IIT Madras Inaugurates India's First 'Cold Spray' SMART Lab in Collaboration with GE

The Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, has collaborated with General Electric (GE) and launched a ‘Cold Spray’ SMART Laboratory (Surface Modification and Additive Research Technologies). This laboratory is the first facility of High Pressure Cold Spray (HPCS) that has been installed in any of the academic institutes of India. The inauguration of the laboratory was done at the IIT Madras campus on Friday, 5th April 2019.

The Director of IIT Madras, Professor Bhaskar Ramamurthi, and the Chief Executive Officer of GE India Technology Centre, who is also the Chief Technology Officer of GE South Asia, inaugurated the laboratory. The event was carried out in the presence of the students, researchers, and faculty of IIT Madras and some officials of General Electric.

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A state-of-the-art HPCS (High Pressure Cold Spray) equipment has been imported from the famous company Plasma Giken of Japan and it is placed in the laboratory. This project is funded by the Government of India under the 'Uchchatar Avishkar Yojana' (UAY) scheme. It is intended to give a boost to the collaboration between the private sector and the academic sector. The key investors for this project were the Ministry of Human Resources Development, the Department of Science and Technology of IIT Madras, and General Electric.

Professor Bhaskar Ramamurthi talked about the importance of this alliance and said that the reviews have proved that the progress made by UAY is good. He expects the collaboration of IIT Madras with GE will give rise to some startups as well.

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Mr. Alok Nanda highlighted the benefits of this initiative and said that it will strengthen the Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul (MRO) ecosystem of India and help in developing expertise in advanced technology.