TechFest to open at IIT Bombay tomorrow

The 18th annual TechFest will open at IIT Bombay in Powai tomorrow. The three-day event would offer visitors a closed up view of the latest developments in science and technology.

Considered to be Asia's largest science and technology festival, TechFest draws some 1.5 lakh visitors each year, and the attractions this year are likely to be the demonstrations in robotics of various types, 3D printing, flight and racing simulations, and drones, among others.

TechFest would offer a variety of robotics demonstrations, in addition to the popular Robowars competition. Robowars is a competition of AI enthusiasts from all over India and abroad, featuring destructive robots taking on one another for Rs1.25 lakh in prizes. Visitors, this year, would be able to place virtual bets on their preferred competitors.

Further there would be the world's first 3D printed walking humanoid robot - Jinn Bot. The bot, controlled via an Android device, is able to hear and speak as also display moods. The Dutch Nao Team of football-playing robots would also be on display giving a 2-vs-2 demo.

Kilobots,  low-cost self-organising swarm robots, would also be present. The unique feature of the Kilobots it that they can be programmed simultaneously for various uses, such as studies of large populations, with accurate, instantaneous results.

The festival also provides a platform for students to interact with personalities from across the globe in order to bridge the gap between industry and academia. The speakers this year include former ISRO chairman, K Radhakrishnan, Nobel Prize winner in Physics, Serge Haroche and CEO of BitTorrent, Eric Klinker.

The festival would also conduct an international summit addressing on the "Internet of Things", through which students would get insights into the digital revolution and how they could make the most of available opportunities. The summit would start with a keynote lecture by Bob Frankston, co-creator of Spreadsheets followed by a panel discussion with representatives from companies like Tech Mahindra, Cisco, Oracle and Vodafone.