India-based startup ideaForge Technologies Pvt. Ltd. which majorly relies on robotics module is variedly supporting the Indian Army with strategies as well as empower it every now and then during hardships. The first urge to seek such technology was in 2013 when a team were busy searching survivors in Uttarakhand through the submerged areas. Furthermore, a similar situation arose in 2016 when Army wanted to figure out the exact position of hidden terrorist of Lashkar e-Taiba holed up in the parliament building in Pampore. The navigation procedure through the essential intelligence was carried out by ideaForge.
The sole task of the startup is to build/develop drones for the Indian Defence System and other government organisational units so that the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) navigate the area and point the exact location of the under search object. Started in 2008, ideaForge has also the credibility to develop world’s lightest and smallest UAV just 10 grammesin 2009, which was later on used in Uttarakhand, Pampore, Pathankot, and so on. The startup not only works for Indian Defencebut rather helps in exposing the violators of the sand mining industry as well which occurred somewhere in Nagpur, Maharashtra.
Developed in 2008, ideaForge was founded by Ankit Mehta, Vipul Joshi, Rahul Singh and Ashish Bhat, the team of geniuses were spotted by Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) at the Micro Air Vehicle (MAV) competition in theUSA in 2008. The startup stood at first place thus giving neck-to-neck competition to Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA. Later on, as years passed, it credited itself to build country’s first fully autonomous vertical takeoff as well as landing UAV.
#drones are exposing the violators of the sand mining industry! #technology #innovation #NETRA #geospatial #industry https://t.co/tOwe0M4K2P
— ideaForge Technology (@ideaforge_tech) December 12, 2016
The respective startup is used for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance of moving and fixed targets. Since its launch, it had developed several categories of UAVs; NETRA, VTOL UAV and SKYBOX Fixed-Wings. It provides training for the product to use, though it’s quite easy to handle. The following drones are mainly operated by middle school educated jawans who are given minimal of training.
In a conversation with Economic Times, ideaForge Co-Founder and CEO, Ankit Mehta stated as….Serving government contracts evolved naturally for us. After the success of NETRA; a product we developed with DRDO, ideaForge Technology and the NETRA family of UAVs have become synonymous with the defence and the government sector. …We felt like there is nothing else we would rather do, nothing else that will give us the same kind of satisfaction. It was almost like an obligation we felt towards what we have already achieved independently. We were also very fortunate in finding a team in college itself with common interests and passion.
As per the futuristic approach, ideaForge plans to deeply involve itself into Armed Forced tasks subsequently becoming the lead or prime provider of industrial and agricultural UAV solutions which will further lead to a recognition of underserved international market. It also looks forward to attending the Geospatial World Forum to be held in Hyderabad in 2017.
