National Innovation Foundation

NIF - INDIA
Type:	Autonomous Body of Department of Science and Technology, Govt. of India
Established:	2000
Employees:	80
Address:	Satellite Complex, Premchand Nagar Road, Jodhpur Tekra, Satellite, Ahmedabad – 380015 (Gujarat) India
Tel:	+91-79-26732456
E-mail:	info@nifindia.org
Website:	http://www.nif.org.in/

National Innovation Foundation (NIF) – India is an autonomous body of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India. It was set up in February 2000 at Ahmedabad, Gujarat to provide institutional support for scouting, spawning, sustaining and scaling up the grassroots innovations across the country. NIF is a national initiative to serve the knowledge-rich, economically poor people of the country. It is committed to making India innovative by documenting, adding value, protecting the Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) of the contemporary, unaided technological innovators as well as of outstanding traditional knowledge holders and disseminating them on a commercial as well as non-commercial basis.

NIF conducts a biennial national competition for grassroots green technologies, developed by farmers, mechanics, artisans and others, through their own genius, without any recourse to professional help. NIF then gets these innovations validated with the help of experts and ascertains the novelty in these innovations by conducting Prior Art Search (PAS). If the innovation is deemed novel, NIF files a patent on behalf of the innovator in his/her name. NIF also funds value-addition initiatives in these innovations to upscale them and make them more useful for a larger segment of people.

To determine the feasibility of the commercialising of technology, NIF conducts market research and test marketing. The technologies which are found to be commercially viable are licensed to willing entrepreneurs. A Micro Venture Innovation Fund (MVIF), sponsored by Small Industries Development Bank of India(SIDBI) in 2003, supports the activities of prototype development, test marketing and pilot production.

Being organised since 2008, IGNITE is an annual competition for student’s ideas and innovations conducted by NIF in partnership with the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE). Some state education boards also partner in the same. All students up to Standard 12 from any school (and of the same age group but out of school) in India are eligible to participate in the competition. The IGNITE awards are announced on October 15, the birthday of Bharat Ratna Dr A P J Abdul Kalam, the former President of India, which is celebrated as the Children's Creativity and Innovation Day by NIF. In 2015, IGNITE competition was renamed as Dr A P J Abdul Kalam IGNITE competition in the memory of Dr Kalam so that the creative children continue to draw inspiration from his spirit.

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