the operations of the ATL. The AIM suggests the following members for this body:

• Chairman – Principal of the School
• Convener – Faculty-in-charge of the ATL
• Two Members – Alumni/reputed academia/young innovators/ representative from local industry or local community
• Two Members – Parents of the School Students
• The advisory body needs to conduct at least three meetings per year and is supposed to send the report of each meeting to AIM.

Contact us for More Information:

We hope that this information will answer a lot of your questions. You can always connect with our representatives for more details on establishing or operating the Atal Tinkering Labs in India. Our representatives are available through:

Phone: 9643327934

Email: info@robotechpl.co.in

It’s an undeniable truth that one of the most precious things in this world is time. That is the reason why in an interview, the legendary Tamil and Bollywood actor Kamal Haasan once said: “If I had stolen anything valuable in this world, I could have stolen time.” However, time is precious for those who understand the importance of time by making its best use in life as the time once passed can never return. So, why don’t you make the best use of your time at such a time when you are having ample of time?

As you all are well aware that due to the spread of the deadly coronavirus or covid19, the whole world is affected in a very miserable way. It has terrified the humanity at large causing thousands of deaths, hospitalisation, quarantining and all. Many countries in the world including, India have enforced lockdown which is just like clamping of curfew. Nobody will get out of homes until any dire requirement or emergency arises there. All of should follow this precautionary measure to prevent the spread of this deadly virus.

I have seen in some video clips that people are dancing, singing, watching movies at their homes to bust their boredom during this lockdown while there are also the people who are praying Almighty God to get the whole humanity relieved from this menace. Students have also shown their patience by staying home consistently. What I meant to say is why don’t you make the best use of this sufficient time? If you really want to educate yourself from your home in the stream of science, technology, engineering, maths and other relevant subjects, it’s a golden opportunity to visit www.mystemtime.com where you can find a treasures of learning through online and video classes.

Just visit the website www.mystemtime.com where you can watch free educational videos related to the following and learn these valuable things online.

• Elementary learning
• STEM Concepts
• Robotics and Coding
• Electronics & Embedded Systems
• 3D Printing
• Audiovisual Assessments

You can register on My STEM Time as a mentor or as student. Videos on the following information and topics are available for aspiring students who watch them and benefit from them as much as possible:

• My STEM Time feature multiple products based videos
• Watch STEM videos on different categories
• Watch ATAL Tinkering Lab videos and check the level of learning the videos
• Watch participants spending times on models in competition
• Connect with Mentor & Students on the contests regularly held

My STEM Time has a team of professionals who are specialised in their field with ample expertise ever ready to help you learn what you aspire to learn and even what you might have not been knowing whether to learn or not to learn. They are selected professionals to introduce you to the modern and international patterns of learning like STEM & STEAM Education, ATAL Tinkering Lab, Artificial Intelligence, etc. as all these are made through STEM and STEAM the subject to hands-on learning or practical learning with tools and other objects. The videos related to them will also suffice to teach you as much as you can be able to handle these things easily. So, hurry up! The time once passed will never return to serve you again.

Growing population, lack of political will, economic slump and some other pertinent aspects have been the reasons behind blurring the hopes of job opportunities in India that have brought them to almost their saturating point. But if the old proverb “Where there is the will there is a way” is followed, it plays an encouraging role to help the Indian youth explore newer ways of opportunities and become symbiotically advantageous with their knowledge, expertise and spirit to work. There are various disciplines of education, and many of them include professional courses, and learning Artificial Intelligence (AI) being one of them has better prospects for Indian youth. Though developed countries are harnessing AI to the best they can afford, India has also joined the bandwagon and it is also on the path of adopting AI for its better future. However, before we go into its depth, we must have a glance of Artificial Intelligence.

What is Artificial Intelligence?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is also called Machine Intelligence because it’s the simulation of human intelligence. Whatever benefits we obtain from AI is in fact, the reflection of human brain that applies to program for a specific output to obtain from AI. Driverless trains and vehicles, ATM machine, appearance of similar advertisements and options for songs and movies of your choice on social websites and even many things which we find and utilize in our day-to-day life are based on automation that works by AI.

15 Ways of How AI can increase job opportunities in India

The demand for fusion of man-machine teams
The future of job opportunities in India banks on how nicely humans and artificial intelligence combine together to build the fusion of man-machine teams. This initiative can blend the strengths of both AI and humans to bring out better business results.

Nationwide Employment
The companies that bring AI into effect can generate more money to expand their businesses. As a result, AI can lead to higher employee wages, better technology tools, and huge efficiency. With such accomplishments, companies can broaden their access to other parts of the world. This, in turn, will demand a global workforce, which India can generate more job opportunities for those who will be well-versed in AI.

The Role of AI in Marketing & Sales
As AI is playing a significant role in marketing and sales, it can build effective, large-scale sales forces by developing smart databases. Such tools as Zendesk and Salesforce are making use of AI to develop the insights that can enable the companies in inducting the ideal sales teams for their businesses.

AI can help companies rise
If big data of large amounts can be used prudently by AI and machine learning algorithms, it will enable companies perform relatively better. The employee retention rate can also be enhanced by it and it can help in new customer acquisition. Thus, it can create new job opportunities as companies will start flourishing and fetching benefits to the industry as a whole.

AI can generate new job positions
According to a recent World Economic Forum report, around 50% of the full-time employees of companies will shrink in a few years to come. Though AI will play a role to curtail jobs, but simultaneously it will make a demand for new job positions. In order to make AI function impeccably, humans will be required to have a check on work, bringing improvement to it and manage it. It is indicated by WEF that the new position will call for additional skills for managing the edge between technology and man.

Jobs maintenance by AI
AI is aiding businesses to operate more smoothly, particularly in such areas as customer service, automation, and so forth. There are also some companies that have even integrated AI in all their essential systems. Since AI is being implemented in several industries, the demand for an AI maintenance workforce is on rise. Resultantly, companies would need a large number of AI developers and engineers for maintenance of their systems.

AI’s role in Robotics
As estimated, the realm of robotics is going to experience an immense growth in the year to come. AI-based robots like stationary robots, non-humanoid land robots, and fully automated aerial drones, are attaining substantial business interest from companies across the world. Some of the Indian companies will also take part in it. This increasing demand is sure to widen the avenues of job opportunities for AI robotics engineers.

Acting as Facilitator
Companies adopting AI are going to make a demand for AI facilitators who will bring business to them with flexibility to create their own AI environments. It will include the creation of automated environments as also the build systems like virtual assistants. These environments will help the workforce perform better without depending considerably on security, governance, data control and compliance.

AI in Healthcare
AI has more scope in healthcare. As per PwC estimates, healthcare will be one of the biggest winners from AI, where increase in job opportunities can be nearly 1 million, and India may share a considerable percent of this increase. In years to come, AI-powered healthcare is going to be available at a scale and on-demand for everybody. Therefore, the need for AI-assisted healthcare jobs is expected to see a big rise.

Playing major role in Automated Transportation
Such companies as Uber and Google are investing millions on AI-driven self-driving cars and trucks. As such mode of transportation is going to pick market up in the future; it will create a large number of vacancies for AI and machine learning engineers not only in foreign countries, but in India as well.

AI in Digital Assistants
The Google Assistant, Siri, Alexa, and Bixby are such Digital Assistants that are getting more active by the year. Global IT giants like Google, Samsun, and Amazon are investing billions into making digital assistants perform complicated tasks. These works involve learning about our daily routines, speech recognition, and so on. As per Zion market research, by 2025, the global intelligent virtual assistant market will go up to $19.6 billion.

In Financial Services
Today, banks and financial services companies need AI engineers to develop the systems that will identify and lessen the incidents of fraud. Besides security, AI is being used in financial marketing. In this way, the AI job opportunities in financial companies will also increase.

In Gaming Industry
AI applications are found to be substantially large in the area of gaming industry. Whether it is design and development to in-game operations and maintenance, AI’s role in receiving rewards for gaming companies has been of remarkably substantive. As the reality games becoming more popular, companies are opting to invest major amounts on AI-based systems. In this way, the demand for AI developers in gaming industry is going to grow considerably.

In Education Sector
According to a recent report of PwC, the education sector is going to create almost 200,000 extra jobs, and of course, India will also have a certain number of vacancies for AI qualified youth. The concepts like smart content, personalized learning, and other data-driven operations hugely hinge upon AI.

In Entertainment Industry
The entertainment industry has very high expectation from AI and machine learning potentials and professionals. With identification of the online consumers’ behaviour, AI algorithms help in recommending media that suitably meet the consumers’ choices. Hence, the industry is going to hire a colossal AI workforce to meet their requirements.

India has embarked upon harnessing the benefits of AI; however it needs to widen its field to maximize the use of AI not only to run all machineries and industries smartly but also to maximize the number of vacancies for AI professionals, thereby increasing their dependence on AI. So it’s also an opportunity lies ahead for the Indian youth to learn AI and become AI expert to secure job across the world besides having broader chance to get absorbed in motherland per se.

After carving out its distinct niche in various sectors by virtue of bringing unprecedented benefits to humankind, now Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been proved an excellent technology to help in understanding and using English language appropriately. Yes, now AI will help computers in understanding the idioms and phrases also. Till recently, the technologies in use were to interpret the language, yet they were not proved worthy of doing satisfactorily error-free interpretation or translation because the machines could not grab the appropriate meaning of the idioms and phrases. For example, still Google translation is not fully reliable if brought into idiomatic perspective of interpretation. That’s the reason why in many offices and departments where linguistic chastity is given top priority manual translators are hired to do the needful. 

A pioneering feat in understanding idioms

However, the US based IT company IBM has made an innovation in AI technology as its Artificial Intelligence researchers have introduced a considerable upgrade to the renowned Watson computer, enabling it to understand idioms and colloquialisms that indeed is a pioneering feat in this field. IBM claims that the update makes it the first commercial Artificial Intelligence system able to identify, understand and analyse some of the most exigent features of the English language. 

Interpretation of tricky phrases is made possible

When tested, the complicated phrases such as “in the soup”, “hot under the collar”, “over the moon”, “hardly helpful” and so forth are confusing for algorithms to spot, i.e. AI is not able to debate the multifaceted topics or have nuanced discussions with humankind. “Language is a tool for expressing thought and opinion, as much as it is a tool for information,” acquainted Rob Thomas, a general manager at IBM Data and Artificial Intelligence. He further said, “This is why we believe that advancing our ability to capture, analyse, and understand more from language with NLP (Natural Language Processing) will help transform how businesses utilize their intellectual capital that is codified in data.”

IBM announces the advancement

The announcement of the advancement was made by IBM as part of a new suite of Watson technologies focussed on NLP, which is going to be implemented from its Project Debater Artificial Intelligence system. Of course, it marks the pioneering commercialisation of the key NLP flairs and will be taken as if Watson is “the only Artificial Intelligence system capable of debating human beings on intricate topics,” as opined by IBM.

New advance sentiment analysis

With new advance sentiment analysis, the feature suggests that Artificial Intelligence will no longer get confused over such phrases as given above for example. The new grade of understanding will have instant use in such zone as customer care, where the recurrent delivery of casually confusing language can be comprehended easily in areas like customer care, where more use of casual language has made correct understanding, grading and detailed analysis an arduous task.

Agile and active IBM’s Watson while paving its way for popularity in 2011 took on and subdued human champions at the US game show Jeopardy, making Watson the first computer capable to understand the unique question-answer format made the show win a wide popularity. 

Robotech Pvt Ltd is pleased to announce the details of the 1st Edition of Build-A-Thon Event that will be held from 23rd April to 25th April 2020.

The event gives a chance to different organizations to hire adept engineering students (IT, CS, Mechanical, ECE) by evaluating their skills on projects based on technologies like:

• Artificial Intelligence
• Internet of Things
• Robotics
• 3D Printing

Features at a glance:

• A 3-day event with two days for developing a project and one day for presentation
• The students have undergone intensive training on the latest technologies
• The students have already developed industrial projects and submitted reports
• The recruiters save their resources spent on screening and training of new candidates
• The recruitment process becomes more optimized
• No registration or recruitment fee for companies

Training offered to the students

The tech experts from Robotech have offered 60-hour training to the participating students. The students have acquired skills in the latest technologies like artificial intelligence, robotics, 3D printing, and the Internet of Things. The students have gained proficiency in these skills through hands-on training that involves educational kits, robotic kits, and rapid prototyping skills.
During their course of training, the students have also developed industrial-level projects, such as e-health monitoring systems and river cleaning bot. They have also documented their learnings and observations in the form of a report.

Working in the teams helps each student develop collaborative skills. You might discover a candidate who has sharpened his/her leadership during the project development phase. The project development and coding phase give them a chance to hone their attributes like creativity, logical thinking, and problem-solving.

Sequence of Events
1. The Challenge: The students will receive a challenge from the Build-A-Thon. This challenge might revolve around any environment, social, industrial, or daily-life issue. The Build-A-Thon will provide the necessary kits and guidelines.
2. Project Development – Each team starts brainstorming the ideas to create a project that precisely matches the challenge and available kits. They decide who’s going to work on which aspect of the project.
3. Coding – The teams program their projects to perform the desired sets of functions. The programming is done in C++, Python, or Scratch.
4. Presentation – Each team presents their projects in front of the recruiters. They talk about the:
Parts used

• Methodologies applied
• Technologies covered
• Challenges solved
• And other aspects

5. Face-to-face interview – The recruiters evaluate the candidates through a face-to-face interview where technical and general questions are being asked. The salary negotiations are also part of this stage.
Offer letter – The recruiters award the final students with the offer letter for a specific position in their organization.

Event Details:

Dates: Phase 1 (Project Development) – 23rd & 24th April 2020
Phase 2 (Presentation)               – 25th April 2020

Venue – Indraprastha Engineering College, Sahibabad (Ghaziabad)

Register your company by connecting with us via:

Phone: 9871998481, 8448916098
Email:  sushant@build-a-thon.com, pinky.bharta@neorobos.co.in

Estimated to be around 3 trillion dollars, today fashion industry has emerged as one of the biggest industries in the world. But like other colossal businesses, fashion biz also needs Artificial Intelligence (AI) to carry on business more smoothly, meeting the current challenges and paving way to further culmination of the business. Though the fashion industry is already in its established position, AI is holistically transforming the industry from the way that fashion companies are making their products to the way they are marketed and purchased by their customers. Today, AI technologies are transforming the fashion industry in every essential part of its value chain like designing, manufacturing, logistics, marketing and sales. Since Artificial Intelligence technologies have brought a tremendous change almost in every business which is done on large scale, fashion industry could not remain uninfluenced by this charismatic technology.

AI is utilized to promote and sell fashion products
Progressively, more fashion brands are making use of AI and machine learning to enhance users’ shopping experience, improve sales systems through intelligent automation, and increase the sales processes with the use of prognostic analytics and guided sales processes. Moreover, fashion brands are also in the process of influencing assistants through chatbots and voice assistant devices like Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Apple Siri, and Microsoft Cortana.

Use of conversational systems
Making use of conversational interfaces, fashion brands can collect data by putting questions to be answered by the customers to understand their desires and trends, go into the depth of their purchase patterns and suggest pertinent and add-on items. This interaction brings maximum satisfaction to the customer and more relevant information to the advantage of the fashion brand.

AI making its way into e-commerce and mobile apps
Apart from conversational systems, now AI is also paving its way towards e-commerce and mobile apps. Today, customers facilitated to take the snaps of the garments they prefer or styles they aspire to emulate. Smart image recognition systems can match the pictures to real life items found for sale. Besides, AI-enabled shopping apps enable the customers to have screenshots of the dresses of their choice they see online, identify shop-worthy suits and accessories in that picture, and find the same set of clothes and shop for same type of styles.

AI is boosting fashion design and manufacturing
Recurrent changes in fashion and design have forced the retailers to keep themselves up with the latest trends and foresee consumer choices for coming season. As per tradition, the retailers make their prediction in accordance with the current year’s sales on data from the prior year. However, this cannot be accurate all the times as sales can be impacted by various factors which are not easy to predict. Yet, AI-based approaches for demand projection, may lessen prognosis error almost half of it.