New Delhi, July 6 (IANS) The Centre’s new Rs one lakh crore fund to support R & D and innovation in the private sector will cover sunrise and strategic sectors such as energy transition, climate technologies, robotics, drones, space technology, biotechnology, synthetic biology, AI applications, and the digital economy, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, Abhay Karandikar has said.

Besides, to address India’s dependence on rare earth imports from China, researchers are working on indigenous alternatives including rare-earth-free technologies like synchronous reluctance motors, he told NDTV Profit in an exclusive interview.

He emphasised that the operational framework for the fund is being finalised and will roll out within months.

Explaining the details of the scheme, Karandikar highlighted that financing will be given through concessional loans, equity, or a combination of both and companies are expected to shoulder half the project cost, while the rest will be covered through the fund.

The government has introduced a research and innovation fund to encourage private players to invest in high-risk sectors which they have been hesitant to enter, he pointed out.

“The fund will invest in private sector research and development including corporates, industries along with deep technology startups,” Karandikar said.

The Union Cabinet on Tuesday approved the Research Development and Innovation Scheme with a corpus of Rs one lakh crore, with the aim of bolstering India’s research and innovation ecosystem.

Recognising the critical role that the private sector plays in driving innovation and commercialising research, the RDI Scheme aims to provide long-term financing or refinancing with long tenors at low or nil interest rates to spur private sector investment in RDI.

The scheme has been designed to overcome the constraints and challenges in funding the private sector and seeks to provide growth and risk capital to sunrise and strategic sectors to facilitate innovation, promote adoption of technology and enhance competitiveness.

The scheme aims to finance transformative projects at higher levels of Technology Readiness Levels, support the acquisition of technologies which are critical or of high strategic importance and facilitate the setting up of a Deep-Tech Fund of Funds.

The objective of the scheme is to encourage the private sector to scale up research, development, and innovation (RDI) in sunrise domains and other sectors relevant to economic security, strategic purpose, and self-reliance.

–IANS

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