Disaster Management through Startups, to Rebuild Kerala

KOCHI:
Reiterating the need to help laymen, Design District has come up as a novel concept by featuring an array of start-ups that make use of cutting-edge technology to fight natural disasters.

As a major highlight at the #Design Kerala Summit being held here, Design District gives focus to disaster management, given that the state was ravaged by massive floods and landslides four months ago.

The Bolgatty Event Centre that is hosting the December 11-12 event has 20 products incubated at Maker Village. They are also doing live demonstrations in a bid to leverage the possibilities of installation techniques. Also, Kerala startup Mission (KSUM) has come up with 14 products at the expo of the Summit.

Maker Village CEO Prasad Balakrishnan said this was the first time such products have been curated, blending of technology, its application to society and its ‘artistic marriage’ with the real environment. “Our moto is passion for technology and compassion for community. Its live demonstration will make people aware of the real use of technologies,” he pointed out.

KSUM CEO Saji Gopinath said Kerala has been conventionally strong when it comes to in electronic hardware. “Now, with a strong backing, in short time, Maker Village has more than a variety of 60 startups. Hence, Design District is to showcase that talent and motivate people to come into this space as there’s a misconception that hardware startups do take a lot of time and may not be successful,” he said. “But if you look at the current status, most of the companies scaled are hardware companies.”

Also on display is fully-automated SMART hospital room using intelligent machines. There is live demonstration of IROV, India’s first indigenously developed compact underwater drone to detect submerged structures and objects to perform real-time analysis of the data. “It is useful to ascertain the structural integrity, extent of damage of underwater structures after a flood and IROV is a perfect solution for it,” Dr Gopinath pointed out.

Another product that will be of immense help during a calamity is the Waferchips Techno Solution, an artificial intelligence powered wearable ECG device for 24X 7 monitoring of persons with critical heart conditions. It monitors the heart condition of patients when the physical presence of doctors is not feasible during a calamity.

Westghats Technologies, a real-time demographic detection using vision processor and machine learning, can be used for determining crowd profiles in areas of dense human congregation and detect signs of a probable stampede and evaluate demographics during rescue operations/evacuation. Evelabs Technologies came up with a fully-automated IOT infusion monitor to monitor the IV medication, eliminating physical nursing care.

Electric boats and ferries powered by solar energy (Navalt), Campper, a startup for camping, Vehicle ST tomonitor vehicles, Pin n Park to identify parking areas, Recipe Book, a startup pertaining to cooking are some of the startups exibhited by KSUM. Many other stalls were also set up which also include the stall by CERA Sanitary ware, the main sponsor of the event.