IT RESEARCH ACADEMY
Narendra Ahuja
n-ahuja@illinois.edu
Member and Coordinator
ITRA Program Steering and Implementation Group
Media Lab Asia, Department of Information Technology, GOI
Donald Biggar Willet Professor
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign;
Founding Director and Director International
IIIT, Hyderabad
ITRA
A Government of India Program
by
Department of Information Technology
Ministry pf Communications and Information Technology
To help enhance the quality of emerging/existing Institutions
IT
Stands for
Information and Communication Technology
and
Electronics
i.e.
Computing and Communications
Software and Hardware
Quality
Four-Fold
1. Research:
Problem Formulation and Solving
Which requires
2. Teaching:
State of the Art Courses
Together which lead to
3. Entrepreneurship:
Deployment of Solutions
For a broad impact, which require
4. Societal Sensitivity:
What problems to solve?
Discerning Eye for Spotting IT Problems in daily life
An Ecosystem
Develop, Deploy and, Debug and Disseminate
Mechanisms
To
Acquire Knowledge from Institutions/Experts,
Adapt, Develop and Integrate,
and Make Available to Those Who Need it
5
An Illustrative Architecture
of
ITRA
7
Illustrative Features/Interactions
in
ITRA
9
Distance learning network
Teach from anywhere
Students
PG Scholars
Short term UG Scholars
Local
Curricula
Partner
Institution
Star Faculty from
India, Abroad
Permanent or visiting
Faculty QIP
(Eventual)
Contributions to ITRA
enable
IT
Research Curricuum
ITA Curricula/Research
Lab Setups
ITA Faculty
Recruitment/Visiting
Holistic
Development
& Societal
Sensitivity
Entrepreneurship
New
world
class
Faculty
recruits
Curriculum
ITRA
PG Student Teams
back for mandatory teaching
Research Teams
Distributed centers of excellence
10
Team Model – A Central Feature
– Build R&D groups, network them and connect
them to industry and society
– Attract high quality researchers through quality
of environment
– Produce large numbers of high quality PhDs
– Produce ideas, prototypes, companies
– Include multitier institutions, mentor-mentee pairs
raise quality of lower tier institutions
Summary – Dynamic Collaborative Environment
11
R&D Capacity Building by Interlinking Groups
ITRA Faculty
ITRA PhD students
ITRA Faculty
ITRA PhD students
Large
Research
Groups
Large
Research
Groups
ITRA
Faculty
ITRA
Faculty
Small
Research
Groups
ITRA PhD
students
P1 P2
P2
P3
Company 1
Company 2
Product P1, P2
Product P2, P3
Small
Research
Groups
ITRA PhD
students
12
Handling the Scale of India –
Via Local Parallel Collaboration
• Begin with a small initial team
• Debug mechanisms
• Expand fast (e.g., double size every few years)
– Exponential growth
14
A Pyramidal Model of Growth
Example:
Each partner institution
adds
two partners
every two years
15
1
…
…
5
…
Scope of ITRA Activities
Through Focus Areas
1. IT Areas
Research Centers
2. Interdisciplinary, IT-in-X Areas
Problems Solving Labs
Choice of IT/X focus areas
driven by priorities and opportunities
17
Building the Pyramid
• Composed of Sub-pyramids
• Each sub-pyramid associated with one focus area
• Multiple Collaborating teams within each subpyramid
• Teams selected and funded by ITRA
• Monitored and helped for quality enhancement
by ITRA
A FOCUS AREA SUB-PYRAMID
= Multiple Teams
TEAM 1
…
…
…
…
n
TEAM n
…
…
…
…
…
Focus Area Pyramids
 ITRA Pyramid
ITRA Pyramid = Coexisting Focus Area Pyramids
To Ensure Collaboration
Basic Unit of Pyramid Construction
= 1 Mentor+ 2 Mentee IIs
Called a Pyralet
Every Cycle (~2 Years), the Pyramid
• Rises in Quality
• Fresh Mentee IIs Join at the Bottom
• Gets Taller (~Doubles in Number)
 Exponential Growth
Organization Support from ITRA
•
•
•
•
Formation of II teams.
Connecting with experts (for Advisory Board).
Establishing curricula, laboratories, facilities
Hiring of faculty (Named ITRA professorships,
salary top-ups, start-up grants, visits to Advisory
Board and co-advising students, travel support to
conferences, support for entrepreneurial
activities, awards
• Adjunct faculty visits
• Attracting students to PhD, etc
• Transfer of developed technologies…….
ITRA Status
• Work started in June 2011
• Seed Funding of 150 Crores over 5 Years
• So far, Two Focus Areas Launched
– IT: Mobile Computing, Networking and Applications
– IT-in-X: IT Based Water Sustainability Solutions
– RFPs issued to build the two Sybpyramids
It is Time to Form a Team
• If you want to be a Mentor II, find two Mentees
• If you want to be a Mentee
• If you have formed a pyralet
–
–
–
–
Discuss your proposal theme
Be ambitious
If you think your objectives require more IIs then
Team up with more pyralets
• Start working on the proposal in two stages
– Expression of interest
– If invited, prepare a fullproposal
Details of Support
• Length of Award: 3 years.
– Year 3 add mentees, supplemental budget for layer 3
•
Estimated Number of Awards
– Roughly 6 pyralets (18 IIs)
– 2 (large) teams of 9 IIs -- 6 (small) teams of 3 IIs
• Level of Support
– Roughly 3 Crores per pyralet over 3 years
Budget Categories
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
Salaries
Student Scholarships
Travel
Adjunct Faculty
Domain Experts
New Research Labs
New Specialized Facilities
Remote Activities
Entreprenuership
Societal Sensitivity Development
Mentor-Mentee /Other Collaboration
Project Motivated Curricula
Special programs to attract undergrads
Overhead
Details of ITRA-Mobile Support
• Length of Award: 3 years.
– Year 3 add mentees, supplemental budget for layer 3
•
Estimated Number of Awards
– As justified by focus area/proposal quality
– Rule of thumb: 6 pyralets (18IIs)
– Or 6, could be 2 (large) teams of 9 IIs or
6 (small) teams of 3 IIs, in the middle
• Level of Support
– Flexible
– Rule of thumb: 3 Crores per pyralet over 3
Details of Support
• Similar Numbers for ITRA-Water
Timeline
RFP posted
Wednesday, December 7,
2011
Expression of Interest (EOI)
deadline for online submission
Tuesday, January 31, 2012,
5pm
Feedback on EOI to teams
Wednesday, February 15,
2012
Proposal deadline for online
submission
Tuesday, March 20, 2012,
5pm
28
More information
• (1) ITRA homepage:
http://medialabasia.in/itra/itra/index.php
(2) Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page
http://medialabasia.in/itra/itra/index.php?optio
n=com_jefaq&view=faq&Itemid=81
(3) Instructions for submission:
• http://medialabasia.in/itra/itra/index.php?opti
on=com_content&view=article&id=1022&It