Start-Ups For Railways-- Indian Railway Innovation Policy launched

Indian Railways has taken an important step in the field of innovation through the participation of start-ups and other entities. The Minister of Railways, Communications and Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw on June 13 launched “Start-Ups for Railways” in Rail Bhavan, New Delhi.

This policy will bring scale and efficiency in the field of operation, maintenance and infrastructure creation through participation of very large and untapped start-up ecosystem.

Addressing the event, Ashwini Vaishnaw said that the long going discussions over integration of technology into Indian Railways have taken today the firm shape in form of this initiative launched.

Expressing happiness on launch of this initiative the minister said that through this platform, start-ups will get a good opportunity to connect with Railways.

Out of over 100 problem statements received from different divisions, field offices and zones of Railways, 11 problem statements like rail fracture, headway reduction have been taken up for phase one of this programme. These will be presented before the start-ups to find innovative solutions.

He requested the start-ups to use this opportunity and ensured them of support from Indian Railways in form of 50 per cent capital grant, assured market, scale and ecosystem.

Salient Details Of Indian Railway Innovation Policy

Grant up to INR 1.5 crore to innovator on equal sharing basis with provision of milestone-wise payment.

Complete process from floating of problem statement to development of prototype is online with defined time line to make it transparent and objective.

Trials of prototypes will be done in Railways. Enhanced funding will be provided to scale up deployment on successful performance of prototypes.

Selection of Innovators will be done by a transparent and fair system which will be dealt through online portal inaugurated by Minister of Railways.

Developed Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) will remain with innovator only.

Assured developmental order to innovator.

De-centralisation of complete product development process at divisional level to avoid delays.

In the month of May, field units were asked to provide Problem Areas. In response to it, around 160 problem statements have been received till date. To start with, 11 problems statements have been identified to deal via new Innovation Policy and uploaded on the portal.

The selected problems include, Broken Rail Detection System, Rail Stress Monitoring System, Headway Improvement System for suburban section interoperable with Indian Railways National ATP system, Automation of Track Inspection Activities, Design of superior Elastomeric Pad (EM Pad) for Heavy Haul freight Wagons, Development of on-line Condition Monitoring System for traction motors of 3-phase Electric Locomotives.

The other problems include, Light-weight wagon for transporting commodities like Salt,  Development of analytical tool by using digital data for improving passenger services, Track Cleaning Machine, App for post-training revision and self-service refresher courses, and Use of Remote Sensing, Geomatics and GIS for bridge inspection.

Objectives

Objective of the policy is to leverage innovative technologies developed by Indian Start-ups, MSMEs, Innovators and Entrepreneurs to improve operational efficiency and safety on Indian Railways.

Railway Ministry aims to address quality, reliability and maintainability-related issues of the Indian Railways.

Funding scheme will be on a cost sharing basis in equal proportion (50:50), between Indian Railways and Start-up, MSME, Innovator and Entrepreneur.

Eligible Organisations

Startups, as defined and recognised by Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

Any Indian company incorporated under the Companies Act1956 or 2013, primarily a Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) as defined in the MSME Act, 2006.

Individual innovators and R&D institutions are also encouraged to apply.

Any partnership firm, company or LLP incorporated under relevant laws. Support in form of Grant will not be given in this case. Cost of scaling-up will be borne by the firm.