DRDO wins Thomson Reuters innovation award

New Delhi: India's premier defence R&D establishment, the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), was Thursday awarded the Thomson Reuters India Innovation Award for 2011 in recognition of its work in the field of science and technology.

The award was presented to DRDO by minister of state for science and technology Ashwani Kumar at an event organised here by Thomson Reuters and the Confederation of Indian Industry, a release said.

The defence research agency won the award in the "Hi-tech Academic and Government Institution" category. The award was received on behalf of the organisation by DRDO's chief controller (R&D), Dr KD Nayak.

The winner was adjudged on the basis of size of patent portfolio, success rate, the extent of globalisation and influence of innovation as the analytical parameters.

DRDO is the largest government science and technology organisation engaged in developing defence technologies covering various disciplines to provide India's armed forces world-class weapons and equipment.

DRDO has generated a wide range of cutting edge defence technologies covering disciplines like aeronautics, armaments, electronics, combat vehicles, engineering systems, instrumentation, missiles, advanced computing and simulation, special materials, naval systems, life sciences, training and information systems.

The organisation has been consistently making efforts at innovation and creating an Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) culture as an integral part of research and development, which resulted in an IPR portfolio of about 1400 patents, copyrights, designs and trademarks.