Infosys on Wednesday said it has invested in ideaForge, a homegrown start-up focused on unmanned aerial vehicle or UAV solutions (drones).
Infosys, which has been aggressively investing in startups over the last few quarters, will fund the latest investment through its Innovation Fund. The investment is subject to receipt of regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions, Infosys said in a statement. It, however, did not disclose the details of the investment. ideaForge’s drones have fully autonomous operation, failsafe technology, high endurance and can offer image intelligence with live feed as well as support complex payloads like thermal and high-resolution imagery.
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The devices have been widely deployed by the Indian Armed Forces for surveillance, crowd monitoring and rescue operations. “ideaForge’s high performance UAVs, which have been designed and built in India, have significant potential in industrial use cases. We are looking forward to working with ideaForge and bringing their technology, expertise, and solutions to our clients to unlock new business insights from operational data that has previously been difficult to obtain,” Infosys Executive Vice President and Global Head of Corporate Development and Ventures Ritika Suri said.
Infosys had set up the Innovation Fund in 2013. It beefed up the fund five-fold to US $500 million in 2015 to provide financing to startups and new technologies like artificial intelligence. The Bengaluru-based firm has spoken many times of its strategy to focus on renewing core business while building new capabilities like design thinking and artificial intelligence at the same time.
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In the last few weeks, Infosys has invested in firms like US-based TidalScale, Danish artificial intelligence startup UNSILO and Stellaris Venture Partners (an early-stage venture fund).”We are very excited to have Infosys as an investor and a partner for exploring UAV services and solutions for global customers. This partnership will play an important role in our industrial expansion to address a wide variety of data acquisition and analysis needs,” ideaForge co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Ankit Mehta said.
(With PTI inputs)