Cracking the code: Technovate for India bridges the talent-technology gap among youth | India News – Times of India

For a society that aspires to be technologically driven, an aspect that India has already made an impact on, it is essential to have a robust ecosystem across the board that helps encourage creativity, support growth and, crucially, help innovators expand their turn creative ideas into scalable, impactful realities
Working with Talrop, an organization that wants to do exactly that, the inauguration Technovate for India launched in the leading IT hub and engineering powerhouse Chennai. The event showcased India’s thriving startup ecosystem and its potential to transform the talent-tech landscape.
Industry leaders shared insights on how India is driving innovation, creating opportunities and building bridges between talent and industry needs. For a technology-driven future, they emphasized the importance of a robust ecosystem that nurtures creativity, supports growth and translates ideas into scalable solutions. Since 2015, Talrop has been committed to strengthening India’s talent pool and building a bridge to industries that need their ingenuity.

Keynote insights

Vanita Venugopal: CEO, Tamil Nadu Technology Hub

Programs piloted in this sector have seen incredible success, in terms of how positively they have impacted not only the confidence of students, but also that of investors and industry leaders, who will then continue to fuel – and build – that growing ecosystem . , not only in urban hubs, but also in tier 2 and tier 3 cities.
She highlighted Chennai’s role as an IT hub accounting for 10% of India’s IT services and outlined plans to further increase this impact. To promote deep tech innovation, she advocated seeing talent as a human asset and not just as a commercial value, with governments playing a crucial role in scalability.
Ms Venugopal highlighted ‘disruptive education’, which involves integrating emerging technologies into the school curriculum. This transformation fills the skills gaps in the sector and places technology learning as foundational. She discussed the “Cafeteria approach”, offering flexible access to technical learning regardless of one’s educational background ensures inclusivity.
She also emphasized that technology is an enabler and not a substitute, urging startups to focus on human interaction and values. Ethical, empathetic innovation, she said, is powerful when “led by collaboration and collective genius.”
She talked about the need for all-round support for people who want to transform technology. According to her, a system with checks and balances ensures an ecosystem that works from the ground up.

SPEAKER #2

Kissflow founder and SaaS pioneer

Kissflow founder and SaaS pioneer Suresh Sambandam highlighted the role of education in Tamil Nadu’s progress. He noted that the state’s focus on technology has led to a “job seeker mentality” but emphasized that entrepreneurship among graduates in the technology sector is being revived. Improved access to devices, internet and equitable education have propelled the state forward and are a springboard for its vision: Tamil Nadu as a trillion-dollar economy.
Central to this vision is encouraging startups, not only in the big cities, but including in all districts. By engaging women and promoting MSMEs, Tamil Nadu can leverage its industrial base to innovate sustainable, market-ready solutions.
Addressing Technovat participants, Sambandam underlined the urgency of creating scalable startups based on small ideas. “You have to build your brands and put your logos on the map,” he said, outlining the path from ideation to financing and scaling, as he indicated with the logos on his screen, and bringing them up as examples to look at strive.
A major key to achieving that coveted trillion-dollar economy is attracting industrial giants, promoting the MSMEs that already exist within the framework of the state – and most crucial of all, “We need to build startups .”
To truly create a trillion-dollar business-forward economy, startups cannot be built exclusively in major cities. He emphasizes the importance of building innovation “in an inclusive way.” By spreading development, each district becomes an economic powerhouse in its own right. A focus on inclusive development by engaging districts and actively involving women, he says, promotes ideas that empower people to create impactful products.
He cited case studies that allowed the state of Tamil Nadu’s pre-existing industrial infrastructure to convert waste materials into not only raw materials but also into a final product that could fully reach the market – an analogy for establishing a strong entrepreneurial culture among the innovators in Tamil Nadu.
A number of regulations required providers of entrepreneurial solutions that exist but have not yet been scaled to the level at which they are needed – paving the way for the problem statement given to the students participating in Technovate for India Chennai 2024.
Addressing the students at the conclave in Chennai, he said, “You are the people who need to build your brands and put your logos on the map. His initiative takes startups from the idea stage to the funding to scale – making it look like – and well, starts as – a small idea, a scalable project.

Problem Statement: Bridging the skills gap

Despite booming industries such as automotive, textiles, electronics and IT, Tamil Nadu graduates face employability challenges due to limited digital and soft skills. Targeted guidance is essential to bridge this gap.
Technovate participants were tasked with tackling this problem. The teams proposed solutions to increase the employability of graduates by focusing on digital skills development and tailoring education to industry needs.

Winning solution

The Chennai edition ended with the team from SRM Institute of Science and Technology taking first place with their innovative platform, SageTree, an AI-powered upskilling tool designed to address the employment gap.

The team at SRM preceded their solution with solid data points that really drove home their point. “Given that 92% of jobs today require digital skills and not that many possess them,” they began, “that’s a gap that needs to be bridged.”, laying the foundation for their representation
The team highlighted a lack of learning expectations or a clear path for students to follow, and a lack of inclusivity across the board, with English being the lingua franca for digital skills development – ​​preventing some grassroots innovators from flourishing.

Online resources for upskilling and learning are plentiful, but often not curated, leading to wasted time finding the right one. Graduates from non-technical backgrounds face fragmented, impersonal and language-limited learning opportunities.
A look at their solutions

SageTree: a personalized upskilling platform

Team SRM has identified a critical problem: a third of workers lack essential digital skills, hindering their employability in a market where 92% of jobs require them. SageTree aims to fill this gap by offering:
SageTree also lists job openings in both technical and non-technical sectors, bridging the gap between skills and employment. The aim of the platform is to make upskilling inclusive, impactful and globally scalable.

The way forward

Technovate for India’s Chennai edition has laid the foundation for transformative innovation by empowering students to tackle real-world challenges. Events like this move India closer to becoming a global hub for technology and innovation, turning its immense talent pool into an engine of change.
Congratulations to Priya, Akrish and Ritam from SRM Institute of Science and Technology for their visionary contributions to the future of work!
Disclaimer: This article was produced on behalf of Technovate for India, a partnership between Talrop and The Times of Indiaby the Times Internet team