Kyndryl India, IIT collaboration on 3D printing

Partnership expected to foster smart manufacturing research

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Kyndryl India, IIT collaboration on 3D printing
The IIT Tirupati and Kyndryl India teams. The collaboration will combine IIT Tirupati’s domain knowledge in 3D printing with Kyndryl’s global expertise.

Kyndryl, a global IT infrastructure services provider, and the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Tirupati on 19 January 2023 announced a collaboration to advance research, share knowledge, promote innovation and drive breakthrough developments in AI-enabled 3D printing technology. The collaboration will focus on quickly developing cost-effective 3D prototypes for complex products in manufacturing.

The evolution of 3D technology has become increasingly vital in the development and manufacturing of product prototypes that are then used to troubleshoot design issues before mass production. As digital transformation increases, the demand for skills and capabilities in smart manufacturing is increasing.

The collaboration will combine IIT Tirupati’s domain knowledge in 3D printing with Kyndryl’s global expertise in artificial intelligence (AI), enabling the co-creation of machine learning (ML) models that will allow for near real-time identification of potential defects during 3D printing. Gaining this knowledge in advance could help identify significant savings in cost, time, and waste generation, as well as contribute to new product development by predicting performance in real-world manufacturing environments.

“This partnership will enable IIT Tirupati students and faculty to collaborate with Kyndryl’s professionals on the frontiers of implementing AI to solve industry challenges,” said Prof. K N Satyanarayana, director, IIT Tirupati. “The co-creation in the digital manufacturing segment with Kyndryl can quickly provide cost-effective solutions to the manufacturing industry and provide better exposure to our students.”

“India’s national manufacturing policy aims to raise the manufacturing sector’s GDP share to 25% by 2025. To accomplish that goal, research advancements and skills development will play an important role in deploying AI in innovative ways to make smart manufacturing technology more accessible and efficient,” said Lingraju Sawkar, president, Kyndryl India. “This collaboration will harness Kyndryl’s Data and AI expertise to help IIT Tirupati create a meaningful learning experience for students and serve as a scalable model of how industry and academia can co-create to help industries.

The two organizations have already begun joint research and will be launching a series of thought leadership conclaves and innovation challenges to advance new ideas across industry and academia that align with the National Innovation and Start-up Policy -2019.

2023 promises an interesting ride for print in India

Indian Printer and Publisher founded in 1979 is the oldest B2B trade publication in the multi-platform and multi-channel IPPGroup. While the print and packaging industries have been resilient in the past 33 months since the pandemic lockdown of 25 March 2020, the commercial printing and newspaper industries have yet to recover their pre-Covid trajectory.

The fragmented commercial printing industry faces substantial challenges as does the newspaper industry. While digital short-run printing and the signage industry seem to be recovering a bit faster, ultimately their growth will also be moderated by the progress of the overall economy. On the other hand book printing exports are doing well but they too face several supply-chain and logistics challenges.

The price of publication papers including newsprint has been high in the past year while availability is diminished by several mills shutting down their publication paper and newsprint machines in the past four years. Indian paper mills are also exporting many types of paper and have raised prices for Indian printers. To some extent, this has helped in the recovery of the digital printing industry with its on-demand short-run and low-wastage paradigm.

Ultimately digital print and other digital channels will help print grow in a country where we are still far behind in our paper and print consumption and where digital is a leapfrog technology that will only increase the demand for print in the foreseeable future. For instance, there is no alternative to a rise in textbook consumption but this segment will only reach normality in the next financial year beginning on 1 April 2023.

Thus while the new normal is a moving target and many commercial printers look to diversification, we believe that our target audiences may shift and change. Like them, we will also have to adapt with agility to keep up with their business and technical information needs.

Our 2023 media kit is ready, and it is the right time to take stock and reconnect with your potential markets and customers. Print is the glue for the growth of liberal education, new industry, and an emerging economy. We seek your participation in what promises to be an interesting ride.

– Naresh Khanna

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