Qualcomm, NASSCOM launch Qualcomm Design in India Challenge

Qualcomm Design in India Challenge
Chipset major Qualcomm in association with the National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) on Tuesday announced the launch of the Qualcomm Design in India Challenge.

Qualcomm Design in India Challenge aims to catalyze the creation of a product and hardware design ecosystem in India in the domains of smartphones, tablets and Internet of Everything (IoT) products for healthcare, education, banking, agriculture, automotive, wearables and smart cities.

Sunil Lalvani, president of Qualcomm India & South Asia, said: “Qualcomm Design in India Challenge has been conceived to leverage India’s pool of skilled engineering talent and to galvanize multitudes of indigenous hardware design companies to innovate technological breakthroughs.”

The wireless chip major said the registration and application for Qualcomm Design in India Challenge will start on December 1, 2015 and end on February 29, 2016.

The challenge is open to all India-based individual companies or start-ups with a minimum of one year of operation which can demonstrate hardware designs for smartphones, tablets, wearables and products for smart cities, automotive & telematics, robotics and devices for the IoT ecosystem.

The company will offer funding of $10,000 each to up to 10 shortlisted companies to proceed to the prototyping phase and incubate at Qualcomm Innovation Lab for nearly six months.

A judging panel will select up to three companies with the most promising products and Qualcomm will offer up to $100,000 as encouragement for future efforts.

Qualcomm will also set up an Innovation Lab in Bangalore to provide technical and engineering support to the Indian companies.

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