Silicon Valley VC Launches a Massive Google Glass Hackathon at India’s First Major Maker Festival

December 31, 2013January 30, 2014 BusinessWire India 0 Comment Technology

Inspired by California’s wildly popular Maker Faire, Silicon Valley venture capitalist Asha Jadeja, in partnership with National Institute of Design, brings India a prestigious technology and design event, in partnership with the Maker Fest (www.makerfest.com) – a non-commercial event, free and open to the public.

Google’s Glass will be introduced to programmers as a private initiative for the first time in India. Ms. Jadeja will be a launching an splashlogo app development competition and hackathon for programmers to create solutions using Glassware, Google’s open source operating system. She is expecting this competition to give a running start to Indian entrepreneurs as they launch apps on Glassware before Google’s Glass is available to the public. Jadeja wants to put India on the global tech innovation map.

Makers from all over India and some from US will be showcasing their inventions to an enthusiastic audience in Ahmedabad, at the National Institute of Design, Jan 4 and 5, 2014.

Shri Sam Pitroda, Advisor to the Prime Minister for Innovation and Chairman, National Innovation Council will grace the occasion on Jan 5, 2014 at noon, at NID and interact with the participating makers.

Some of the Makers who will be exhibited at the Fest include child prodigy – Susant Pattnaik – famous for designing a wheelchair which functions on breath sensors, a team that has created state of the art drones, 3-D printers, and (Evomo) – a Rural Mobility Vehicle among many others.

Alongside Maker Fest, Ms. Jadeja has donated a $140,000 Fablab from MIT to the maker community in Ahmedabad. The Fablab is a set of digital fabrication equipment and software to help makers transform their imagination into products. The Fablab is housed at the prestigious CEPT University Ahmedabad and will be open to the public at select hours every day.

MJFF the Motwani Jadeja Family Foundation (www.motwanijadeja.org) is expecting to seed invest in social impact innovations as they emerge in next few years between the annual Maker Fest and the Fablab.

MJF Angels, a venture capital fund of $8 million is set up by Ms. Jadeja to seed invest in for-profit innovations that emerge from collaborations between her projects and various institutions of higher learning in India.

Maker Fest
January 4th & 5th
National Institute of Design,
Address: Bhagtacharya Rd, Rajnagar Society, Paldi, Ahmedabad, Gujarat 380007