Tirupati: In an attempt to enhance the participation of women in biotechnology research, the prestigious women’s university in the temple city, Sri Padmavathi Mahila Viswa Visyalayam (SPMVV) is soon going to establish a ‘Women Bio-tech Incubator Facility’ (WBIF) on its campus. To nurture women entrepreneurship for scaling technologies, the incubation centre will be supported by the biotechnology industry.
The Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) was set up by the Department of Bio-technology (DBT) of the Central government. For this, the SPMVV was sanctioned Rs 4.14 crores by DBT for a three year program and final approvals are at the clearing stage.
In a bid to promote biotechnology activities through a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship in the country, the DBT has been setting up biotechnology incubators at various centres in the country and is currently supporting nearly 33 incubators.
In this regard, to bring in budding women scientists, students and stakeholders in this region and ensure the success of their innovative ideas, the SPMVV is soon going to have an exclusive WBIF on its campus.
The key objectives of this program are to have a facility for rapid prototyping, product development and patenting. This program supports the university to strengthen its infrastructures, refurbishing laboratories, and in turn creates employability opportunities for women.
The SPMVV -WBIF involves setting up infrastructure and equipment, ready to use lab spaces which will be made available for participants and researchers for analysis, refinement and validation. The SPMVV-WBIF is proposed to act as a hub of biotech R&D industry in the major domains of biotechnology.
The facility will be made available to clients to develop their own customized R&D labs; graduate and undergraduate students will be given hands-on technical training in the areas of biotechnology.
The SPMVV serves as a platform for improvement of technology based research in the multi-disciplinary thrust areas of pharmaceutical technology, sericulture, biotechnology and applied microbiology to enhance entrepreneurial population in this region. Participants can start their own enterprise by exploiting developed innovative strategies.
The centre will fostering the development of need based technologies which will have several commercial industrial applications and will therefore provide a strong impact on entrepreneurship and generation of employment.
Speaking to DC, SPMVV Registrar Prof D. M. Mamatha said that the WBIF will have common instrumentation facilities and infrastructure with advanced equipment to help budding women scientists and students to bring their innovative ideas to reality.
"The facility provides them a dedicated space to work and executive their ideas. They will be given hands-on training by experts to help them work towards maximising product development output and guide them at all levels from ideation to setting up companies to ensuring that they succeed," she maintained.
Prof Mamatha added "The incubation centre will engage with all stakeholders of the biotechnology translational journey, including regulators, seed funders, business developers, successful businessmen and research institutions and further act as bridge for the budding scientists and students, who successfully bring their innovative projects to reality".
