New Delhi, May 21 (IANS) Drone company AVPL International on Tuesday announced a collaboration with the Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) to begin drone spray operations across an expansive 50 lakh acres, spanning eight states including Gujarat, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana, Punjab, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh.

The partnership promises to revolutionise the distribution of agricultural products, potentially boosting crop yields by up to 20 per cent while also reducing environmental impact.

The initiative will drive substantial growth in agricultural productivity and sustainability across targeted regions.

“We are excited to join hands with IFFCO on this transformative journey. Our vision is to revolutionise agriculture through cutting-edge technology, and this partnership enables us to deliver advanced drone solutions to millions of farmers, thereby boosting productivity and championing sustainable farming practices,” said Deep Sihag Sisai, Founder & Managing Director of AVPL International.

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between AVPL and IFFCO outlines a strategic roadmap for the phased deployment of drone spray operations, tailored to different crops and terrains, ensuring comprehensive and effective coverage across the targeted acreage.

The partnership, under the innovative “drones as a service” (DAAS) model, aims to make advanced drone technology accessible to farmers at an unprecedented scale.

With an estimated investment exceeding $50 million, supplemented by government subsidies, the initiative is poised to stimulate agricultural innovation and drive economic development in rural areas, paving the way for a surge in opportunities for employment in drone operations and maintenance, AVPL said.

Recently, the government’s Namo Drone Didi initiative has trained several rural women to become drone pilots for agricultural purposes, which also targets to boost economic empowerment and financial autonomy among women.

The initiative aims to equip 15,000 women-led Self-Help Groups (SHGs) with agricultural drones to assist in tasks such as crop monitoring, spraying fertilisers, and sowing seeds.

–IANS

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New Delhi, May 21 (IANS) Amid the surge in unsolicited commercial communications (UCC) or spam voice calls on mobile phones, the Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI) on Tuesday urged the government to ensure a level-playing field in regulatory compliance requirements between telecom service providers (TSPs) and other messaging platforms providing similar communication services.

While the industry continues to assist the Department of Telecommunication (DoT), the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and the Department of Consumer Affairs in addressing the spam calls and SMSs menace, the top industry body said it looks forward to progressive action from the authorities.

Under the TRAI’s Telecom Commercial Communication Customer Preference Regulation (TCCCPR) the industry has developed various modules, which have been “reasonably successful” considering the noticeable decline in the volume of spam originating from SMSs over the last couple of years.

“However, UCC from voice calls, is still an issue that the regulator and TSPs are working together to address,” said Lt Gen Dr SP Kochhar, Director General, COAI.

The issue involves multiple stakeholders — TSPs, telemarketers, aggregators, principal entities (PEs) like banks, financial institutions and real estate agencies.

“TSPs are currently working on bringing a few more models to address the issue of UCC through voice calls. The government has allocated the 140 series for promotional voice calls and has now prescribed the 160 series for transactional and service voice calls,” informed Kochhar.

These modules are being worked upon and designed under discussions between all TSPs and technology partners and will be implemented by TSPs in the coming months, he added.

Further, the digital consent acquisition (DCA) framework is an important module developed by the TSPs, wherein PEs are required to digitally take explicit consent from the users for sending commercial/business communications.

TSPs are trying to engage and onboard various PEs to implement the DCA framework.

The committee formed by the Department of Consumer Affairs is working to prepare draft guidelines under the Consumer Protection Act, 2019, to safeguard consumers from unwarranted commercial communications.

“We believe that these guidelines, once notified, will be helpful in addressing the menace of UCC substantially as it will put a deterrence on the unregistered telemarketers,” said COAI.

–IANS

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New Delhi, May 21 (IANS) Singapore-based early-stage startup investment firm ThinKuvate on Tuesday launched their first India-focused Fund “ThinKuvate India Fund – I” with a total corpus of Rs 100 crore.

The India Fund will look to invest in tech startups across sectors with an initial amount of up to Rs 3 crore. The company aims to invest in 12 to 15 startups every year through this fund.

“From our existing portfolio, we have already invested in Indian startups and the performance of these companies coupled with macros of the Indian economy, growing investors’ interest played a crucial role in ThinKuvate launching an exclusive India fund,” Ritesh Toshniwal, Founding Partner, ThinKuvate, said in a statement.

Moreover, the investment firm mentioned that the the fund launch will also be announced via investor roadshows across cities in a phased manner. In the first phase, the company will roll out the fund in key cities such as Nagpur, Raipur, Bengaluru and Chennai.

ThinKuvate has received the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) approval to launch this AIF CAT 1 Fund in India. With an investor base of nearly 200, the fund expects to reach its first close within this quarter.

“Our fund has been investing in India since 2016 and has a first-hand experience of the large market and growth potential India has to offer to the world,” said Addison Appu, Partner, ThinKuvate.

The fund is founded by Nagpur University alumni Ghanshyam Ahuja, Ritesh Toshniwal and Vikas Saxena.

–IANS

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New Delhi, May 21 (IANS) Billionaire Elon Musk on Tuesday said that his space venture SpaceX is likely to exceed 90 per cent of all Earth’s payload to low-Earth orbit later this year.

Musk said this, in a post on social media platform X, based on a report that showed that SpaceX aced more than half of the 63 orbital launch attempts worldwide in the first quarter of 2024.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO noted that this may further increase to “over 99 per cent” once his huge Starship vehicle is launched.

The 400-foot-tall Starship rocket along with the Heavy Booster aims to help land astronauts on the Moon during the crewed Artemis 3 mission in 2026.

“SpaceX might exceed 90 per cent of all Earth payload to orbit later this year. Once Starship is launching at a high rate, probably >99 per cent,” Musk wrote in a post on X.

“Has to be or we can’t build a city on Mars or base on the Moon. We file almost no patents, so nothing stopping competition from copying us,” he added.

According to a Q1 Launch Report by the Payload website, the five Chinese launchers combined lofted 13.6x less than SpaceX.

Compared to Q1 in 2023, SpaceX’s launch attempts grew by 11 flights in Q1 2024.

Musk had recently announced that the fourth test flight of the Starship vehicle will take place in “about 2 weeks”.

“The primary goal is getting through max re-entry heating. Worth noting that no one has ever succeeded in creating a fully reusable heat shield. Shuttle required >6 months of rework,” he noted.

Meanwhile, Musk’s satellite-based Internet service Starlink crossed 3 million customers in 99 countries.

“Congratulations to the @SpaceX team on passing 3 million customers in 99 countries! And thanks to you for buying @Starlink!,” Musk said.

He said that no long-term contract is required to order high-speed Internet service with Starlink.

It is “easy to order online in 2 minutes,” he said.

–IANS

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New Delhi, May 21 (IANS) Indian startups have come a long way in the last 5 to 10 years and the government’s Startup India programme and several other initiatives “played a pivotal role in getting us to where we are”, Urban Company co-founder Abhiraj Singh Bhal has said.

During an interaction, Bhal told IANS, “When I started 10 years back, we were a small ecosystem and the country had only one unicorn. Today, we are a very large ecosystem, one of the largest in the world. The country now has more than 110 unicorns”.

As of May 2024, the Indian Startup Ecosystem, ranking third worldwide in terms of unicorn count, is collectively valued at $349.67 billion.

Speaking at the ‘Vishesh Sampark Abhiyan’, the co-founder said that the Startup India initiative helped “us brainstorm for hours and create a highly conducive startup ecosystem”.

Bhal also stressed that in the times to come the opportunities are huge for India and the Indian startup system will “only grow from here”.

Meanwhile, a recent report by Tracxn, a leading market intelligence platform, showed that India secured the third position globally in terms of funding raised for the fintech sector in the first quarter (Q1) of this year.

Total funding received by the fintech sector grew by 59 per cent in Q1 2024, compared to Q4 2023, emphasising the robustness of the Indian fintech landscape amid a dynamic economic environment.

–IANS

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