Startup Incubation and Innovation Centre, IIT Kanpur launched the Mission Bharat O2 in May 2021 to strengthen the Indian healthcare infrastructure, with the objective of promoting indigenous manufacturing at par with global standards. In the initiative, led by Professor Amitabha Bandyopadhyay, Professor In-charge, Innovation & Incubation, IIT Kanpur, Srikant Sastri, Director, FIRST-IITK and Chairman, I3G Advisory Network, and Rahul Patel, Head of Strategic Initiatives, startup Acquafront Infrastructure has successfully installed 10 oxygen plants of 500 and 600 LPM capacities in UP, MP, Karnataka, Haryana and Bihar.
In the 2nd wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, AIPL, designed and manufactured the PSA technology-based oxygen plants. It was supported by 2 SMEs, based in Kolkata and Hallol, as manufacturing partners of the Mission Bharat O2.
To make this national initiative successful, SIIC brought experts from various domains from all across the world. Mentors for the MBO2 included – Dr. Arvind Rajendran (Canada), Devendra Choudhary (Switzerland), Monojit Choudhury, Nirmal Saraf, Sanjiv Verma, Sanjay Banerjee, Rajesh Raizada, Nagesh Pai (Canada), Sanjiv Maddila (USA) and others.
Prof Amitabha Bandyopadhyay, Professor-In-Charge, SIIC, said, “When the world was struggling to understand COVID-19 in 2020, the SIIC team delivered critical medical equipment, amidst stringent deadlines, within 90 days! Seeing the nation in crisis, we had to step up again - Mission Bharat O2 is the result of the enthusiasm of the team to serve the nation with technology at par with global standards, yet again.”
