To promote and inculcate a spirit of innovation in India, numerous initiatives have been taken by the Indian government as well as by Industry/academic leaders to encourage and harness breakthrough technology ideas in the society. One of the significant steps is "India Innovation Initiative" or “i3” - a joint initiative of Agilent, Department of Science & Technology, Government of India (DST) & Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), which aims at promoting young innovators and facilitates the commercialization of the innovations and creating an innovation eco-system in the country by sensitizing, encouraging the innovators / innovations.

This initiative is for all innovators in India, above 18 years of age and irrespective of their profession or background (students, professors, industry professionals, individuals or grassroots innovators).

Indian Institute of Management, Ahmadabad (IIM-A) & Young Indians (Yi) are the partners for this initiative. While IIM-A has offered to provide incubation support for business proposal development and commercialization of some of the best innovations, Yi will support with a wider outreach of this significant initiative, confer a Special Yi Next Practices Award and also support in commercialization of select innovations. Interaction with various support organizations involved in the process of commercialization will be facilitated through CII-Raunaq Singh Innovation Grid (www.innovationgrid.org). 

A total of 250 innovations were received from across the country from students, industry professionals, individual & grassroots innovators in various fields such as Life Sciences, Electronics & Communications, IT, Energy and Engineering Technologies. After a first level of screening by an expert panel comprising of eminent scientists and industrialists, the top 40 innovations had been showcased at the i3 National Fair on 27^th October at IIT Delhi. From these, a high level National Jury had selected top 5 innovations (one special innovation) based on the technical feasibility, market potential of the innovation and its impact on the Industry, society and environment. The top 5 innovations at i3 were awarded with a certificate & cash prizes of Rs 1lakh (1^st prize), Rs 75000 (2^nd prize), Rs 50000(3^rd prize) , Rs 25000 (both 4^th & 5^th winner) . Yi has also awarded the winners with a certificate & cash prizes of Rs 35000, Rs 25000, & Rs 15000 to the 1^st, 2^nd & 3^rd winners respectively. Also IIMA is giving commercial support to the top ten innovations.