The Telangana Government, said in a report, that it will request President Pranab Mukherjee, for the launch of T-Works in the State.

T-Works is a startup incubator for technology, mainly in the hardware industry.

Principal Secretary of IT, Jayesh Ranjan, said, “T-Works on the lines of T-Hub for Hardware. This 100,000-square-feet incubation and innovation center will be located at the Osmania University in Hyderabad.

“We are requesting the President Pranab Mukherjee to launch it during the Centenary Celebrations of the University next month,” added Mr. Ranjan.

T-works will provide entrepreneurs with sophisticated equipment, and is mainly software focused. It will act as a prototyping center for electronics, semiconductors and hardware startups, he added.

T-Works will have machinery and equipment that can cater to different types of hardware requirements, especially electronic hardware and Internet of Thing (IoT) hardware. It will house sophisticated machinery, testing labs and can be used by startups as a common facility.

“A startup can book the equipment and use it for a while. A user fee will be charged for this,” Ranjan said.

The Telangana Government plans to invest Rs. 35-40 crores for all the equipment that will be brought into T-Works.

Organized by Indian Institute of Packaging (IIP), Ranjan inaugurated the National Conference on ‘Inno Vision in Packaging’.

The idea for T-Works came to Ranjan and his team when they visited iHub, which is the innovation hub of the state of California in the United States. T-Works have adopted a similar model here in Hyderabad.

The functioning will be similar to that of T-Hub. There will be a professional CEO and COO, and a board will be constituted. “The board will oversee the working of T-Works and will have both industry representatives and government representatives,” said Ranjan.

IIP Director, N C Saha, said, “the company is requesting the Telangana State Government to allocate 5 acres land, for the expansion of their local operations.”

The Indian packaging market is expected to reach USD 32 billion by 2020, added Mr. Saha.

The Centre has assigned the IIP to develop packaging standards for 500 export oriented commodities, including tea, coffee, spices, flowers and fruits among others, said Saha.

By Supraja